ABSTRACT
Inspired by George Orwell’s essays, this chapter explores several of the author’s reasons for wishing to write scholarly texts, the most important of which is to help readers better understand how music and the arts in general are powerful modes of communication and persuasion through which their understandings of reality and truth are shaped by all manner of people and institutions. Hence the importance in education of teachers helping students appreciate why and how music and the arts figure so prominently in advertising, politics, social or other media, business, entertainment, religion, the military, and virtually all aspects of everyday life. The chapter prepares the ground for the book by providing necessary social and political context for understanding music’s ubiquity and significance in our lives in a time of growing social instability and authoritarianism. Music and music education are implicated in these political developments but they also have potential for helping to redress social problems.
