Edvin Østergaard

• Professor
• Professor (Full) at Norwegian University of Life Sciences

This exposition is published as part of Edvin Østergaard, ‘Music-in-Becoming’, in "Practices of Phenomenological and Artistic Research", (eds.) Alex Arteaga, Emma Cocker, Erika Goble, Juha Himanka, Phenomenology & Practice, [Vol. 17, No.1, 2022], ISSN 1913-4711. See here: https://journals.library.ualberta.ca/pandpr/index.php/pandpr/index

In this article, Music-in-Becoming, I explore the integrative practices of composing music and researching its emergence. The article reports from an artistic research project on composition as lived experience. The music that serves as the raw material for my inquiry consists of four pieces for three overtone-skilled singers and one double bass pl...

In this article, I explore the music-in-becoming as a dialogue. The thesis of my inquiry is that during musical composition, the composer’s listening is marked by both activeness and receptiveness; actively structuring the sounding work, and receptively letting the work express itself as it takes its form. Composer and work merge in sudden moments...

Un repaso de las definiciones de agroecología como ciencia, un conjunto de prácticas y un movimiento (Wezel, 2009) proporciona ejemplos de cómo este término se aplica en diferentes países y por grupos diversos para describir una amplia gama de actividades relacionadas con la investigación, la aplicación, y el activismo. Con frecuencia colegas acadé...

In the article, I argue that teachers can promote their students' audial attention, in general education as well as in science education, by drawing on musicians' and composers' refined listening skills. I investigate the act of listening phenomenologically by exploring listening in its multiple forms. With reference to Heidegger's philosophy of ex...

Sustainability education is an interdisciplinary endeavor and should thus in-clude music as well. In this paper, I explore the under-researched field of music and sustainability education. My central thesis is that music and attentive listening have a potential of strengthening students’ aesthetic experience and world bonding, two essential element...

In the cave allegory, Plato illustrates his theory of ideas by showing that the world man senses and tries to understand, actually only is a dim representation of the real world. We know the allegory for its light and shadow; however, there is also sound and echo in the cave. In this article, I discuss whether the narrative of the prisoners in the...

Focus of this article is the current situation characterized by students’ de-rootedness and possible measures to improve the situation within the frame of education for sustainable development. My main line of argument is that science teachers can practice teaching in such a way that students are brought in deeper contact to the environment. I disc...

In this chapter, my main educational argument is that music can provide an entrance into aesthetic experience of nature. Based on my own experiences as composer and researcher with the ongoing art-science project Pendulum Dialogues, I discuss how artistic-scientific dialogues with the pendulum might reveal the world’s ontological dimensions. I grou...

The question of how to foster rooting in science education points towards a double challenge; efforts to prevent (further) uprooting and efforts to promote rooting/re-rooting. Wolff-Michael Roth’s paper discusses the uprooting/rooting pair of concepts, students’ feeling of alienation and loss of fundamental sense of the earth as ground, and potenti...

Phenomenon-based learning in agroecology provides a rationale and platform for bridging academia and society. Learning based on reflective experiences on farms and in communities has provided the foundation and the core of an agroecology course in Norway since 2000. Student teams work with university teachers and stakeholders in ‘open-ended cases’...

Purpose: This article examines and evaluates the potential contributions from action learning and action research with stakeholders to higher education in agriculture and food systems.Design/Methodology/Approach: The research is based on our experiences over the past two decades of running PhD courses and an MSc degree programme in Agroecology in N...

Two of the most influential works of the Western nineteenth century were completed in 1859: Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species and Richard Wagner’s opera Tristan and Isolde. Although created within very different cultural traditions, these works show some striking similarities: both brought about a critical, long-lasting debate and caused confl...

Report of a one week seminar with six participants held in Greece in December 2010. All participants are engaged in the fields of art, science and teaching. The participants did exercises together, reflected on the processes and held presentations for the group on topics relevant for the field. How can a coalescence of art and science become teachi...

Agroecology is described as an integrative and systemic approach to research and education in farming and food systems. This emerging area involves the ecology of food systems and the complexity of multiple challenges and stakeholders whose interests must be addressed. The quest for resilient and sustainable production and food systems is taking pl...

Leonardo da Vinci’s careful descriptions of the reflection of light by the moon inspired the author to compose a piece for choir on ways of perceiving the moon. In The Two Moons, Leonardo’s words are contrasted with two additional texts: facts from a textbook on astronomy and a poem by Denise Levertov. The author discusses the challenge of transfor...

Preparing students for a complex and dynamic future is a challenge for educators. This article explores three crucial issues related to agroecological education and learning: (1) the phenomenological foundation for learning agroecology in higher education; (2) the process of students' interactions with a wide range of various learners within and ou...

This paper is a phenomenological critique of some of the basic notions informing much of the research in and practice of science education (SE) today. It is suggested that the philosophical grounds of SE are in need of three “reversals of primacy”: the ontological primacy of the perceptual lifeworld must replace that of abstract scientific models;...

This article is a review of applications of phenomenology, as a philosophy of knowledge and qualitative research approach, to the field of science education (SE). The purpose is to give an overview of work that has been done as well as to assess it and discuss its possibilities of future development. We ask: what attempts for connecting phenomenolo...

The work Albert Einstein published in 1905 led to a revolution in physics and the way nature is explained. At the same time, his physics touches on profound existential questions which are also dwelt upon in the arts. This article addresses the relatedness of music and physics, art and science. The point of departure is my composition The Einstein...

The aim of this article is to discuss the importance of local initiatives for distribution of organic food. This subject is discussed both in relation to how such initiatives may affect the overall conventional food system and the possible implications for development of a more sustainable food system. The article is based on findings from three di...

Action education provides an appropriate set of methods for learning about the complexities of farming and food systems. Agroecology provides the framework to organise learning opportunities for students interested in solving challenges in today's world. Our programmes in agroecology concentrate on discovery and learning. Rather than agroecological...

This paper reports from a 2 year empirical study of pre-service science teachers exploring the phenomenon of sound. The research design is based on the phenomenological approach to science education, starting from careful descriptions of phenomena as experienced before introducing scientific concepts. The purpose of our study is to explore how scie...