Subjectivity and identity are newly configured within cyberspace and technologically mediated environments. The global musical subject is thus defined and framed within global empires and techno-culture in ways not unrelated to political interests. 'Being musical' becomes a critical issue. The New Zealand music curriculum resonates with reflections of global 'progress', and music educators, as cultural workers, therefore require an awareness of political and strategic conceptions of musical knowledge as well as a familiarity with the discourses through which the work of music education is enframed. Where technology enters hegemonic discourses of musical knowledge, the relationship between global communication and technology requires interrogation, and unquestioned past and present curriculum 'certainties' come under scrutiny.In a global cyber economy embedded with inequalities in power relations, cyberspace and its technologically mediated environments give birth to new paradigms of subjectivity and identity. The global musical subject is defined and framed within global empires and techno-culture in ways not unrelated to political interests. 'Being musical'-the protection of musicality-becomes a critical issue where technology orders and constructs a politics of musical knowledge. The New Zealand music curriculum, no less than other subject areas, resonates with reflections of global 'progress' at a local level under the strategies of the global knowledge economy and music education falls into line under the globalizing constructions of knowledge. Therefore, what becomes imperative for music educators as cultural workers is an awareness of political and strategic conceptions of musical knowledge and a familiarity with the discourses through which the work of music education is enframed. Where technology enters hegemonic and universalist discourses of musical knowledge as in music curricula, the relationship between global communication and technology requires recognition. Unquestioned past curriculum certainties come under scrutiny.

Through an engagement with the notion of 'globalisation' and 'subjectivity', I argue that the politics of musical knowledge involved in global empires not only defines and enframes the global musical subject, but subverts impulses towards democratic practices. The subjectifying experiences thus provided require music education's engagement with the state of musical knowledge in the postmodern condition-a critical awareness of the revolutionising of the arts, music, and communication through digital aesthetics. Technological ordering processes impinge upon institutional sites such as schools through curriculum prescriptions where discourses of official music educational knowledge are conditioned and unquestioned. Musical production is increasingly framed on technology's terms. I interrogate technology in the New Zealand music curriculum, exemplifying the political construction of musical knowledge within the global neoliberal policy environment. Collective memory involves a politics of knowledge, no less a politics of musical knowledge. The sites of construction of community in the musical organisation of collective memory require interrogation for ideological purposes. Critical philosophical questions therefore need to be brought to the music educators' table about technology. Heidegger's questioning concerning technology exposes ontological questions concerning technology's role in the ordering and construction of musicality as a site of identity-'being musical' and the protection of musicality become critical issues. Enlightenment metanarratives of individualism, autonomy and freedom are reinvoked suggesting the wisdom of Lyotard's (1984) claim that postmodernism is modernism in its "nascent state".

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This paper is the pedagogical embodiment of accumulated understandings drawn from discussions of postmodern and poststructuralist theory and suggests some forms that an ethical music education might take. Music education in the postmodern era calls for and revives an attention to the relations between music and cultural narrative. Students bring diverse locational and historical narratives to the classroom. Bearing this in mind, this paper examines difference in the context of a music education that is now charged with both obligations as a result of internationalism, and with a role in resistance to the homogenising forces of globalisation. It suggests music education as a possible site for a critical concept of knowledge and as a dynamic site of cultural narrative.