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If you could travel to any part of the world, where would you go? Is there a place you have always wanted to travel to that is on your bucket list? I have several places on mine. I certainly hope that I am able to visit and discover each one of them. Maybe you have an adventurous spirit like me. We have so much to learn from each other… I know that each time I travel to another part of the world I continue to learn. I also find that our world is becoming more and more globally minded.
I recently had the privilege of presenting at the Midwestern Region Music Therapy conference in Springfield, Missouri. I was talking about the World Federation of Music Therapy and developments in music therapy around the world. It was a delight to spend time with the 30+ students that attended the session. I was impressed by the thoughtful and insightful questions they asked. I was pleased to answer their questions about how to engage in music therapy in a global way. Here were some of the wonderful questions they asked:
• Can I do an international internship?
• How would I go about setting up an international internship?
• What opportunities exist to experience music therapy internationally if my academic institution does not offer a global experience?
• How can I connect with a music therapist in another country?
• How is music therapy practiced in other countries?
• What country or countries are experiencing the greatest growth in music therapy?
• How do music therapists build their profession in a country where music therapy has not existed before?
• If I want to interview a music therapist from another country for a project, how can I find someone to interview?
• How can I connect to music therapy students from another country?
• Is there funding available to provide financial support for students that want to have an international or global music therapy experience?
• How many music therapists are in the world?
It was thrilling to spend time in conversation with these eager globaltarians (yep, I just made that word up) and share our collective excitement for music therapy on a global level. I walked away from the experience feeling great hope for our future as music therapists and for our profession. We are cultivating a new generation of global music therapists and building a broader professional perspective and understanding through this.
Maybe you have questions about music therapy as it connects to another part of the world. If so, I certainly hope you will ask, seek out your own global experience, utilize the resources on the WFMT website, or come to Vienna and Krems, Austria and meet music therapist from over 40 countries around the world.
Globally yours,
Annie Heiderscheit, Ph.D., MT-BC, LMFTFellow of the Association for Music and ImageryInterim President, WFMT
