My main research interests lie in music and migration, intercultural relations, and collective voice. One strand of my research focuses on the musical lives of migrant and former refugee communities, in emigration, diaspora and resettlement. Another focuses on the functionalisation of music as public pedagogy to enable self-representation and address intergroup conflict. In other projects I’ve examined the construction and experience of ‘diversity’ in secondary school music curricula. My current project is a community-engaged diasporic study about the interface between the musical voice and global labour migration, particularly in relation to Overseas Filipino Workers.
I publish on these topics in journals and edited volumes across ethnomusicology, community music, and music education, and serve on the editorial boards of International Journal of Community Music and Research Studies in Music Education.
My teaching for the Music Faculty includes convening courses on ‘Foundations in the Study of Music’, ‘Music in the Community’, ‘History and Philosophy of Music Education’, and ‘Music Education: Practice and Pedagogy’. In addition to these courses, at Somerville College, I provide tutorials for the modules on ‘Musical Thought and Scholarship’, ‘Critical Studies in Ethnomusicology’, ‘World Jazz’, and ‘Women in Popular Music’.
Recent postgraduate supervisees’ dissertation titles include, ‘Institutional music education and public pedagogy in Afghanistan’ (DPhil), ‘Music and trust in international relations: Bilateral relationship between Canada and France’ (DPhil), ‘Black musicians and accessibility to music education and the classical music industry, UK and US’ (MPhil), ‘Music integration programmes for migrants in North-Rhine Westphalia, Germany’ (MPhil).
Music education
Community music
Applied ethnomusicology
Secondary school music curricula
Migration and diaspora
Intercultural relations and organised cultural encounters
The below-listed publications authored under the name Samantha Sebastian Dieckmann or Samantha Dieckmann.
Encountering publicness and multiculture: Public pedagogy with a multilingual community choir. 2025 (forthcoming). Journal article. Ethnomusicology.
Voicing voicing: Attuning to the material in studio recording the Lullaby Choir. 2024. Journal article. Music Education Research.
Building bridges: Translating refugee narratives for public audiences with arts-based media. Journal article. Journal of Intercultural Studies. Co-author with Rose Campion.
War and conflict in resettlement contexts: Music in children’s everyday lives. 2023. Book chapter. Oxford Handbook of Early Childhood Music Learning and Development. Co-author with Kathryn Marsh.
Addressing tribalism in displacement: Self-directed music activities in Blacktown’s South Sudanese community. 2020. Book chapter. My Body was Left on the Street: Music Education and Displacement.
From dropping out to dropping in: Exploring why individuals cease participation in musical activities and the support needed to reengage them. 2020. Journal article. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts. Co-author with Amanda Krause, Melissa Kirby and Jane W. Davidson.
Peace, empathy and conciliation through music. 2019. Journal special issue. International Journal of Community Music. Co-editor with Jane W. Davidson.
Bridging musical worlds: the effects of musical collaboration between student musician-educators and South Sudanese Australian youth. 2019. Book chapter. Visions of Intercultural Music Teacher Education. Co-author with Kathryn Marsh and Catherine Ingram.
Emotions. 2018. Journal article (co-authored). Music and Arts in Action. (Special issue: Keywords for music in peacebuilding). Co-author with Jane W. Davidson.
Organised cultural encounters: Collaboration and intercultural contact in a lullaby choir. 2018. Journal article. The World of Music (New Series). Co-author with Jane W. Davidson.
Constructing whiteness in Blacktown: Everyday encounters with diversity in Australia’s music. 2018. Book chapter. Diversity in Australia’s music: Themes Past, Present and for the Future.
