Sex and Geographic Representation in Two Music Education History Books

The purpose of this study was to examine sex and geographic representation in two well-known books on the history of American music education: History of Public School Music in the United States by Edward Bailey Birge (1937/1966) and A History of American Music Education by Michael L. Mark and Charles L. Gary (1992). The number of different individuals mentioned, total number of mentions, and number of lines devoted to each individual were categorized by sex and geographical region. Photographic evidence was examined in a like manner. The authors of both books, published 55 years apart, provided statistically significant inequitable representation with regard to sex and region of the country. On the other hand, the two books are remarkably similar with regard to the variables examined. The researcher posits the "top-down" approach to historiography as the main reason for the inequitable representations.