Jackson State University Band Director Dowell Taylor is being honored as a 2014 Mississippi Humanities Teacher Award winner.
The assistant professor of music and director of The Sonic Boom of the South marching band gave a speech Thursday in recognition of the Mississippi Humanities Council award.
Speaking on The Arts: A Struggle for Survival, Taylor said he was “honored and pleased to be recognized” by the Humanities Council and chose this topic as it relates to the performing arts.
Taylor said he was a product of the Jackson Public Schools and attended Brinkley High School until desegregation forced him to go to Callaway High School.
Music and performing arts were a priority when he was a JPS student, he said, but “with the stroke of a pen began the long downward spiral to where we are today.”
Detailing dwindling budgets and support in the public schools, he showed a photo of a room with empty chairs at Wingfield High School where there is no instrumental program, he said. And that erosion of support is occurring nationwide.
“We must do whatever it takes to support music and arts programs in the United States,” he said.
Showing a photo of young person standing in a room with white walls, without form or substance, he said: “It’s imperative to keep the color and the sounds in our lives.”
Taylor noted that in Detroit the city was looking for ways to save money and slashed funding for the arts, laying off teachers. Cars and music “made” Detroit, he said, asking: Can you imagine what we would be like without Motown?
We live in a world pressing for the sacrifice of each person’s uniqueness, he said, as well as removing group cultural expression. Each one of us has a responsibility to stand up against cutbacks in funding and support for the arts.
“It’s up to us to keep artistic expression alive,” he said, to a standing ovation at the F.D. Hall Music Center Recital Hall.
Taylor has served as band director since 2012. He also served from 1984-1992.
Before the speech, Liberal Arts College Interim Dean Dr. Deborah Barnes noted that in her native North Carolina, Gov. Pat McCrory said last year he would like to withdraw support for liberal arts programs in public universities.
“This is an outrage,” she said.
According to Inside Higher Education magazine, McCrory’s comments echo statements made by a number of Republican governors — including those in Texas, Florida and Wisconsin — who have questioned the value of liberal arts instruction and humanities degrees at public colleges and universities.
We are moving toward a STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) society, Barnes noted, but that cannot be at the expense of the arts and humanities.
Dr. Jean Chamberlain, chair of the Department of English and Modern Foreign Languages, represented the Humanities Council at the presentation. Taylor will be recognized with 30 other honorees at a Humanities Council award ceremony later, she said.
“The humanities and the arts are for everyone,” Chamberlain said.