Musical Spaces for Imagining the Future: Ukrainian Children’s Experiences of Forced Migration

The article highlights the experience of creating participatory music workshops for Ukrainian children in Ireland as a safe space for emotional expression and imagining the future in the context of forced migration. Following the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Ireland has become one of the European countries with the highest proportion of Ukrainian children enrolled in mainstream schools. The study outlines an approach taken within the MUSPACE project, where music emerged as a resource for hope and agency, where children's improvisation and co-creation contributed to the understanding of traumatic experiences and the construction of future imaginings. This approach draws on the ideas of Paulo Freire (1992; 2004), who conceptualised the pedagogy of hope as a central imperative of emancipatory education. In contexts of forced migration and war, hope becomes crucial, as it concerns the capacity to imagine a future amid uncertainty and disrupted temporal continuity. The qualitative case study is based on three months of participant observation conducted by a Ukrainian music educator in an Irish primary school in Limerick in 2024, supported by the facilitator’s reflective logs and focus interviews with fourteen Ukrainian children aged 9–11. The importance of participatory practices as a space for social interaction and agency for children who have experienced war is highlighted. In particular, the findings contend that the integration of singing, free movement and musical improvisation supported the emotional, social and cultural needs of Ukrainian children and fostered a shared experience of hope.