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Papers by David Dennis

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Pamela M. Potter, Most German of the Arts: Musicology and Society from the Weimar Republic to the End of Hitler’s Reich (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1998)

German Studies Review, 2000

Research paper thumbnail of Beethoven in National Socialist Political Culture

We will constantly achieve success if we stride forward on the highpoints of [our] spiritual heri... more We will constantly achieve success if we stride forward on the highpoints of [our] spiritual heritage...: if we stride forward from Beethoven to Hitler. Eugen Hadamovsky, (1934)[1] Sometime in 1934, shortly before emigrating from Germany, the photo journalist Alfred Eisenstaedt did a story on the Beethovenhaus in Bonn. Having climbed the narrow steps of the apartment, he prepared to take a shot of the cramped attic room where the great composer had been born. "By sheer coincidence," in his words, "the Nazis came into the room.. . and laid a wreath with a swastika at the base of [Beethoven's] bust in honor of the Führer's birthday. After they left, I took the picture both with and without the swastika. I was a little afraid to remove it, but I was willing to take a chance for a good picture."[2] Beyond the action of the few Nazis involved or the risky counteraction of Eisenstaedt, this appropriation of a Beethoven icon belonged to was part of a grand propaganda scheme undertaken by the cultural politicians of National Socialism. Their purpose was to persuade the German public to revere Ludwig van Beethoven not only as a great composer, but as a man who had held views comparable to those of Nazi leaders. In fact, people were expected to believe that he had attempted to express them in his music.

Research paper thumbnail of Michael H. Kater, "Carl Orff im Dritten Reich," Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 43, 1 (January 1995): 1-35

Research paper thumbnail of Does Beethoven Have to Roll Over? Not If We Flip Him!” paper for session: “Who’s Afraid of High Culture?”

Research paper thumbnail of Johannes Brahms's Requiem eines Unpolitischen

Here they talk and talk; he is silent. There the almighty racket of oh-so progressive and fine-so... more Here they talk and talk; he is silent. There the almighty racket of oh-so progressive and fine-sounding theories. Here active silence, silent action.-Wilhelm Furtwängler[1] It is easy to attribute all sorts of motives to a man who is not keen on answering and explaining.-Johannes Brahms[2] In a letter of 24 April 1865, Johannes Brahms wrote to Clara Schumann of a "choral piece" he was projecting. Never sure whether or not his compositions would end up at the end of a lighted cigar, Brahms asked that she "read here the beautiful words with which it begins" since "this may yet evaporate to nothing." He then copied out the first two stanzas of what indeed came to be A German Requiem, op. 45: Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. They go forth and weep, and bear precious seed and come joyfully bearing their sheaves. Indicating that "I compiled the text for myself from the Bible," Brahms then related words from the second movement: For all flesh is as grass and the splendor of man is like the flower of the field. The grass withers and the flower falls away. "You could appreciate such a German text as much as the customary Latin one, couldn't you?" he asked Clara, "I have high hopes for putting together a unity of sorts, and hope to retain courage and desire for once."[3] Here Brahms hinted, in his usual cryptic and modest way, that he was composing his first grand work since Robert Schumann had prematurely announced that the "Young Kreisler" (as he often signed himself) was "fated to give the highest expression to the times." Brahms worked intensively on the piece from February to December 1866. A preliminary run-through of the first three movements took place at the Vienna Musikverein in December, 1867, and the first complete performance occurred on Good Friday, the 10 th of April, 1868 in the Protestant cathedral of Bremen. Through 1869 and 1870, A German Requiem was performed in churches and halls across German and Austrian lands, including Köln,

Research paper thumbnail of The Nazi War on Weimar 'Asphalt Culture'" for "Dissonance: Music and Globalization since Edison's Phonograph

Many thanks to Professors Kinderman and Liebersohn for the invitation to participate in this semi... more Many thanks to Professors Kinderman and Liebersohn for the invitation to participate in this seminar. It is a great pleasure to join you in discussing the issues of modernism in Weimar culture, and responses to it. Professors Kinderman and Liebersohn have asked me to present some material from my recent book, Inhumanities: Nazi Interpretations of Western Culture as it pertains to notions of "dissonance" during the Weimar Republic.

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Jonathan Petropoulos, Art as Politics in the Third Reich (Chapel Hill: North Carolina U.P., 1996)

The American Historical Review, 1997

Research paper thumbnail of Wagner in the "Cult of Art in Nazi Germany

In his book on aesthetics and Nazi politics, translated in 2004 as The Cult of Art in Nazi German... more In his book on aesthetics and Nazi politics, translated in 2004 as The Cult of Art in Nazi Germany, Eric Michaud, Director of Studies at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, wrote that National Socialist attention to the arts was intended "to present the broken [German] Volk with an image of its 'eternal Geist' and to hold up to it a mirror capable of restoring to it the strength to love itself." 1 I came upon this, among other ideas of Michaud, when preparing the conceptual framework for my own book, Inhumanities: Nazi Interpretations of Western Culture, just released by Cambridge University Press. Considering his book last year, I found a number of Michaud's concepts very intriguing, but only made general references to them in my Introduction and Conclusion. The gist of these ideas will be familiar to readers of George Mosse, whom Michaud should have cited more vigorously. However, I found that Michaud put some of the key concepts of the History of Nazi Culture more strongly than I have read elsewhere, and also that they seemed to resonate with much of the material I uncovered in my research. Above all, Michaud insisted that Nazi cultural politics was not just a matter of "propagandizing" the party platform in cultural terms. Instead, he insisted that it was a central component of the National Socialist world view, with an active, not merely reflective, role in the life and actions of the Nazi party and regime. As Michaud put it, we cannot "account for this phenomenon by simply resorting to the term propaganda" and assuming that Nazism was just "making art serve its political ends." 2 To see what Mosse termed "Nazi culture" as mere propaganda is an underestimation of its seminal function in the workings of National Socialism. In Michaud's words, again, through Nazi representations of Cultural History-"the Geist, the internal or spiritual Reich, was phenomenalized. .. Hitler was convinced that German art contained the power that. .. could save the sick Germans. In answer to party militants who [questioned] the need to 'sacrifice so much to art,'.. . he retorted confidently that what had to be achieved was no less than the 'strengthening of the protective moral armor of the nation."' 3 Thus did references to the History of Western Humanities-as constructed according to a fairly longstanding "Germanic" point of view-have an formative function in the Nazi program. Through them, the Volk would, as Michaud wrote, "fabricate its own ideal image. .. that would constitute the model and guide capable of propelling it toward its own salvation. Neither

Research paper thumbnail of Their Meister's Voice: Nazi Reception of Richard Wagner and His Works in the Völkischer Beobachter

Research paper thumbnail of War on Modern Music and Music in Modern War: Voelkischer Beobachter Reception of 20th Century Composers

Recent scholarship on Nazi music policy pays little attention to the main party newspaper, the Vö... more Recent scholarship on Nazi music policy pays little attention to the main party newspaper, the Völkischer Beobachter, or comparable publications for the general public. Most work concentrates on publications Nazis targeted at expert audiences, in this case music journals. But to think our histories of Nazi music politics are complete without comprehensive analysis of the party daily is premature. One learns from this resource precisely what Nazi propagandists wanted average party members and Germans in general, not just top-level officials and scholars, to think-even about music. Therein, we see how contributors placed a Nazi "spin" on music history and composer's biographies. Using heretofore untranslated materials, this article will fill part of this gap in our historiography of Nazi music policy. It will first detail Völkischer Beobachter attacks on prominent representatives of musical modernism in the Weimar era. Thereafter, this presentation will cover "acceptable" alternatives to Weimar decadence that the Völkischer Beobachter posited from the so-called Era of Struggle [Kampfzeit ] through the Third Reich. With the war, however, the theme most emphasized in Völkischer Beobachter cultural coverage was militarism. My paper will conclude with a survey of how revered figures such as Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, and Wagner were scrutinized for indications that they could serve as inspiration for the German Volk at war. "WEIMAR MUSIC" IN THE VÖLKISCHER BEOBACHTER With its outlook so strongly rooted in the romantic German music tradition, what the Völkischer Beobachter found most disgraceful in Weimar culture was cultivation of musical modernism, the whole of which it referred to as, at best, the "farcical imitation of a carnival barker selling a tent full of musical freaks,"[1] and, at worst, " Jewish terror in music."[2] The newspaper stood firm in its rejection of works by "Jews and assorted foreigners" or Germans who supposedly associated with "international, Jewish circles"[3]-applauding "brave acts of resistance" such as when a lone Nazi [Hakenkreuzler] stood up and shouted "pfui" at a concert of Schoenberg, Bartok, Hindemith, Stravinsky, and Bartok.[4] The "musical foreigner" whom the Völkischer Beobachter derided most was Igor Stravinsky. While an early attack identified him as a "spiritual Polack," [5] Fritz Stege described Stravinsky as a "Russian composer with half-Asiatic instincts hidden under the cover of French civilization" who simply knew how to

Research paper thumbnail of “Robert Schumann and the German Revolution of 1848,” for “Music and Revolution,” concert and lecture series

Recommended Citation Dennis, David B.. “Robert Schumann and the German Revolution of 1848,” for “... more Recommended Citation Dennis, David B.. “Robert Schumann and the German Revolution of 1848,” for “Music and Revolution,” concert and lecture series. The American Bach Project and supported by the Wisconsin Humanities Council as part of the State of Wisconsin Sesquicentennial Observances, All Saints Cathedral, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, , : , 1998. Retrieved from Loyola eCommons, History: Faculty Publications and Other Works,

Research paper thumbnail of Computer Science and Cultural History: A Dialogue

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Michael Kater, The Twisted Muse: Musicians and their Music in the Third Reich (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997)

Research paper thumbnail of History of Computing

The social and organizational history of humanity is intricately entangled with the history of te... more The social and organizational history of humanity is intricately entangled with the history of technology in general and the technology of information in particular. Advances in this area have often been closely involved in social and political transformations. While the contemporary period is often referred to by such names as the Computing and Information Age, this is the culmination of a series of historical transformations that have been centuries in the making. This course will provide a venue for students to learn about history through the evolution of number systems and arithmetic, calculating and computing machines, and advanced communication technology via the Internet. Students who take this course will attain a degree of technological literacy while studying core historical concepts. Students who complete this course will learn the key vocabulary of the computing discipline, which is playing a significant role in modern human thought and new media communications. The Hist...

Research paper thumbnail of The Most German of All German Operas": Die Meistersinger through the Lens of the Third Reich

In college classrooms across the United States, a common feature of many courses covering modern ... more In college classrooms across the United States, a common feature of many courses covering modern German history is a screening of Leni Riefenstahl's propaganda film promoting the 1934 Nazi Party rally at Number~. Usually Triumph des Willens (Triumph of the Will), which includes no narration, is presented with commentary by instructors or explanatory notes. These explications often include assertions that the music accompanying Riefenstahl's opening imagery comes from Richard Wagner's Die Meistersinger van Nurnberg: "For 68 seconds the screen remains dark. From this cinematic 'void' there gradually emerges the solemn, swelling sound of the overture from Wagner's Mastersingers of Nuremberg," reads one guide to the movie. "Herbert Windt, a classical composer, created the Wagnerian-style orchestral scores which provide a background to the film,"

Research paper thumbnail of “Music in the ‘Cult of Art’ of Nazi Germany” for the “Epistemic Transitions and Social Change in the German Humanities: Aesthetics, Ideology, Culture and Memory” session

In his book on aesthetics and Nazi politics, translated as The Cult of Art in Nazi Germany, Eric ... more In his book on aesthetics and Nazi politics, translated as The Cult of Art in Nazi Germany, Eric Michaud wrote that the National Socialist attention to the arts was intended "to present the broken Volk with an image of its 'eternal Geist' and to hold up to it a mirror capable of restoring to it the strength to love itself." 1 In preparing the conceptual framework for my own book, just released by Cambridge University Press, I came upon this, among other ideas of Michaud, who is Director of Studies at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, somewhat late in the game. His book was originally published by Gallimard in 1996, and then translated into English in 2004. Considering it last year, I found a number of his concepts very intriguing, but was only able to make general references to them in my Introduction and Conclusion. Many of these ideas will be familiar to readers of George L. Mosse, whom Michaud should have cited more vigorously. However, I found that Michaud put some of the key concepts of the History of Nazi Culture more strongly than I have read elsewhere, and also that they seemed to resonate with much of the material I uncovered in my research.

Research paper thumbnail of Review Essay on Recent Literature about Music and German Politics

Research paper thumbnail of Honor your German masters : The use and abuse of classical composers in Nazi Propaganda

Recent scholarship on Nazi music policy pays little attention to the main party newspaper, the Vo... more Recent scholarship on Nazi music policy pays little attention to the main party newspaper, the Volkischer Beobachter, or comparable Nazi publications for the general public. Most work concentrates on publications Nazis targeted at expert audiences, in this case music scholars. To think our histories of Nazi music politics are complete without comprehensive analysis of the party daily is premature. Perusing articles and images that described every phase of Hitler's rise to power and the world war from the perspective of committed party members, one learns what Nazi propagandists wanted average party members and Germans in general, not just top-level officials and scholars, to think-even about music. Therein, we see how propagandists placed a Nazi "spin" on music history, musicology, and composers' biographies. Using heretofore untranslated materials, I have detailed the terms by which Nazi propagandists incorporated the tradition of eighteenth-century German music i...

Research paper thumbnail of “Beethoven in National Socialist Political Culture,” paper for the “Musicology Colloquium Series

We will constantly achieve success if we stride forward on the highpoints of [our] spiritual heri... more We will constantly achieve success if we stride forward on the highpoints of [our] spiritual heritage...: if we stride forward from Beethoven to Hitler. Eugen Hadamovsky, (1934)[1] Sometime in 1934, shortly before emigrating from Germany, the photo journalist Alfred Eisenstaedt did a story on the Beethovenhaus in Bonn. Having climbed the narrow steps of the apartment, he prepared to take a shot of the cramped attic room where the great composer had been born. "By sheer coincidence," in his words, "the Nazis came into the room.. . and laid a wreath with a swastika at the base of [Beethoven's] bust in honor of the Führer's birthday. After they left, I took the picture both with and without the swastika. I was a little afraid to remove it, but I was willing to take a chance for a good picture."[2] Beyond the action of the few Nazis involved or the risky counteraction of Eisenstaedt, this appropriation of a Beethoven icon belonged to was part of a grand propaganda scheme undertaken by the cultural politicians of National Socialism. Their purpose was to persuade the German public to revere Ludwig van Beethoven not only as a great composer, but as a man who had held views comparable to those of Nazi leaders. In fact, people were expected to believe that he had attempted to express them in his music.

Research paper thumbnail of “Music Reception in the Völkischer Beobachter,” paper for the “Music, Politics, and the State” session

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Pamela M. Potter, Most German of the Arts: Musicology and Society from the Weimar Republic to the End of Hitler’s Reich (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1998)

German Studies Review, 2000

Research paper thumbnail of Beethoven in National Socialist Political Culture

We will constantly achieve success if we stride forward on the highpoints of [our] spiritual heri... more We will constantly achieve success if we stride forward on the highpoints of [our] spiritual heritage...: if we stride forward from Beethoven to Hitler. Eugen Hadamovsky, (1934)[1] Sometime in 1934, shortly before emigrating from Germany, the photo journalist Alfred Eisenstaedt did a story on the Beethovenhaus in Bonn. Having climbed the narrow steps of the apartment, he prepared to take a shot of the cramped attic room where the great composer had been born. "By sheer coincidence," in his words, "the Nazis came into the room.. . and laid a wreath with a swastika at the base of [Beethoven's] bust in honor of the Führer's birthday. After they left, I took the picture both with and without the swastika. I was a little afraid to remove it, but I was willing to take a chance for a good picture."[2] Beyond the action of the few Nazis involved or the risky counteraction of Eisenstaedt, this appropriation of a Beethoven icon belonged to was part of a grand propaganda scheme undertaken by the cultural politicians of National Socialism. Their purpose was to persuade the German public to revere Ludwig van Beethoven not only as a great composer, but as a man who had held views comparable to those of Nazi leaders. In fact, people were expected to believe that he had attempted to express them in his music.

Research paper thumbnail of Michael H. Kater, "Carl Orff im Dritten Reich," Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 43, 1 (January 1995): 1-35

Research paper thumbnail of Does Beethoven Have to Roll Over? Not If We Flip Him!” paper for session: “Who’s Afraid of High Culture?”

Research paper thumbnail of Johannes Brahms's Requiem eines Unpolitischen

Here they talk and talk; he is silent. There the almighty racket of oh-so progressive and fine-so... more Here they talk and talk; he is silent. There the almighty racket of oh-so progressive and fine-sounding theories. Here active silence, silent action.-Wilhelm Furtwängler[1] It is easy to attribute all sorts of motives to a man who is not keen on answering and explaining.-Johannes Brahms[2] In a letter of 24 April 1865, Johannes Brahms wrote to Clara Schumann of a "choral piece" he was projecting. Never sure whether or not his compositions would end up at the end of a lighted cigar, Brahms asked that she "read here the beautiful words with which it begins" since "this may yet evaporate to nothing." He then copied out the first two stanzas of what indeed came to be A German Requiem, op. 45: Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. They go forth and weep, and bear precious seed and come joyfully bearing their sheaves. Indicating that "I compiled the text for myself from the Bible," Brahms then related words from the second movement: For all flesh is as grass and the splendor of man is like the flower of the field. The grass withers and the flower falls away. "You could appreciate such a German text as much as the customary Latin one, couldn't you?" he asked Clara, "I have high hopes for putting together a unity of sorts, and hope to retain courage and desire for once."[3] Here Brahms hinted, in his usual cryptic and modest way, that he was composing his first grand work since Robert Schumann had prematurely announced that the "Young Kreisler" (as he often signed himself) was "fated to give the highest expression to the times." Brahms worked intensively on the piece from February to December 1866. A preliminary run-through of the first three movements took place at the Vienna Musikverein in December, 1867, and the first complete performance occurred on Good Friday, the 10 th of April, 1868 in the Protestant cathedral of Bremen. Through 1869 and 1870, A German Requiem was performed in churches and halls across German and Austrian lands, including Köln,

Research paper thumbnail of The Nazi War on Weimar 'Asphalt Culture'" for "Dissonance: Music and Globalization since Edison's Phonograph

Many thanks to Professors Kinderman and Liebersohn for the invitation to participate in this semi... more Many thanks to Professors Kinderman and Liebersohn for the invitation to participate in this seminar. It is a great pleasure to join you in discussing the issues of modernism in Weimar culture, and responses to it. Professors Kinderman and Liebersohn have asked me to present some material from my recent book, Inhumanities: Nazi Interpretations of Western Culture as it pertains to notions of "dissonance" during the Weimar Republic.

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Jonathan Petropoulos, Art as Politics in the Third Reich (Chapel Hill: North Carolina U.P., 1996)

The American Historical Review, 1997

Research paper thumbnail of Wagner in the "Cult of Art in Nazi Germany

In his book on aesthetics and Nazi politics, translated in 2004 as The Cult of Art in Nazi German... more In his book on aesthetics and Nazi politics, translated in 2004 as The Cult of Art in Nazi Germany, Eric Michaud, Director of Studies at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, wrote that National Socialist attention to the arts was intended "to present the broken [German] Volk with an image of its 'eternal Geist' and to hold up to it a mirror capable of restoring to it the strength to love itself." 1 I came upon this, among other ideas of Michaud, when preparing the conceptual framework for my own book, Inhumanities: Nazi Interpretations of Western Culture, just released by Cambridge University Press. Considering his book last year, I found a number of Michaud's concepts very intriguing, but only made general references to them in my Introduction and Conclusion. The gist of these ideas will be familiar to readers of George Mosse, whom Michaud should have cited more vigorously. However, I found that Michaud put some of the key concepts of the History of Nazi Culture more strongly than I have read elsewhere, and also that they seemed to resonate with much of the material I uncovered in my research. Above all, Michaud insisted that Nazi cultural politics was not just a matter of "propagandizing" the party platform in cultural terms. Instead, he insisted that it was a central component of the National Socialist world view, with an active, not merely reflective, role in the life and actions of the Nazi party and regime. As Michaud put it, we cannot "account for this phenomenon by simply resorting to the term propaganda" and assuming that Nazism was just "making art serve its political ends." 2 To see what Mosse termed "Nazi culture" as mere propaganda is an underestimation of its seminal function in the workings of National Socialism. In Michaud's words, again, through Nazi representations of Cultural History-"the Geist, the internal or spiritual Reich, was phenomenalized. .. Hitler was convinced that German art contained the power that. .. could save the sick Germans. In answer to party militants who [questioned] the need to 'sacrifice so much to art,'.. . he retorted confidently that what had to be achieved was no less than the 'strengthening of the protective moral armor of the nation."' 3 Thus did references to the History of Western Humanities-as constructed according to a fairly longstanding "Germanic" point of view-have an formative function in the Nazi program. Through them, the Volk would, as Michaud wrote, "fabricate its own ideal image. .. that would constitute the model and guide capable of propelling it toward its own salvation. Neither

Research paper thumbnail of Their Meister's Voice: Nazi Reception of Richard Wagner and His Works in the Völkischer Beobachter

Research paper thumbnail of War on Modern Music and Music in Modern War: Voelkischer Beobachter Reception of 20th Century Composers

Recent scholarship on Nazi music policy pays little attention to the main party newspaper, the Vö... more Recent scholarship on Nazi music policy pays little attention to the main party newspaper, the Völkischer Beobachter, or comparable publications for the general public. Most work concentrates on publications Nazis targeted at expert audiences, in this case music journals. But to think our histories of Nazi music politics are complete without comprehensive analysis of the party daily is premature. One learns from this resource precisely what Nazi propagandists wanted average party members and Germans in general, not just top-level officials and scholars, to think-even about music. Therein, we see how contributors placed a Nazi "spin" on music history and composer's biographies. Using heretofore untranslated materials, this article will fill part of this gap in our historiography of Nazi music policy. It will first detail Völkischer Beobachter attacks on prominent representatives of musical modernism in the Weimar era. Thereafter, this presentation will cover "acceptable" alternatives to Weimar decadence that the Völkischer Beobachter posited from the so-called Era of Struggle [Kampfzeit ] through the Third Reich. With the war, however, the theme most emphasized in Völkischer Beobachter cultural coverage was militarism. My paper will conclude with a survey of how revered figures such as Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, and Wagner were scrutinized for indications that they could serve as inspiration for the German Volk at war. "WEIMAR MUSIC" IN THE VÖLKISCHER BEOBACHTER With its outlook so strongly rooted in the romantic German music tradition, what the Völkischer Beobachter found most disgraceful in Weimar culture was cultivation of musical modernism, the whole of which it referred to as, at best, the "farcical imitation of a carnival barker selling a tent full of musical freaks,"[1] and, at worst, " Jewish terror in music."[2] The newspaper stood firm in its rejection of works by "Jews and assorted foreigners" or Germans who supposedly associated with "international, Jewish circles"[3]-applauding "brave acts of resistance" such as when a lone Nazi [Hakenkreuzler] stood up and shouted "pfui" at a concert of Schoenberg, Bartok, Hindemith, Stravinsky, and Bartok.[4] The "musical foreigner" whom the Völkischer Beobachter derided most was Igor Stravinsky. While an early attack identified him as a "spiritual Polack," [5] Fritz Stege described Stravinsky as a "Russian composer with half-Asiatic instincts hidden under the cover of French civilization" who simply knew how to

Research paper thumbnail of “Robert Schumann and the German Revolution of 1848,” for “Music and Revolution,” concert and lecture series

Recommended Citation Dennis, David B.. “Robert Schumann and the German Revolution of 1848,” for “... more Recommended Citation Dennis, David B.. “Robert Schumann and the German Revolution of 1848,” for “Music and Revolution,” concert and lecture series. The American Bach Project and supported by the Wisconsin Humanities Council as part of the State of Wisconsin Sesquicentennial Observances, All Saints Cathedral, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, , : , 1998. Retrieved from Loyola eCommons, History: Faculty Publications and Other Works,

Research paper thumbnail of Computer Science and Cultural History: A Dialogue

Research paper thumbnail of Review of Michael Kater, The Twisted Muse: Musicians and their Music in the Third Reich (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997)

Research paper thumbnail of History of Computing

The social and organizational history of humanity is intricately entangled with the history of te... more The social and organizational history of humanity is intricately entangled with the history of technology in general and the technology of information in particular. Advances in this area have often been closely involved in social and political transformations. While the contemporary period is often referred to by such names as the Computing and Information Age, this is the culmination of a series of historical transformations that have been centuries in the making. This course will provide a venue for students to learn about history through the evolution of number systems and arithmetic, calculating and computing machines, and advanced communication technology via the Internet. Students who take this course will attain a degree of technological literacy while studying core historical concepts. Students who complete this course will learn the key vocabulary of the computing discipline, which is playing a significant role in modern human thought and new media communications. The Hist...

Research paper thumbnail of The Most German of All German Operas": Die Meistersinger through the Lens of the Third Reich

In college classrooms across the United States, a common feature of many courses covering modern ... more In college classrooms across the United States, a common feature of many courses covering modern German history is a screening of Leni Riefenstahl's propaganda film promoting the 1934 Nazi Party rally at Number~. Usually Triumph des Willens (Triumph of the Will), which includes no narration, is presented with commentary by instructors or explanatory notes. These explications often include assertions that the music accompanying Riefenstahl's opening imagery comes from Richard Wagner's Die Meistersinger van Nurnberg: "For 68 seconds the screen remains dark. From this cinematic 'void' there gradually emerges the solemn, swelling sound of the overture from Wagner's Mastersingers of Nuremberg," reads one guide to the movie. "Herbert Windt, a classical composer, created the Wagnerian-style orchestral scores which provide a background to the film,"

Research paper thumbnail of “Music in the ‘Cult of Art’ of Nazi Germany” for the “Epistemic Transitions and Social Change in the German Humanities: Aesthetics, Ideology, Culture and Memory” session

In his book on aesthetics and Nazi politics, translated as The Cult of Art in Nazi Germany, Eric ... more In his book on aesthetics and Nazi politics, translated as The Cult of Art in Nazi Germany, Eric Michaud wrote that the National Socialist attention to the arts was intended "to present the broken Volk with an image of its 'eternal Geist' and to hold up to it a mirror capable of restoring to it the strength to love itself." 1 In preparing the conceptual framework for my own book, just released by Cambridge University Press, I came upon this, among other ideas of Michaud, who is Director of Studies at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, somewhat late in the game. His book was originally published by Gallimard in 1996, and then translated into English in 2004. Considering it last year, I found a number of his concepts very intriguing, but was only able to make general references to them in my Introduction and Conclusion. Many of these ideas will be familiar to readers of George L. Mosse, whom Michaud should have cited more vigorously. However, I found that Michaud put some of the key concepts of the History of Nazi Culture more strongly than I have read elsewhere, and also that they seemed to resonate with much of the material I uncovered in my research.

Research paper thumbnail of Review Essay on Recent Literature about Music and German Politics

Research paper thumbnail of Honor your German masters : The use and abuse of classical composers in Nazi Propaganda

Recent scholarship on Nazi music policy pays little attention to the main party newspaper, the Vo... more Recent scholarship on Nazi music policy pays little attention to the main party newspaper, the Volkischer Beobachter, or comparable Nazi publications for the general public. Most work concentrates on publications Nazis targeted at expert audiences, in this case music scholars. To think our histories of Nazi music politics are complete without comprehensive analysis of the party daily is premature. Perusing articles and images that described every phase of Hitler's rise to power and the world war from the perspective of committed party members, one learns what Nazi propagandists wanted average party members and Germans in general, not just top-level officials and scholars, to think-even about music. Therein, we see how propagandists placed a Nazi "spin" on music history, musicology, and composers' biographies. Using heretofore untranslated materials, I have detailed the terms by which Nazi propagandists incorporated the tradition of eighteenth-century German music i...

Research paper thumbnail of “Beethoven in National Socialist Political Culture,” paper for the “Musicology Colloquium Series

We will constantly achieve success if we stride forward on the highpoints of [our] spiritual heri... more We will constantly achieve success if we stride forward on the highpoints of [our] spiritual heritage...: if we stride forward from Beethoven to Hitler. Eugen Hadamovsky, (1934)[1] Sometime in 1934, shortly before emigrating from Germany, the photo journalist Alfred Eisenstaedt did a story on the Beethovenhaus in Bonn. Having climbed the narrow steps of the apartment, he prepared to take a shot of the cramped attic room where the great composer had been born. "By sheer coincidence," in his words, "the Nazis came into the room.. . and laid a wreath with a swastika at the base of [Beethoven's] bust in honor of the Führer's birthday. After they left, I took the picture both with and without the swastika. I was a little afraid to remove it, but I was willing to take a chance for a good picture."[2] Beyond the action of the few Nazis involved or the risky counteraction of Eisenstaedt, this appropriation of a Beethoven icon belonged to was part of a grand propaganda scheme undertaken by the cultural politicians of National Socialism. Their purpose was to persuade the German public to revere Ludwig van Beethoven not only as a great composer, but as a man who had held views comparable to those of Nazi leaders. In fact, people were expected to believe that he had attempted to express them in his music.

Research paper thumbnail of “Music Reception in the Völkischer Beobachter,” paper for the “Music, Politics, and the State” session