Der Topos der Juden

Annkatrin Dahm explores patterns of Jewish discrimination in German music literature. Stereotypical stigmatization debasing “the Jew” had been part of music literature since the beginning. The author unfolds the historical development of the topos “Jew” taking sources from 18th and 19th century into account. Early literature about German synagogal music displays characteristic conceptions of the Jew of that time like un-originality or copying, which had been a typical perception of Jewish star composers like Giacomo Meyerbeer, Jacques Offenbach and Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy even before the paper “Jewry in Music” by Richard Wagner. 19th century music historiography that favoured nationalistic components and fundamental differentiation of music in art- and light music lead to the cultivation of a dual evaluation system that was linked to the origin of music. By showing the connection between insinuation outside of music and musical facts Dahm mirrors the hostile attitudes against Jews and anti-Semitic ideology throughout the centuries.