This module aims to study musical expressions and musical practices as part of a cultural and political dialogue around issues of national and collective identity, nationalism, state formation, and political and social ideology, in the period when these issues where particularly prevalent. It will introduce and study key concepts and ideas around nation building and cultural nationalism, and analyse and learn to understand the connections and cross-actions between cultural utterances, political forces and collective ideologies, while also introduce skills to discuss musical expression and practices as cultural texts in such contexts. The time period will mainly cover the ‘long’ nineteenth century and case studies will be drawn from Scandinavia, Germany, Austria, Italy, the Czech Republic, Russia, France and Britain, among others.

The weekly seminars may cover topics like: Regime & opera, Singing society, Music & Language, Canonisation, Music, landscapes & homelands, Political music, The national composer, and War, memory and modernity.



The module forms part of the “Historical Topics” modules, studying political and cultural nationalism through the medium of music and aiming to increase provision of specific topical study while incorporating study of musical expression in a historical context.



Suggested/General Reading:

Riley, M & Smith, A.D. (2016) Nation and Classical Music, Woodbridge: Boydell
 Anderson, B. (1991; 2nd ed.) Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, London: Verso
 Beard, D. & Gloag, K. (2005) Musicology: The key concepts, London: Routledge
 Blanning, T.C.W (ed.) (2000) The Nineteenth Century: Europe 1789-1914, Oxford: OUP
 Hobsbawn E. & Ranger T. (eds.) (1983) The Invention of Tradition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
 Johnson, J. (2002) Who needs classical music? Cultural Choice and Musical Value, Oxford: Oxford University Press
 Steinbeck, M. (2006) Listening to Reason: Culture, Subjectivity, and Nineteenth-Century Music, Princeton: Princeton University Press