BEETHOVEN DEAF: THE BEETHOVEN MYTH AND NINETEENTH-CENTURY CONSTRUCTIONS OF DEAFNESS
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| Title: | BEETHOVEN DEAF: THE BEETHOVEN MYTH AND NINETEENTH-CENTURY CONSTRUCTIONS OF DEAFNESS |
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| Authors: | Burke, Devin Michael |
| Committee Members: | Brittan, Dr. Francesca |
| Summary: | In the late-eighteenth century, not long before Ludwig van Beethoven began to experience the first symptoms of hearing loss, an important historical shift in the understanding of deafness took place in Europe. This shift resulted from the birth of deaf education, of the deaf community, and of deafness itself as a social category. The history of deafness, and more broadly of disability, has been neglected by musicologists, and in this thesis I map out points of intersection between Beethoven reception history and deaf history to show that these histories can enlighten each other. I focus on three “documents” of Beethoven reception—the Heiligenstadt Testament, Richard Wagner’s 1870 Beethoven essay, and twentieth-century Beethoven biopics—to show that Beethoven has been used to normalize hearing and construct deafness as its pathological opposite, even as his example shows that hearing loss does not negate music. |
| URL: | http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1270267092 |
| Database: | OpenDissertations |
| Abstract: | In the late-eighteenth century, not long before Ludwig van Beethoven began to experience the first symptoms of hearing loss, an important historical shift in the understanding of deafness took place in Europe. This shift resulted from the birth of deaf education, of the deaf community, and of deafness itself as a social category. The history of deafness, and more broadly of disability, has been neglected by musicologists, and in this thesis I map out points of intersection between Beethoven reception history and deaf history to show that these histories can enlighten each other. I focus on three “documents” of Beethoven reception—the Heiligenstadt Testament, Richard Wagner’s 1870 Beethoven essay, and twentieth-century Beethoven biopics—to show that Beethoven has been used to normalize hearing and construct deafness as its pathological opposite, even as his example shows that hearing loss does not negate music. |
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