Conquering the Cape: the role of domestic keyboard instruments in colonial society and the colonisation process

Dippenaar, Erik  (Gert  Diederick Victor)

Conquering the Cape: the role of domestic keyboard instruments in colonial society and the colonisation process

Doctoral Thesis

2021

Abstract

This thesis traces the history and usage of domestic keyboard instruments in the Cape Colony from 1652 until 1852, and brings to light the role that these instruments played in colonial society and in the colonisation process in the Cape Colony. Chapter 2 sketches the broader historical, social and cultural context within which domestic music making involving keyboard instruments took place in the Cape Colony. Chapter 3 presents an overview of the distribution of domestic keyboard instruments in the Cape Colony as well as historical evidence about the situations in which they were located and used. This chapter also describes importation and building trends during the period covered by this study, and sheds light on the various types of keyboard instruments that could be found in domestic settings in the Cape Colony. Chapter 4 draws attention to the types of repertoire that would have been played on these instruments and examines the presence (or often absence) of sheet music on premises where keyboard instruments were found in a domestic context. The concluding chapter of this thesis (Chapter 5) contextualises the historical evidence on domestic keyboard instruments in the Southern African colonial context (as outlined in Chapters 2, 3 and 4) within the broader framework of the global historical and cultural meanings associated with keyboard instruments. It does so by examining the cultural meanings attached to keyboard instruments in other contexts, and ascertaining how these meanings were played out, and sometimes transformed or enhanced, in the Southern African colonial context. This interpretation is then used to show that domestic keyboard instruments played a significant role in defining a cultural identity in colonial society, and contributed considerably to the colonisation process in a variety of ways. It also highlights how domestic keyboard instruments were involved in these processes, on the basis of five broad themes: domestic keyboard instruments and female respectability; keyboard instruments as a diplomatic tool and a display of technology; the ‘loud' absence of evidence pointing to slaves playing keyboard instruments; the totemic function of domestic keyboard instruments; and the sonoric and physical impact caused by keyboard instruments.

Keywords

Music

Reference:

Collections

PhD / Doctoral

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