Song as Social Media: Street Songs and Political Sociability in Early Modern Germany

Abstract

This paper will focus on sixteenth-century weaver and wedding singer Jonas Losch of Augsburg as a focal point for examining craftsmen in Germany who moonlighted as singers, offering both formal and informal entertainment in the streets, pubs, and other informal spaces of early modern German towns. Because songs were one of the few ways that artisans of lower status were able to make their voices heard, their songs were often political, socially critical, or even subversive, although many of these artisan singers also performed at weddings or in other non-political venues. In a process recognizable to a modern audience, sharing songs of protest provided a vehicle for building and solidifying group political identity and politicizing the spaces in which they were performed. The setting of political songs to familiar tunes associated with Protestant or Catholic identity increased the potential for eliciting emotional reactions and inflaming passions among listeners, which could lead to conflict. Because sound also penetrated windows, walls, and thresholds, songs could temporarily redefine spatial boundaries. The networks of artisan singers who wrote, copied, and shared these songs created political space for a lively public sphere of opinion among the artisan classes of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.