How the guitar became an instrument of domestic gender control
In short: Why was the guitar associated with 'vapid' femininity in the 19th century? This lecture explores how musical instruments were used to police the intellectual boundaries of women and turn art into a tool for social management.
By the 1830s, while caricatures depicted the fashionable guitarist as male, amateur musical ability remained strictly gendered. The guitar was specifically linked to the 'vapid' aspects of young women's minds because it was perceived as light and softly voiced. This association served a dual purpose: it confined music to the restricted intellectual sphere of non-working women and framed performance as an art of seduction for marriage.
Professor Christopher Page explores whether instruments like the guitar, harp, and pianoforte were targets of a deliberate campaign. The goal was to control the potency of musical art within the home by tethering it to domesticity and 'coquetry,' allowing male observers to either indulge or censure these performances as they saw fit.
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Sources
- Summary by Intellect · source: The Guitar and 'the Fair Sex' - Professor Christopher Page
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