The Art of Censorship: The censoring of jazz in the Netherlands during the Second World War

If there is one thing that never seems to leave the world, it is censorship. For centuries, both formal and informal forms of censorship have been applied to all forms of art and other expressions. For instance, lists of prohibited and approved music have been established by the catholic church (more specifically, the Society of Jesus, or Jesuits) in Europe in the sixteenth century. Desiderius Erasmus, whom the Erasmus University Rotterdam was named after, railed against the “obscene love songs” fit only for the dances of “harlots and minstrels” that had made their way into the House of God.2 Since 1900, governments are able to monitor people more closely than ever before due to improved technology. An example of such close monitorization can be seen under the regime of the German Reich, from 1933 to 1943, and the Greater German Reich, from 1943 to 1945. In these years, the popular music genre of jazz was censored and branded as “Entartete Musik”, under the umbrella term of “Entartete Kunst”.