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Of oligarchs, orientalists, and cosmopolitans: how “Armenian” is rabiz music?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Rik Adriaans
Rik Adriaans*
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology, Central European University, Budapest, Hungary
*
*Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

This paper examines the controversial music genre rabiz in relation to political and socioeconomic developments in post-Soviet Armenia. Rabiz, an urban folk-pop genre characterized by melismatic singing and “oriental” embellishments, is a ubiquitous soundtrack to everyday life in the country, with lyrics commonly covering romance, male friendship, and family ties. Ethnographic observations suggest that its popularity draws on the affective appeal with which it captures common hardships and aspirations of post-socialist transition. In spite of this, rabiz is almost universally denounced by nationalist intellectuals and liberal citizens for foreign influences, sentimentality, consumerism, and conservatism. While for the cultured classes, the rejection of rabiz as “un-Armenian” is often an integral part of the construction of a virtuous self, the alternative conceptions of performers and fans reveal the polysemy of Armenianness as a moral category.

Keywords

musicnationalismpost-socialismorientalizationtasteArmenia
Type
Articles
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 46 , Issue 4: Special Section: Classification , July 2018 , pp. 704 - 716
Copyright
Copyright © 2018 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

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