Music and the Armenian Diaspora: Searching for Home in Exile

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Guide to Online Media Examples
Introduction
1. Ottoman Empire, 1890-1915: Komitas Vartaped and the Construction of "Armenia"
2. New York, 1932-1958
3. Beirut, 1932-1958
4. Beirut, 1958-1980
5. California
Notes
References
Index

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Survivors of the Armenian genocide of 1915 and their descendants have used music to adjust to a life in exile and counter fears of obscurity. In this nuanced and richly detailed study, Sylvia Angelique Alajaji shows how the boundaries of Armenian music and identity have been continually redrawn: from the identification of folk music with an emergent Armenian nationalism under Ottoman rule to the early postgenocide diaspora community of Armenian musicians in New York, a more self-consciously nationalist musical tradition that emerged in Armenian communities in Lebanon, and more recent clashes over music and politics in California. Alajaji offers a critical look at the complex and multilayered forces that shape identity within communities in exile, demonstrating that music is deeply enmeshed in these processes. Multimedia components available online include video and audio recordings to accompany each case study.

Reviews

World of Music

Covering with much detail a wide variety of musical phenomena that have been hitherto ignored in Armenian music scholarship, Music and the Armenian Diaspora is a landmark work that challenges many of the orthodoxies about Armenian music as it is conceived of today. . . . The lucid writing style, the empatheic and observant attention to forgotten musical histories, and the excellent selection of included recordings, make Music and the Armenian Diaspora a book that deserves to be read by a wide range of readers interested in topics as varied as music and conflict, diaspora studies and the cultural dimensions of genocide

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