Zhakir’s sorrow: Minstrelsy and kısas Zâkirin bir dünya derDi: Âşıklık ve kısas


İLHAN M. E.

Turk Kulturu ve Haci Bektas Veli - Arastirma Dergisi, vol.99, pp.405-414, 2021 (SCI-Expanded) identifier

  • Publication Type: Article / Article
  • Volume: 99
  • Publication Date: 2021
  • Doi Number: 10.34189/hbv.99.018
  • Journal Name: Turk Kulturu ve Haci Bektas Veli - Arastirma Dergisi
  • Journal Indexes: Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-EXPANDED), Scopus, MLA - Modern Language Association Database, Directory of Open Access Journals
  • Page Numbers: pp.405-414
  • Keywords: Artisan Personality, Ashik, Cultural Economy, Religious Character, Secularism, Zhakir
  • Akdeniz University Affiliated: Yes

Abstract

© 2021 Ankara Haci Bayram Veli University. All rights reserved.In this study, the structural transformation of the Kısas’s Zhakir (Alawi religious minstrel) – Ashik (minstrel) tradition in context of secularization and cultural economy is analyzed. As a cause and consequence of the cultural economy, the performance of folk songs has gained great importance in cities after the 1960s in Turkey. In addition, if the transformation of the Ashik tradition is added, this has had a great impact on the representation (although not directly in their nature) of the instrumental and vocal performances, which are one of the cornerstones of Alawi-Bektashi culture and tradition. The Bektashis, who have only one town population in Urfa, have adapted to the existing isolation, although there is no social and cultural interdiction. Even if they are “profan” and “heterodox” in a sense, they have built “outwardly open” and “extroverted” cultural rituals because of the increasing rural migration after the 1970s and the social and cultural transformation experienced by Turkey. If it is avaluated through the example of Kısas (and in a sense Akpınar), this construction activity has been served not only by their own hands but also with cultural research activities. In this sense, it is claimed that the opportunities of secularization and cultural economy are instrumentalized. As a form of worldly, secularization is substituted as a model of universalization; it will be stated that this is conceived and designed as a transition from Zhakir to Ashik. On the other hand, in terms of literary quality, it will be revealed that Kısas has other characteristics, unlike the dominant characteristics of the folk songs in Urfa region, that Kısas has the tradition and/or features of Ashik style literary, but that it later ascribes the Ashik style culture and tradition to itself later. It will be stated that this is a inevitable option in the transition from Zhakir to Ashik.