In a region home to many different ethnic, religious, and linguistic communities, folklore has long been a rich source of collective identities – a shared body of cultural expressions in which history remains alive and future often takes shape. Far from being an antiquated practice, folklore is a living tradition in the Balkans, one deeply integrated into everyday life and long studied worldwide for its ethnographic and socio-political significance. Their central role in culture has meant that folkloric traditions have been both used and abused across the Balkans throughout the last two centuries. Regional variations in folk heroes, costumes, and even musical scales are often held up as evidence of unbridgeable ethnic differences, dividing various South Slavic, Turkish, Greek, Albanian, and Romani cultures from one another. Generations of musicians, writers, and artists have “remixed” folkloric elements, giving them new meaning in modern contexts and reaffirming the power of folklore to unite rather than divide.
Stories, melodies, crafts, food, drink, and song: these elements of folklore have long animated a shared culture in the Balkans. In this course, we will read folktales whose vampires, winged horses, talking animals, and inveterate tricksters – along with their political valence, authentic oral speech patterns, and unsparing brutality – deeply fascinated (and sometimes shocked) the Brothers Grimm and Goethe. We’ll listen to decasyllabic epic poetry sung extemporaneously, thousands of lines without pause, by living “Balkan Homers” – and will see how this epic tradition has been used to address seemingly improbable contemporary topics like political elections and the Yugoslav Wars, soccer matches and the Sarajevo Winter Olympics.
We’ll immerse ourselves in folk music and dance, studying unique forms of polyphony and singing styles, characteristic Balkan musical scales, and mind-boggling time signatures. By the end of the course, 9/8 will seem tame compared to 13/8 or 22/16! Local musicians will teach us to drown our sorrows in the minor keys of Bosnian sevdah and will lead us in the circle dance known by many names across the Balkans. We’ll examine regional kilim or ćilim rugs from Turkey and Southern Serbia, coffee culture in Bosnia, folk costumes from Croatia, pottery from Macedonia, and domestic and religious architecture in Bulgaria and Kosovo. Approaching folklore experientially and interdisciplinarily will illuminate some of the most pressing issues in the contemporary Balkans – from genocidal nationalism and the legacy of conflict to the politics of gender and of globalization.