JSIS A 239/CLAS 239 GREECE: ANCIENT TO MODERN

Modern Greek Folk Songs Orally composed and transmitted in different performative contexts Writing and literary techniques have played no role in formation and transmission of modern Greek folk songs Main genres and themes of modern Greek folk songs Modern Greek folk songs lack epic genre

Collections of Greek Folk Songs Modern Greek folk songs were collected and published in the 19th century, initially by Western European collectors (Cl. Fauriel, N. Tommaseo, et al.) and then by Greek collectors (A. Manousos, N. Politis, et al. ) N. Politis, Selections from the Songs of the Greek People (1914)

Ritual Lament A subgenre of Greek folk songs performed by women moiroloyistres (μοιρολογίστρες): female lamenters of the dead

Components of ritual lament Vocal lamentation Dramatic bodily movements: tearing the face and hair, beating the breast, rending one’s garments The mourners’ personal ‘sufferings’ / ‘ponoi’: Isolation Widowhood Loss of social status Desertion by male realatives Sufferings from childbirth or child-raising Grievances against war and death

Functions of ritual lament Expression of ‘pain’ – both personal and interpersonal Expression of individual and collective female voice Social bonding of female lamenters against patriarchal village culture Protest of female lamenters against patriarchal culture and against social injustice Lamenter as mediator between living and dead

Parallels between modern and ancient Greek laments Laments in ancient Greek tragedy and modern Greek oral traditions share parallels in function, theme, agency and verbal art Euripides’ Suppliants: laments of mothers of warriors who died fighting against Thebes Mothers of dead warriors form a community of mourners

Exceptionalism Belief that a country or national culture has developed politically, economically or socially along unusual lines Country or national culture are interpreted within categories that are different from a generally accepted model E.g. ‘American exceptionalism’ or ‘the French exception’

Modern Greek Exceptionalism Claims that modern Greek culture, society and national building processes are somewhat unique Positive Greek exceptionalism: e.g., Hellenic continuity; unique position of modern Greece in world history due to its relationship to classical and Byzantine Greek civilization Negative Greek exceptionalism: e.g., modern Greek literature as belated in relation to other cultures

European Exceptionalism (West) European model of a secular modernity (old secularization paradigm) USA (with its vibrant religiosity) was seen as deviation from European model of secular modernity From alleged universality of European model to a ‘European exceptionalism’: European secular modernity is the exception to the norm – religion persists in Eastern Europe and most other parts of the globe

Greek Orthodoxy: An Exception in Europe’s religious landscape? Does Greece, a predominantly Orthodox country, fit into the general secular pattern of Western Europe? Greece has been called ‘an anomaly, the Orthodox outsider in Western organizations’ Orthodoxy continues to play a role in Greek public life

Greek Orthodoxy: An Exception in Europe’s religious landscape? There are aspect of historical religious development that differentiate Greece from Central and West European countries (e.g. lack of Reformation) and other patterns of religious life presenting similarities (Italian and Greek forms of ‘diffused religion)

From Greek ‘exceptionalism’ to Greek specificities Instead of talking about a Greek ‘exceptionalism’ it is more accurate to speak of Greek specificities or particularities relative to the historical religious development of Greece and to the specific ways Greeks practise religion. The Greek Orthodox situation with its idiosyncrasies supports the idea of a specific ‘West European exceptionalism’ within the overall European and global religious scene