Browsing by Subject "urban space"

This thesis is an ethnographic study about rap, rock, and metal scenes in today’s Tehran. The study takes off from hip-hop scholars Pennycook’s and Mitchell’s proposition of hip-hop as “dusty foot philosophy” which is rooted at local dusty ground while articulating philosophies of global significance. This study aims to examine what kind of spaces are these dusty streets in Tehran and how does Tehran’s urban landscape inform music making and music aesthetics. This study focuses on how notions of belonging, space, and place have been expressed by rappers and rockers both in their music making and their embodied use of urban spaces. Followingly it will observe how urban realities, urban space, and geographical segregation are perceived, challenged, and reclaimed through their craft. The study asks how underground musicians are debating questions of authenticity that have risen along music’s localization, and how musicians strive for artistic legitimacy which would verify their street credibility both within their local music scenes and wider society, as well as within global music community. The study is based on an ethnographic fieldwork carried out in Tehran between 2012 and 2014. This is a multi-sited ethnographic research and employs phenomenological approach to analyse subjective and embodied experiences in the urban space. Methodologically it is based on participant observation, semi-structured interviews, and email interviews. The study includes dozens of rappers, rockers, and metalheads, most of whom are young male between 19 and 35 both from lower-class and middle-class backgrounds. Few of the musicians are young female as well. This thesis is a contribution to Iranian popular music studies and to our understanding of everyday realities of Tehrani rappers and rockers and music life in the city. It aims to shed some light to the ongoing democratization of music production which is rapidly changing the demographics of Tehran’s underground music scene. The study aims to underline that Tehran’s underground music scene is a heterogeneous space consisting of musicians from different socioeconomic backgrounds and genres having diverse and contradictory aspirations, music aesthetics, and styles. Accordingly, it applies intersectional approach which helps to grasp multiple experiences within the same and shared social space. The study aims to problematize the persistent understanding of underground music scene as inherently subversive and emancipatory space, and argues that individual musicians don’t have an equal access to these allegedly “emancipatory” spaces nor equal opportunities to make a professional career out of music. Furthermore, it is argued that this highly politicized understanding might do more harm than good for underground musicians who are considered defiant against their own aspirations. The study argues that the spatial surroundings of rap and rock scenes look very different. While rock and metal musicians mainly gather, rehearse, and record indoors, rappers have more visibly taken over public spaces by gathering and battling at different urban locations around the city. The study concludes that socioeconomic background and gender affects to a great extent in how musicians experience public sphere and musical spaces and how they move in them. Simultaneously, the study aims to show that global hip-hop discourse that privileges “ghetto life” and hardships in life can be self-empowering narrative for rappers from lower-class families, mainly from south Tehran which has been historically perceived as poor, traditional, conservative, and backward. The study argues that the democratization is gradually going beyond rap music as well, and there exists increasingly more rock and metal musicians from low-income and religious families. The study concludes that music is a powerful tool for constructing self-identity and demanding social and cultural change. Ultimately, the study aims to show how conscious Tehrani musicians are pushing for wider cultural and global change by telling local philosophies of global significance.

The themes of this thesis are alternative, informal, and uncommercial cultural spaces, the scenes using the spaces, and the individual scene participants. The study’s frame is Helsinki between 2000–2019. The study combines relevant theoretical discussion from subculture research tradition and urbanism. The key concepts of the thesis are ‘scenes,’ a cultural definition of ‘subculture,’ ‘alternative cultural spaces,’ ‘DIY culture’ (‘do it yourself’), and ‘enclaves.’ The thesis presents Helsinki’s ‘DIY landscape’ to consist of interconnected actors—scene participants—who are part of a network that revolves around making, performing and facilitating music in a specific urban infrastructure—the city, Helsinki—and in which the alternative cultural spaces create physical ‘hubs’ for the scene. The data has been collected online via a combination of oral history recollections and qualitative surveying. The data was collected in collaboration between Helsinki City Museum and Music Archive Finland in fall 2019. The data consist of 70 individual responses. The data is treated through the epistemology of qualitative research and oral history, and therefore is seen to include both ‘factual’ information and the informant’s subjective interpretations, their experience. On a practical level, the analysis has been conducted mainly via qualitative content analysis (QCA), but also geographic information system (GIS) has been used. The study aims to explicate a widely recognized but poorly known cultural phenomenon. The study’s key results are as follows. Four types of alternative cultural spaces have existed: dedicated buildings, rooms, outdoor venues, and even a ship. All of the study’s 34 spaces have hosted live music events and a variety of other cultural, political, and social activities. The spaces have been acquired for use by renting, squatting, and asking permission, and in two cases are owned by the facilitator. With some exceptions, they are located in the fringe areas of Helsinki’s city center, have a relatively short lifespan (maximum of five years in a set location) and share ‘aesthetics of necessity’ that roots meager or non-existent funding and the use of subcultural symbols and art. The spaces follow certain ‘DIY operating principles’ that aim to create an encouraging and inclusive atmosphere for DIY participation. The spaces, and their users, have faced a variety of challenges, setbacks, and problems. These are rooted in funding, the deficits of the buildings and their facilities, and to other citizens, the police, and the City of Helsinki. The City’s role emerges from the data as ambivalent—a constrainer and enabler. According to the responder’s experience, the City does not have a uniform policy towards the use of vacant urban space, and DIY culture overall is not recognized. For the scenes, the alternative cultural spaces function as platforms where cherish—often ‘marginal’—music and subcultures. Some of the participants connect political and societal ideals to the spaces and DIY activities. DIY activities emerged as—sometimes self-purposefully—social and communal by their nature. In the spaces between scene participants take place socio-cultural ‘cross-fertilization,’ which sometimes leads to new organizational groups and even scenes forming. These might relocate their practices elsewhere, and thus DIY culture spreads to new locations in the urban infrastructure. For the individual scene participants, crossing with the scene represents an important part of finding a social reference group. Some of the responders described going through a ‘DIY phase,’ which is a several yearlong period in their youth when life orientations and identity are intensively connected to DIY culture. The meaningfulness of scene participation lasts to later life, even if the participant’s active years are foregone. For some, the skills and knowledge acquired in the scene creates a basis for a more professional career in cultural production. As the reasons for the diminish or end of the DIY participation are given the closure of an alternative cultural space focal for the participant, challenges in activities, and major life events. In the discussion, the thesis suggests the concept of ‘urban DIY enclaves’ in the toolboxes of urban planners and designers. The DIY enclaves differentiate from the broader urban landscape by their condition, aesthetics, political messages, and subcultural symbols. Socially they have been constructed to advance DIY culture and cherish the creative lifestyle associated with it. The concept is suggested as a device for acknowledging the existence of DIY culture; in other words, its need for space, and its participants’ eagerness to participate in the construction of the urban and cultural landscape.