Problems of Research and Personal Stuff

Today is the Feast of St. Sofia, which meant that the streets were filled today with revelers and citizens of this namesake city.

Today also marks the end of my first "business" week - of research, learning, and establishing myself here. It has been a success, more or less, but it hasn't been 100% vanilla. My research is off to a good start but I may have to revise my methodology and tweak my hypotheses.

Not previously knowing much about this field, I had assumed that it would be as easy as establishing its history, examining records, comparing them with what we know now, and drawing conclusions therefrom. I've realized it's not going to be as simple as that.

The first problem is that there are no written records establishing a history of the Shopi before a certain (very recent, historically speaking) point. This is Big Problem Number 1. All of the history of this people had, until that recent point, been handed down orally, which introduced some problems that go along with exclusively-oral traditions. Thus, there is probably no way of knowing the origins of the Shopi (Are they Bulgars? Thracians? Slavs? Something else entirely?) or their diaphonic singing or certain important specific pieces of information, such as when Christianity was introduced to them.

Perhaps a more daunting problem, which I only encountered yesterday, lies in the fact that nobody can actually seem to define who the Shopi are. By that, I don't mean the question of their origins (see above), but the rather more essential question of exactly who this group encompasses. There is no consensus definition for who is and isn't a Shop, and there seems to be a lack of definitive markers--cultural and ethnic alike--that define the extent of this people. This is Big Problem Number 2.

I have, however, uncovered quite a lot of valuable and essential information. One of my most important discoveries so far has been the connection between religion, custom/ritual, and song. Fairly obvious/self-evident, no? But, of course, it takes me a while to put things together sometimes.

Prof. Naidenova writes about this connection in her book, so it was gratifying for me to see another source discuss, expand upon it, and give examples. The source in question is Martha Forsyth's book, which I have spent the better part of the week examining, about Bistritsa, a small village south of Sofia. In the book, she explains that during the Socialist era, when religious practices were suppressed, the customs that went along with these practices were suspended, and the singing of many songs along with them. When religious freedom was reinstated in 1990 (coinciding with the fall of Socialism), certain practices were resumed, but since many of the songs hadn't been committed to writing, there was often widespread disagreement over words and melodies. (This particular anecdote also seems to substantiate the claim that, out of all the forces at work in Bulgaria over the centuries, Socialism had the biggest effect.)

So, how to go about attacking the questions I laid out in my research proposal? It was clear I had to find different methods. After thinking about it, I came up with this: 

With the knowledge that different villages within the Shopluk have slightly different musical repertoires, comparative analysis seems like a good way to go.  So I now have a tentative plan to compare the bodies of music sung in villages from different regions. Once I establish a history for each of these regions, the influences should become fairly obvious, and voilà - I will hopefully have established a backdoor method for answering my questions.

One thing you should know about me: I love Linguistics. I'm fascinated it. Thus, I had an idea that draws on principles from the field. One of these principles (which I heard many, many times during my course at USC) states that "People who talk to each other tend to talk like each other." (The credit for this accurate and succinct summation of one of the very basic tenets of Linguistics belongs to Prof. Ed Finegan of USC - smart, smart man.) It therefore stands to reason that the same mechanism that drives this linguistic phenomenon should do exactly the same thing on a musical level: Where the region divides into linguistic areas, I would bet nearly anything that it divides into musical areas (based on the conventions in this type of singing) along the exact same lines.

And, though this may constitute a trial of my luck, I could possibly go one step further. Many, if not most, songs are common to several villages within the region, and I would bet that some of the details of these songs have diverged from each other in their separate versions over time, much like daughter languages from a parent language. Perhaps--though I have not yet done any research that would bear this out--it may be possible to reconstruct the "parent" versions of these songs, compare them to the "daughter" versions, and glean even more information that way.

This coming week, I will begin this line of attack, and should the need arise, I will modify my methodology and hypotheses again, following the Scientific Method that they taught us all the way back in 8th grade.

/End research-talk

Other highlights of the week include: My Phillies clinching their fifth straight playoff berth (I will probably do an entire post devoted to the Great Franchise and their Season in the next week or so), continuing Bulgarian lessons with Dr. Angelov, and last night, a FISI reunion party, which was, to be quite painfully honest, a tremendous amount of fun.

L - R: Greg, Xristo, Irena, Atanas

How cute

L - R: Greg, Fred, Dimitra

Greg knows something you don't know

L - R: Xristo, Irena, the Author, Greg, Sanya

One sobering thing - 

My great-great-uncle Morty passed away this week,  just shy of his 99th birthday. He was the last surviving sibling of my great-grandfather Harry, and the only reason we ever found Harry's grave, 80 years after he died. Morty was a veteran of World War II, and got his ear shot off in Italy. He was the toughest guy, refusing care to the very end, always insisting that nobody go out of their way for him, or help him at all. And though he didn't want to be honored or even memorialized in any way, I can't help but give him this tiny tribute. I only met him twice, and he wasn't particularly close to any branch of the family that I'm familiar with, but he was truly a great man. May his memory be a blessing.

Next entry: More on life in Sofia.