The Cappadocian “Songs of the Expatriate’s Wife”

Abstract

The value of folk songs for understanding the emotional impact of major events on ordinary people is indisputable. This article traces the varied impact on women left behind due to male migration from Cappadocia to big cities of opportunity in the late Ottoman Empire through a specific category of songs: the songs of "the expatriate's wife". While illuminating the stories of culturally muted Orthodox Christian women in Cappadocia through the testimonies found in the Oral Tradition Archive of the Centre for Asia Minor Studies, this study carries out a study of emotional archeology with the songs found in the same archive.