Vahit Lütfi Salcı’s Studies on Alawi Music as an Example of Anthropological Orthogenesis

Abstract

AbstractVahit Lutfi Salci’s studies on polyphonic Alawi music are among the most interesting examples ofthe Early Republican Turkish elite’s seeking a pure national essence harmonious with Western music.According to Salci, Turkish folk music is divided into two main branches: Manifest and secret. Secretfolk music represented by Alawi tribes organized as closed circles is the authentic expression of pureTurkish culture, since it has been isolated from the cosmopolite Ottoman culture and the urban musicwhich was stigmatized as Oriental music. At the same time, this secret folk music is the pride of theTurkish nation against the civilized Western world since it involves polyphonic elements denotingharmony and counterpoint. The aim of this study is to scrutinize this formulation developed by Salci about secret Alawi music as an example of anthropological orthogenesis and discuss its relationwith the official music policy. Anthropological orthogenesis is a concept developed by the authorof this article, inspired by both Grunebaum’s distinction between orthogenetic and heterogeneticcultural change and Neuman’s adaptation of this concept to Cevdet Pasha’s ideas. In this article,orthogenesis is defined as the interpretation of heterogenetic cultural changes, which are basedon foreign models, as orthogenetic changes, descending from native sources and is divided asarchaeological and anthropological orthogenesis. Archaeological orthogenesis refers to the discoursethat seeks the source of cultural change in the remote past of the nation as in the Turkish HistoryThesis. On the other hand, anthropological orthogenesis refers to the discourse that seeks a nationalessence harmonious with Western culture in closed communities of the villages and attempts to builda narrative of historical continuity as Salci did. Keywords: Alawi Music, Sociology of Music, Cultural Influence, Turkish Music, Vahit Lutfi Salci,Orthogenesis