Hostname: page-component-54dcc4c588-ff9ft Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-09-22T13:36:05.005Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Women’s Role in Preserving Lament Songs in the Villages of Gjirokastër, Albania

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 October 2020

GRIJDA SPIRI
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

“Vajtim,” mourning, is an expression of women’s grief and cannot be counted in months or years: it is a continued expression of the inner world that for many women can take decades. In this paper, I examine how women have carried and preserved the lament songs of the Southern Albania region from generation to generation. Field research in my hometown, Gjirokastër, reveals how the laments songs are connected from mother to daughter within the families. Using descriptions of lamenting rituals, personal interviews with mourners, and analysis of lyrics and field recordings, I demonstrate how women continue this tradition through generations.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Yearbook for Traditional Music , Volume 52 , November 2020 , pp. 147 - 167
Copyright
© International Council for Traditional Music 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

References

Alexiou, Margaret. 2002[1974]. The Ritual Lament in Greek Tradition. 2nd ed. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Originally published by Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Auerbach, Susan. 1989. “From Singing to Lamenting: Women’s Musical Role in a Greek Village.” In Women and Music in Cross-Cultural Perspective, ed. Koskoff, Ellen, 25–43. Champaign: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Caraveli-Chaves, Anna. 1980. “Bridge between Worlds: The Greek Women’s Lament as a Communicative Event.” Journal of American Folklore 93:129–157.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caraveli-Chaves, Anna. 1986. “The Bitter Wounding: The Lament as Social Protest in Rural Greece.” In Gender and Power in Rural Greece, ed. Dubisch, Jill, 169–194. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Danforth, Loring. 1982. The Death Rituals of Modern Greece. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Durkheim, Emile. 1961[1912]. The Elementary Forms of Religious Life. New York: Collier Books.Google Scholar
Eckehard, Pistrick. 2015. Performing Nostalgia: Migration Culture and Creativity in South Albania. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Feld, Steven. 1990. “Wept Thoughts: The Voicing of Kaluli Memories.” Oral Tradition 5(2):241–266.Google Scholar
Goody, Jack. 1974. “Death and the Interpretation of Culture: A Bibliographic Overview.” American Quarterly 26(5):448–255.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Halbwachs, Maurice. 1980[1950]. The Collective Memory. New York: Harper & Row.Google Scholar
Hertz, Robert. 1960. “A Contribution to the Study of the Collective Representation of Death.” In Death and the Right Hand, trans. R. Needham and C. Needham. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Herzfeld, Michael. 1982. Ours Once More. Folklore, Ideology, and the Making of Modern Greece. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Holst-Warhaft, Gail. 1992. Dangerous Voices: Women’s Laments and Greek Literature. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Christopher C. 2018. Lament from Epirus. New York: W.W. Norton.Google Scholar
Köchümkulova, Elmira. 2015. “Kyrgyz Funeral Laments.” In The Music of Central Asia, ed. Theodore, Levin, Daukeyeva, Saida, and Elmira, Köchümkulova, 198–233. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Koskoff, Ellen. 1991. “Gender, Power, and Music.” In The Musical Woman: An International Perspective , Vol. 3 , 1986–1990, ed. Zaimont, Judith Lang, Gottlieb, Jane, Polk, Joanne, and Rogan, Michael J., 769–788. Westport: Greenwood Press.Google Scholar
Koskoff, Ellen and Cusick, Suzanne. 2014. A Feminist Ethnomusicology: Writings on Music and Gender. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Llogo, Resul. 2008. Një Jetë me Këngë. Tiranë: Toena.Google Scholar
Magrini, Tullia, ed. 2003. Music and Gender: Perspectives from the Mediterranean. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Mauss, Marcel. 1921. “L’expression Obligatoire des Sentiments (Rituels Oraux Funeraires Australiens).” Journal de Psychologie 18:425–434.Google Scholar
McLaren, Anne E. 2008. Performing Grief: Bridal Laments in Rural China. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Muich, Rebecca. 2010. “Pouring out Tears: Andromache in Homer and Euripedes.” PhD dissertation, Urbana-Champaign: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.Google Scholar
Schieffelin, Edward. 1976. The Sorrow of Lonely and the Burning of the Dancers. New York: St Martin’s Press.Google Scholar
Seremetakis, Nadia C. 1991. The Last Word: Women, Death and Divination in Inner Mani. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Shelemay, Kay Kaufman. 1998. Let Jasmine Rain Down: Song and Remembrance Among Syrian Jews. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Shehan, K. Patricia. 1989. “Balkan Women as Preservers of Traditional Music and Culture.” In Women and Music in Cross-Cultural Perspective, ed. Koskoff, Ellen, 45–53. Champaign: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Shetuni, Spiro. 2011. Albania Traditional Music: An Introduction with Sheet Music and Lyrics for 48 Songs. Jefferson: McFarland.Google Scholar
Sugarman, Jane C. 1989. “The Nightingale and the Partridge: Singing and Gender among Prespa Albanians.” Ethnomusicology 33(2):191–215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sugarman, Jane C.. 1997. Engendering Song: Singing and Subjectivity at Prespa Albanian Weddings. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Sugarman, Jane, Leotsakos, George, and Prela, Zana Shuteriqi. 2001. “Albania.” Grove Music Online. http://www-oxfordmusiconline-com.oca.ucsc.edu/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000040650 (accessed 13 April 2020).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tirta, Mark. 1996. “Vdekja në Rite e Besime ndër Shqiptarë” [Death in rites and beliefs among Albanians]. Kultura Popullore 2:15–30.Google Scholar
Tirta, Mark. 2004. Mitologjia ndër Shqiptarë [Albanian Mythology]. Tiranë: Akademia e Shkencave e Shqipërisë Instituti i Kulturës Popullore, Dega e Etnologjisë.Google Scholar
Tolbert, Elizabeth. 1990. “Women Cry with Words: Symbolization of Affect in the Karelia Lament.” Yearbook for Traditional Music 22:80–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tolbert, Elizabeth. 2007. “Voice, Metaphysics and Community: Pain and Its Transformation in the Finish Karelian Ritual Lament.” In Pain and Its Transformation: The Interface of Biology and Culture, ed. Coakley, Sarah and Shelemay, Kay Kaufman, 147–165. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Tole, Vasil S. 2010. “‘Inventory of Performers on Albanian Folk Iso-Polyphony.’ ‘A Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Mankind’ safeguarded by UNESCO.” http://www.isopolifonia.com/Other%20docs/Inventory%20of%20Performers,%20on%20iso-polyphony.pdf (accessed 30 June 2020).Google Scholar
Tole, Vasil S.. 2011. Pse Qajnë Kuajt e Akilit? [Why Achilles Horses Wept?]. Tirana: Mediaprint.Google Scholar
Vyshka, Gentian and Çipi, Bardhyl. 2010. “Death Rituals in Albania: An Anthropological Review.” Online Journal of Anthropology 6(2):235–246.Google Scholar
Wilce, James M. 2008. Crying Shame: Metaculture, Modernity, and the Exaggerated Death of Lament. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caushi, Fitim. Interview by author. Gjirokastër, June 2018, 2019.Google Scholar
Kasoruho, Naxhi. Interview by author. Tiranë, July 2019.Google Scholar
Kocollari, Andro. Interview by author. Gjirokastër, July 2019.Google Scholar
Spiri, Marjanthi. Interview by author. Gjirokastër, June 2019.Google Scholar
Caushi, Fitim. Interview by author. Gjirokastër, June 2018, 2019.Google Scholar
Kasoruho, Naxhi. Interview by author. Tiranë, July 2019.Google Scholar
Kocollari, Andro. Interview by author. Gjirokastër, July 2019.Google Scholar
Spiri, Marjanthi. Interview by author. Gjirokastër, June 2019.Google Scholar