Orient-Institut Studies 2 (2013) Simon Dubois Streets songs from the Syrian protests <1> Since March 2011, the Syrian uprising has created spaces for popular expression that were restricted during the preceding four decades of dictatorship. Numerous productions of texts, poems, caricatures, and songs began to appear on social media sites, and activists then gathered them onto networks providing local alternative information. These networks included websites, blogs, YouTube channels, Facebook and Twitter accounts. They often contained sections titled "Art of the Revolution" or the like, which listed the cultural production of the protests. <2> This article is part of a study conducted online via networks (for instance, F.N.N,1 Deir Press2) and websites or YouTube channels that focused on the revolution©s music, such as "Music from the great or Dndne Indesasye.4 An initial survey of protest 3,( موسيقى الثورة العربية الكبرى) "Arab revolution songs, conducted between October 2011 and March 2012, revealed a vast production of protest music. This research presents some of the results of a global analysis carried out on a collection of material composed exclusively of demonstration chants, which represented cultural production in the service of protest. Videos of the demonstrations that frequently accompany these chants have a special status, since they are evidence that the protest rallies really took place, a fact that was repeatedly denied by the regime at the beginning of the protest movement. <3> In this research, demonstration chants are determined by two criteria. First, there must be interaction between the public and the singer; that is to say, the audience has to be active, repeating some lyrics that constitute the chorus. This allows us to distinguish chants from poetry recitals (in which the audience merely listens), or from slogans (repeated solely by the public). Secondly, the singer must be an adult, since the chants sung by children display a different emotional dimension and children generally cannot be considered as their authors. 1 The F.N.N network is available online at: http://www.facebook.com/syria.news.F.N.N <06.12.2012>. 2 The Deir Press network is available online at: http://www.facebook.com/DeirPressNetworkEnglish <06.12.2012>. :is available online at (موسيقى الثورة العربية الكبرى) "The website "Music from the great Arab revolution 3 http://music-of-revolution.blogspot.fr/ <06.12.2012> 4 The YouTube channel "Dndne Indesasye" is available online at: http://www.youtube.com/user/DndneIndesasye/videos <06.12.2012> Lizenzhinweis: Dieser Beitrag unterliegt der Creative-Commons-Lizenz Namensnennung-Keine kommerzielle Nutzung-Keine Bearbeitung (CC-BY-NC-ND), darf also unter diesen Bedingungen elektronisch benutzt, übermittelt, ausgedruckt und zum Download bereitgestellt werden. Den Text der Lizenz erreichen Sie hier: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/de <4> The time frame of the corpus ranges from 22 April 2011 until mid-March 2012. It can be divided in two parts: the first part runs from the beginning of the revolution to early August 2011 (when the Free Syrian Army was created) and corresponds to a phase of peaceful demands based on the people©s legitimate rights for power. The second part, from August 2011 to mid-March 2012, reflects a progressive rise of armed struggle alongside more peaceful demands, an evolution that is perceptible through the different chants. Some results and observations of this research are outlined in the following analysis of four chants. The lyrics in Arabic are available in the appendix. The transcription tries to respect the main characteristics of the Syrian dialect while remaining understandable to all Arabic speakers. (5يل ارحل يا بشار ) "Chant 1: "Get out Bashar <5> is attributed to a singer from Hama called ,( يل ارحل يا بشار) "The well-known chant, "Get out Bashar Ibrahim Qashoush. He sang it for the first time on 27 June 2011, and had his throat cut a week later, on 4 July. His identity as the performer of this song is contested, since we can find other songs sung on 30 July ,(6 يا عيني يا روحي) "attributed to him post-mortem, such as "Oh my eye, oh my soul 2011). Therefore he might have been the author of the chant, but not the singer. <6> With this chant, Ibrahim Qashoush became both a symbol and a martyr of the Syrian revolution. His murder revealed the regime's fear of artistic and popular creativity, which pushed it to resort to the murder or mutilation of artists (the caricaturist Ali Farzat had his hands broken in August 2011). This chant was taken up, modified, and adapted by each singer and province. The representation of its singer-leader-martyr appears throughout Syria, as we can see with the emergence of singers nicknamed "Qashoush from so-and-so"; for instance Qashoush from Harasta (a town in the north of Damascus), who was killed on 5 February 2012, or Qashoush from Jarjanaz (a town in the north of Syria, next to the city of Maarat al-Numaan). We can even note the appearance of the term Qashoushiyyat, meaning chants made in Qashoush's style, defining an integral type of protest music. ?is available online at: http://www.youtube.com/watch ,(يل ارحل يا بشار) "The video of the chant "Get out Bashar 5 v=nM_7rlDvcpM&feature=channel_video_title <06.12.2012> :is available online at ,(يا عيني يا روحي) "The video of the chant "Oh my eye oh my soul 6 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YG3Q03Rg-s <06.12.2012> Lizenzhinweis: Dieser Beitrag unterliegt der Creative-Commons-Lizenz Namensnennung-Keine kommerzielle Nutzung-Keine Bearbeitung (CC-BY-NC-ND), darf also unter diesen Bedingungen elektronisch benutzt, übermittelt, ausgedruckt und zum Download bereitgestellt werden. Den Text der Lizenz erreichen Sie hier: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/de <7> "Get out Bashar" was released following the speech of President Bashar al-Asad on 20 June 2011,7 in which he affirmed the existence of an international conspiracy against Syria ± one of the reasons why demonstrators call him a liar. The term also refers to the president's promise of numerous reforms, none of which would effectively change the functioning of the state. <8> The chant was the first "hit" of the Syrian demonstrations. It drew its immediate popularity from the in a Syrian chant for the first ,(ارحل) "reappropriation of the Arab revolutions' key expression, "Get out time.8 An analysis of the collected material indicates that it is the most used expression against Bashar and other animal names, which are a way to break (حمار) "al-Asad. We can find the insult "donkey down mental barriers after forty years of dictatorship that completely forbade any form of insult to the and (مجرم) "murderer" ,(جزار) "president. The most used adjectives are "executioner" or "butcher The prevalence of adjectives related to murder reflects the popular opinion that Bashar .(قاتل) "killer" al-Asad was the one responsible for the massacres. This has some significance, because at the beginning of the uprising and its early repression, a section of Syrian opinion believed in a puppet president, guided by his mother and brother. This "traditional" approach was disproved after the first massacres. The theory stemmed from the modern and reformist image of Bashar al-Asad created when he came to power in 2000, as a leader whose methods were very different from those of his father. <9> Ibrahim Qashoush emancipates himself from the language conventions and insults Bashar al-Asad .for instance, can be translated as "screw you". It reveals a double transgression ,"طز فيك" ;directly First, the singer avoids the morality that implies a decent language (for the general public) by referring to the bottom. On the other hand, it is an insult openly addressed to the president, something inconceivable until then. In the video clip we can even hear the astonishment of the public when the .is used, followed by applause, as if a mental barrier had been broken down (ط ز) "word "ass <10> The lyrics of other chants could be even more vulgar against Bashar al-Asad. For instance, "you will 9,"ديوث" containing a sexual meaning), or the insult ,اجباري بدك تقلب) "definitely be knocked over 7 The video of President Bashar al-Asad's speech, on 20 June 2011, is available online at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3dNMienjX8&feature=relmfu <06.12.2012> 8 Compare Nader Srage's article on "Irhal" in this volume. The video is available .(ساقط ساقط يا بشار) ."Both insults are mentioned in the chant "You are falling Bashar 9 online at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dTiIhbiPU4&feature=youtube_gdata_player <06.12.2012> Lizenzhinweis: Dieser Beitrag unterliegt der Creative-Commons-Lizenz Namensnennung-Keine kommerzielle Nutzung-Keine Bearbeitung (CC-BY-NC-ND), darf also unter diesen Bedingungen elektronisch benutzt, übermittelt, ausgedruckt und zum Download bereitgestellt werden. Den Text der Lizenz erreichen Sie hier: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/de which means not only "pimp", but also the pimp prostituting his own family. To exceed the imposed boundaries of correctness enables protesters to demystify the regime in everyday life, and to introduce the act of criticizing it directly and radically. In contrast to the "nukta" (joke) and its tendency to remain within the limits of what is politically acceptable, the humour and explicit parodies used in the current Syrian context ± including the enjoyment of insults and foul language ± radically affirm the novelty of the revolutionary atmosphere: a time for freedom of action, of speech and of creativity that defy the tyrannical regime's norms. <11> عميل ) "Maher al-Asad an "agent of the United States ,(مندس) "Bashar is called an "infiltrator two terms frequently used by the regime©s propaganda to describe the rebels, and based on ,(المريكان the widespread anti-American sentiment among the Syrian population.