Structural Transformation and New Folk Music – Deidre Rath

In Essen, the interdisciplinary conference ‘Sweet Home’ explored a special part of the world: home

‘The best thing about the Ruhr Valley is its people.’ Andreas Jacob, director of the Folkwang UdK Essen, chose this famous quote from Heinrich Böll to open the interdisciplinary symposium ‘Sweet Home’. The two-day conference, organised by JA member Gordon Kampe, took place against the backdrop of the defunct Zollverein mine in Essen, which closed in 1986. Over the course of 5 and 6 May, 13 speakers presented contributions on the topic of home and its many facets.

‘Home’ and the accompanying concept of ‘a home of one’s own’ both also imply the existence of ‘the foreign’. The term is used in various ways, and one of its definitions describes the state of being rooted in a certain country or region and sharing the values and traditions of that area. In this sense, ‘home’ is equivalent to origin, and the term often also stands for a way of life based on a Christian identity.

The bible provides homelessness as a fundamental determination

The idea of a German and Christian West is one that right-wing parties in particular enjoy appropriating, noted JA member Katharina Heyden, professor of Ancient History of Christianity and Interreligious Encounters at the University of Bern. For example, the AfD party promotes the idea of a struggle for a German and – in opposition to the perceived enemy, Islam – Christian western world that is in need of protection. As a result, the AfD has become a stronghold for many fundamental Christians. But, as Heyden explained, this link between Christianity and the concept of an earthly home is misleading, as the Bible actually provides the fundamental determination for the opposite: homelessness.

The spiritualisation of the concept of home can be found in the New Testament in particular, in which the great promise of ‘home’ describes not an earthly, but rather a heavenly homeland. Evidence of this can be found in a pseudo-Pauline letter sent from Rome to the Hebrews around 80/90 A.D.: ‘All of these died in the faith and have not attained that which was promised, but have only seen it and hailed it from a great distance, and recognised that they are guests and strangers on earth (ξένοι καὶ παρεπιγημοί ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς). But when they say this, they mean that they are searching for a homeland (πατρίδα ἐπιζητοῦσιν). And if they had meant the land from which they departed, they would have had time to turn back. But now they long for a better (homeland), namely the heavenly one.’ In light of this understanding of home, Christians can only ever hold partial citizenship in an earthly life and will always remain strangers in earthly homelands, even when they attempt to reflect their heavenly home in earthly sites. As a result, theology must always point to the ambivalences inherent in the concept of ‘home’, especially within political and instrumentalising discussions. 

"Home" also always includes the repeated perception of certain situations

The topic of homelessness was also the focus of the presentation by Martin Butler, Professor for American Literary and Cultural Studies at the University of Oldenburg. In his contribution, entitled ‘No Home in this World anymore’, Butler addressed a phenomenon of 1930s America. In a time of economic and ecological turmoil, more and more young men opted for a life as an itinerant labourer and with it a life on the street. While this group was initially disparaged by society, the figure of the homeless wanderer later developed into a romantic topos in American folk music. One initiator and figurehead was Woody Guthrie, born in Oklahoma in 1912. The lifestyle model of the so-called hobo became increasingly appropriated by the left, in part thanks to Guthrie himself. Butler argued that due to the hobo’s marginalised and therefore incorruptible position, he seemed to have been designed to serve as a type of cultural guardian. The nascent unions in particular instrumentalised hobos for their purposes. And yet, even being in a state of constant travel can refer back to the concept of home. Or, as sociologist Harmut Rosa put it: ‘Because home also always includes the repeated perception (or “re-cognising”) of certain situations, it is not surprising that in our society, some people today feel at home on an ICE train or a Lufthansa lounge. The established recurring state of being on the road can paradoxically become a familiar way of being in the world, of being home.’ During the subsequent discussion, the participants came to the conclusion that having a home can also simply mean building a specific relationship to a part of the world in which the items have meaning for us, where they speak to us and form a resonance chamber of sorts.

Folk music is today delivered with a tongue-in-cheek attitude

Musicologist and JA member Miriam Akkermann highlighted another musical aspect in her presentation. She spoke about German ‘tradimix’, a contemporary music genre in which new elements are combined with traditional instruments, and which, according to Akkermann, is free from ideological connotations. The music that in earlier decades was referred to as folk music is today being repackaged and delivered with a tongue-in-cheek attitude. As a result, people who would previously never have dared to be seen at a traditional folk music concert are now attending ‘tradimix’ events. The Bavarian band ‘Kofelgschroa’ serves as a prime example of the trend – their performance of culture and home is so free from ideological burdens that even Berlin hipsters are dancing to it. Akkermann noted that traditional German music has become so foreign to young people, especially those living in larger cities, that they no longer identify with it. The ‘new folk music’, on the other hand, is both familiar and exotic and equivalent to a type of ‘home on the go’; it reveals a hidden longing for home but without any sense of obligation.

The conference concluded with a presentation from musicologist Andreas Jacob, who explained that even the Ruhr Valley has its own tradition of folk songs. The raw and dangerous life of the miners and steelworkers is reflected in songs such as ‘Mit schwachen Armen, bleichen Wangen (Das Bergmannskind)’ (‘With weak arms, pale cheeks [The Miner’s Child]’) or the ‘Steigerlied’ (‘Foreman’s Song’). In this context, the concept of home is inextricably linked with structural transformation in the region and the resulting closure of blast furnaces and mines as well as the repurposing of this infrastructure into spaces for cultural events. Last but not least, Jacob argued, we must not forget Böll’s often-cited quote: ‘No building, no house, no landscape is visible that seems to the foreigner to be worth a trip or at least a brief sojourn. Industry has killed the landscape without creating a new one.’ Fortunately, a bit of time has passed since Böll uttered these words.

Deidre Rath is a freelance employee of the Junge Akademie.

 

The interdisciplinary conference ‘Sweet Home’ was organised as part of the Essen Summer of Science & Research 2017. The exhibition ‘An diesem Ort _ die Ungewissheit bestimmt den Aufenthalt’ (‘In This Place _ Uncertainty Determines Where You Stay’) took place in conjunction with the symposium and featured photographic works about the situation of refugees, created by photography students from the Folkwang University of the Arts.