Sixteenth International Conference on New Directions in the Humanities

Abstract

One of the factors that shape individual and collective identity is experience. Members of an ethnic group during their daily life are involved in different forms of ethnic experience. These experiences are mainly defined and redefined according to the dominant norms and values of the society, ethnic intellectuals, and the media. In Iran, the ideological confrontation and clash between the ethnic culture of the first and second Pahlavi dynasties (1926-1979) culminated in rising sensitivity about folk/ethnic art. On the other hand, after the revolution, the war with Iraq imposed by Saddam Hussein together with a monological discourse of ideology led to the backwardness of ethnic art originating in rural areas compared to the modernity of urban art in Gilan province. In this part of Iran, a contradiction exists between ethnic elites and commoners in their perceptions of ethnic identity. While ethnic intellectuals overemphasize a textual form of ethnic identity and invented ethnic traditions and rituals, the common people disregard these forms in favor of lived experience. This paper opens a new field of discussion under the lens of the idea of horizon of ethnic expectation.