Working title:
Voice-shifting as a Method: Eco-Gods in Future Orthodox Chants
Abstract "Voice-shifting as a Method: Eco-Gods in Orthodox Chants" proposes an alternate reading of the Serbian/Slavic Orthodox chant. The project strategically observes chants as a form of Serbian state nationalism. Examining Serbian Orthodox chants as the only official state performance ritual that re-emerged after the fall of the Former Yugoslavia, looking into their historical contexts during the Byzantine era and its pagan roots. The research takes the elements of Orthodox chants (e.g. form, narrative, melody, rhythm, and performance) out of their customary thematic/narrative patristic1 binary uses, and recontextualizes these elements with an eye toward possible future eco-narratives. It changes the narrative and its discoursewhat it is sung about, who it is sung to, and how it is composed. The proposed project will look into chants not only as sound morphologies but as cultural phenomena. By detaching them from the experience of the patristic past and the inherited narratives that church rituals enclose, my project proposes to create new narratives that relate to the present time and think about possible futures that take current anthropogenic ecological events into account. Using the narrative strategy of speculative fabulation, the work will weave complex myths into transnational experiences, capturing and complicating the idea of cultural heritage. In this research I will contemplate the following questions: What can we learn from insects to facilitate voice-shifting? How might performing chant not to God (a singular, male, anthropomorphic figure) but with and about insects disrupt previous institutional alignments and make room for new identifications?
1 Patristics (or patrology) is a theological science that presents the history and content of the teachings of the church fathers. The patristic tradition has the character of a dogmatic synthesis on which the apostles, apologists, martyrs, confessors, ecclesiastical writers, and fathers of the Church worked.
1. Topic and methodology
Keywords: voice-shifting, hymnography, liturgics, future speculative narratives, eco-feminism, new mythologies, Serbian Orthodox chant
At the core of this Ph.D. research is voice-shifting, with voice taken as the narrative context of the Serbian Orthodox chants. Theoretically, through a focus on voice/narrative-shifting, I question ontological principles of liturgical performance practices and develop new ways of thinking about difference and identity that are anti-essentialist rather than grounded or fixed. Of additional importance for this research is Donna Haraways' eco-feminist method that seeks knowledge through the weave of different threads, specifically using the form of speculative fabulation to narrate and examine the threads through alternate history. With voice-shifting I investigate voice (hymnography2) and its theatrical production (liturgics3) that have been practiced through time across different Serbian liturgical contexts. Historically, the Serbian Orthodox Chant encompasses an array of different influences from the Byzantine era, including Ottoman and Western chants. Through song, the research will examine Serbia's polytheistic past4, and how it shifted into a war-driven, state manipulation apparatus. Ultimately, my project aims to expand the possible contexts of chant, transforming them into a multispecies universe where deities translate to the natural world, and with that — creating new mythologies.
Another important intervention I hope to make with this research is to reverse the logistics of the hymn/chant making, taking sound and melody as a vehicle for the text,5 and not vice versa. Other parts of the research will encompass formal liturgical terminology and its meanings relating to different processional times of the year – further proposing an entirely deconstructed Serbian liturgical ritual that reaches toward a more ecological future. This newly deconstructed ritual would be the formal outcome and the practical part of this Ph.D.
2 The craft of hymn composition (including text)
3 Study of liturgy, predominantly the choreographies/performances and the ritual aspects accompanying chant.
4 Serbia was a part of the Slavic religion where they had beliefs, myths, and ritual practices of the Slavs before Christianization, which occurred at various stages between the 8th and the 13th century.
5 The sound in chant-making comes last, meaning it is in the service of the text and not vice versa.
"I believe in the relationship between me6 and you, conscience, a gaze, communication –creator of Heaven and Earth and everything visible and invisible."
Verse excerpt from Alarm7 (chant no.4 from my performance work Look up! I am no Canopy- I am a Messenger)
The original liturgical verses of the Symbol of Faith8 are: "I believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth and all things visible and invisible". This excerpt from Symbol of Faith (recited towards the end of the Sunday mass/liturgy) is a miniature case study from my practice-based work Look up! I am no Canopy- I am a Messenger9 , that deconstructed its context. The verses are turned into a fictitious story of the Brood XI10 who was "resurrected," came and spoke to its "disciples" from North America to Serbia. It brought environmental colonialism and alien species into play.
The formal methodologies and themes of this Ph.D. research, therefore, lie in my work Look Up!
I am no Canopy- I am a Messenger11. In the mentioned work, in order not to restrict our physical bodies to their physical properties, I decided to look into the psychological properties of insects in order to voice-shift. Building on my previous work addressing insects, chants, and time scales, the ambition of this Ph.D. project is to open and carve out a space for storytelling that attempts to go beyond the human.
6 The pronoun "Me" in the context of the work Look Up! I am no canopy- I am a Messenger! spoken from the first person (insect) perspective of the Magicicada septendecim
7 Verses appropriated from the Symbol of Faith
8 A Symbol of Faith is a statement of the common beliefs of a religious community in the form of a fixed formula that summarizes the basic principles.
9 The basis of the work Look Up! I am no Canopy- I am a Messenger was a book Insect singers: A natural history of the Cicadas (1929). It is a book by an exemplary entomologist John Golding Myers.
10 Is a Cicada colony that disappeared in 1954
11 For this project I worked with the members of the Serbian Orthodox Church Choir (Antifon) and theologian Đorđe Gojić. Additionally, the work was awarded The 59th October Salon Special Award at The 59th October Salon, 2022 (Belgrade Biennial).
"Verujem, u odnos Mene i Tebe, savest, pogled, komunikaciju, Tvorca Neba i Zemlje i svega vidljivog i nevidljivog."
3. Other theories and practices related to the research
The idea of "becoming insect" extracted from Deleuze and Guattari focuses specifically on the transformative potential of insects as a way of reimagining our relationship with the natural world, much like my proposed thesis. Insects are seen as symbols of metamorphosis, as they undergo radical physical transformations throughout their life cycles. This process of transformation can serve as a metaphor for voice-shifting, as well as a means of challenging traditional notions of identity and subjectivity.
A set of additional arts-related projects inform my research. Marguerite Humeaus' sound works speculatively propose the sounds of prehistoric mammals. Symphony for Absent Wildlife by Lucy and Jorge Orta brings a fragment of our disappearing natural environment, its sounds, and the diversity of its fauna, closer to the city. Marcus Coates' work Dawn Chorus attempts to question bird song, understanding it not only as a beautiful melody but as a ritual of domination. Other influences include Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping with his lifelong Earthallujah performance opus as well as Peter Szöke‘s Az Ismeretlen Madárzene / The Unknown Music Of Birds, where he analyzed bird "music" and created an alphabet of sounds. An example of a local artistic discourse related to the project is an art group ŠKART whose artistic practice blurs the boundaries between activism and environmental art. Their artistic practice usually employs choral performances.
4. Ph.D. supervision at HDK-Valand; contribution to the Academy
At the HDK-Valand, I hope to work more experimentally in order to re-contextualize narratives, and have the freedom to critically question the subject matter, as this kind of approach is lacking from the Serbian educational system. It would also allow me to think about it in relation to an international context. Additionally, Gothenburg would serve as a source of inspiration (from methodological institutional recourses to historical connections with the subject) and perhaps a point of reference for my artistic-philosophical- cultural investigation of the urban multispecies universe and Serbian history. For my part, I would bring training in Orthodox chant, a New Media art background, and familiarity with cross-cultural and theoretical literature on chants, ecology, and the arts. My previous art projects have demonstrated not only extensive research experience but also a solid background in formal representations. I hope that with
admission to the HDK-Valand Art program at the University of Gothenburg, I could continue to explore these research and performance interests in generative ways.
5. A provisional 3 year plan for research:
Catherine Keller reminds us about the urgent challenges of the climate change, environmental degradation, and the threat of mass extinction. Keller argues that these challenges demand a radical rethinking of traditional political and theological frameworks, and calls for the emergence of a new mode of political theology that can respond to the planetary emergency. She argues that traditional political and theological frameworks have been shaped by a narrow, anthropocentric worldview that prioritizes human interests and desires, often at the expense of the natural environment and other living beings. She argues that this new public sphere must be grounded in a multispecies ethics that recognizes the intrinsic value of all life, and that promotes sustainable practices and policies that prioritize the well-being of the environment and future generations.12
Both – ‗spiritual practice‘ (e.g. liturgies) and eco- feminist art give rise to transformative forces and have a potential to reconnect and deepen our engagement with the environment. Therefore, the research will combine theory of process philosophy with a practice-based activity through three interconnected activities throughout the three years: (i) an observatoryidentifying and mapping existing state and creative practices and theories; (ii) an intersectoral laboratory - for experimentation and collaboration; (iii) and evaluation - testing the new ecoperformative methodology and writing.
(i) By intermingling the thinking with the doing, I hope to gain embodied insights in historical, performance practices aforementioned in the section 3. ‘Other practices and theories related to the research’ Beside the practical approaches to experiential learning, the research will look into diverse theories built around multispecies feminist scholars13 , social science perspectives, ecocritical frameworks14 , sustainability, indigenous knowledge15 , queer ecology16
12 Catherine Keller, Political Theology of the Earth: Our Planetary Emergency and the Struggle for a New Public, Published by: Columbia University Press, 2018
13 Donna Haraway
14 Timothy Morton, Rosi Braidotti, Bruno Latour, Tim Ingold etc.
15 Robin Wall Kimmerer, Deborah Bird Rose, Donald Dwayne
16 https://queerecology.org/
(ii) During the second year, my intention is to start developing an intersectoral laboratory to work together with different institutions, organizations, scientists, choreographers, theologians, psychologists, anthropologists in order to initiate a dialogue and a pluralistic way of thinking between art, (natural) sciences and performative aspects of chants. I wish to act as a catalyst to connect different communities/institutions and establish a collaborative working practice with organizations outside of the art context.
(iii) From here I move to my choral practice where an intensive production of the research project will be taking place through performance training sessions. Ranging from the means of vocal and performative exercises, education to those of advocacy, the practical part of the project research will be conducted in- situ, depending on the context of the outcome and the details, it will aim to envelop a wide range of institutions, venues and/or public spaces.
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