engleski

When the technology is in the hand(phone)s of 'the primitive'

Over the past years, a recurrent theme found within Croatian mediascapes has been the "case" of turbo-folk. To judge by the TV features, news headlines, talk shows or titles of newspaper articles – one comes to the conclusion that turbo folk has become one of the most important, most discussed, and most contested facets of musical life in Croatia. Labelled variously as "bad", "corrupting", "dangerous, " and even "primitive" music by "official" media, turbo folk, as well as its audiences, are discursively being pushed to the margins of society, "appropriate" cultural images and, in case of Croatia's capital, to the edges of urban-ness. Everyday soundscapes of Zagreb, however, sound a different story. Through loudspeakers of passing cars and handphones' ringtones (to mention just the most penetrating), turbo folk seems to "fight its way back" into the centre of the city and its soundscape. Departing from seemingly insignificant add space offering various ringtones for cellphones (appearing on final pages of many Croatian magazines), I try to navigate through thick layers of discursive practices, labelling processes, and the struggle over interpretation/representation on the one side, and listening practices, consumption processes and resistance to being labelled, on the other.

music; turbo folk; technology; ringtones; handphones; Croatia

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