Firas Ben Nasr

Personal details

2014 Ph.D. in cultural sciences (in progress), specialty: Music and Musicology, Superior Institute of Music of Tunis, University of Tunis
2014 Master’s Degree in cultural sciences (with highest honors), specialty: Music and Musicology, Superior Institute of Music of Tunis, University of Tunis
2010 Diploma in instrument (oriental lute) with high honors, Superior Institute of Music of Sousse, University of Sousse
2010 Fundamental license in art of music and musicology (with honors), specialty: Interpretation of Arabic music, Superior Institute of Music of Sousse, University of Sousse

Research profile

  • Musicology
  • Ethnomusicology
  • Organology
  • History of Music
  • Anthropology of Art
  • Sociology of Art

Dissertation

Street Musicians in Tunesia: Use of the public spaces and identity construction

After the revolution, the new Tunisian alternative music became a symbol of creativity, of resistance to artistic, social and political conformity and invaded the social networks, the media and in particular the public spaces where our study subjects were able to raise the voice, to sing, and be known.

In this paper, we will study a new phenomenon in Tunisia, a subcategory of street arts and it’s the street music, from a socio-anthropological view, through groups (Art Is An Arm, Ganja Africa…) and individual musicians. We will try to give a detailed idea about these musicians (origins, style, ideas, motifs, goals, what they stand for, struggles and difficulties…), about the music and to study the communicational aspects, committed, humoristic, multiculturalist and moralizing of this kind of music and how it has become more and more over a new form of political and ideological expression practiced by youth and a way to escape from the normativity. We will try to question the constituent relations of the public space and to investigate the state of adaptation of public space users in front of this event, their acceptance and if these musicians are actually defying society norms. This research is based on fieldwork collecting and analysing data (quantitative and qualitative methods) in order to better understand this new phenomenon.

Lectures and conference contributions

2017

  • Doctoral Students Day, Institut Supérieur de Musiquede Tunis, 23rd January 2017.
  • German Oriental Studies Conference: Friedrich-Schiller Universität Jena, 18-22th September 2017. Lecture within Panel 29: “Changes in the Arab World: The interplay of the local, regional and national level” (19th September 2017): “Street Musicians: Use of the public spaces and identity construction”.

2018

  • Doctoral Students Day, Institut Supérieur de Musiquede Tunis, 30th January 2018.

 

Conference Participation  

2017

  • Seminar « L’interaction dans la musique », Rennes, 11-12th October 2017.
  • Seminar « Penser La Musicologie Aujourd’hui », Paris, 23-25th November 2017.

2018 

  • Seminar « Questions et perspectives de la musicologie », Tunis, 3rd April 2018.