Fragile Scenes: Metal, Rap, and Electro in Post-Revolutionary Tunisia

Abstract

The thesis analyses three youth cultures in contemporary Tunisia: metal, rap, and electro. Tunisia is a North-African country which has often been represented as a bridge between Europe and the Arab/Muslim world. It is a crossroad of cultural influences, and its complex situation of economic disadvantage and social inequality imposes peculiar conditions to the existence of local youth cultures and popular music scenes. Moreover, its history of dictatorship, and its 2011 revolution (which inaugurated the so-called Arab Springs), render it a locus of political and cultural struggle. For these reasons, the Tunisian context offers the possibility of expanding the research on youth culture beyond the much-covered West. The thesis is built upon data coming from a fieldwork research that was carried out for eleven months between 2014 and 2015. Data were collected through interviews with 70 participants in the three scenes (musicians, concert organisers, venue managers, journalists, fans); through participant observations at concerts, DJ sets, and other sites of scene interaction; and through the analysis of textual data coming from Internet websites, song lyrics, newspapers, and the like.