ALEVİ-BEKTAŞİ İNANÇ BELLEĞİNİN SOSYAL MEDYAYLA İMTİHANI: YOUTUBE’DAKİ SEMAH KAYITLARI
THE TRIAL OF ALEVI-BEKTASHI’S COLLECTIVE FAITH MEMORY WITH SOCIAL MEDIA: THE VIDEO RECORDINGS OF SEMAH ON YOUTUBE

Summary/Abstract: The transformation course of semah, which is a ritual dance performed by Alevi-Bektashi communities across Turkey in cem rituals, from a ritualistic practice to a stage presentation and from there to an intangible cultural heritage element has been moved to another dimension with its representations circulating on cyberspace. The video recordings of semah on YouTube that can be considered as the concrete outputs of this transformation also involve a number of noteworthy details that can be used in analysis of the interactions between religious belief, cultural memory and digital media. These video recordings which contain certain embodiments of Alevi-Bektashi’s collective faith memory can be utilized a sampling domain for analyzing how the collective memory of the community in question is represented, transmitted and reproduced on cyberspace. The conceptual and theoretical aspect of this study which problematizes not only why media use memory as a content and but also how memory use media as a medium for reproduction and representation itself will be expounded in terms of cultural memory and digital media interactions. The practical dimensions of the study consist of various analyzes related to the samples selected from the video recordings of semah on YouTube.

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