Arabness, Al-Watan, & Fairouz

Introduction 

For millions of Arabs around the world, Fairouz is not just a singer. She is a beacon of hope, a reminder of prosperity and authenticity, as well as a refuge for those who have left their homelands in search of a better life. Most of her listeners cannot even remember the very first time they heard one of her songs. She seems to have always been there, her voice traveling across the airwaves of radios, television sets, smartphones, and laptops. She is heard in homes, neighborhoods, cars, weddings, and restaurants. She is everywhere, all at once.

Among Arab diasporic communities, Fairouz offers opportunities for self-reflection and social positioning. She is able to tap into individual and communal spectrums of identity, allowing for various forms of understanding. During my research conducted for Fairouz and the Arab Diaspora: Music and Identity in the UK and Qatar, a book that examines audience responses to the music of Fairouz from Arab communities abroad, it was clear that when discussing Fairouz, the most intricate and intimate details of life among listeners were brought to the surface. Evidently, through her songs, Fairouz offers a glance into diasporic challenges and the ways the Arab experience can adapt and change across time and space. Fairouz in the diaspora operates as a tool of expression, and a fundamental reference for one’s history, present, and future. Her songs about patriotism, love, and resistance have contributed to notions of ‘Arabness’, which members of the Arab diaspora are able to navigate its significance in relation to both their individual and social identities. In addition, her lyrics open up opportunities for redefining concepts of ‘homeland’ or Al-Watan, and incorporating them into various sociocultural contexts. In whatever format she is heard, Fairouz and her songs provide room for the exploration of, and connection with, multiple forms of identity.

Fairouz & Arabness 

As a singer who rose to fame in the 1950s ‘Golden Era’ of Beirut, Fairouz has been characterized by some scholars as a Lebanese artist whose influence was limited to the borders of a single country. In his book, Popular Culture and Nationalism in Lebanon, Christopher Stone criticizes Fairouz as verging on being a “post-colonial, nation-building project”.¹ Although Stone presents valid arguments, and Fairouz as a Lebanese singer brings a host of other thematic undertones to the table, his obstinacy at cementing the artist to Lebanon’s geographic borders denies her ability for autonomy, relatability, and expansion across the region, and beyond. It is valid to assume that Fairouz as a figure transforms by way of historical and discursive events and conversations to represent various “social terrains”.² However, these emblematic constructs do not remain fixed in a spatial-temporal vacuum. Instead, they fluctuate according to subjective, communal, and contextual tangents that intersect with, and deviate from, each other. In this way, Fairouz takes on different meanings at different times to different audiences.

Consequently, it is not only Fairouz who adopts a flexible framework of representation, but also the certain ideas with which she is often associated that are molded and shaped to incorporate the diversity of her listeners. Through conversations with members of the Arab diaspora in London and Doha, Fairouz was constantly brought up as an inherently Arab artist who connotes ‘Arabness’. While the concept of Arabness is vague and can be subjected to political and limiting narratives, it is important here to see it as a malleable structure that can shift and take shape according to individual and social understandings of the term. Ramy Aly defines it as a performative “process”,³ or what he calls, “doing Arab”. For Aly, this is a means by which members of the Arab diaspora are able to express their identities through social activities and engagements. Arab diasporic listeners use the songs of Fairouz privately and publicly as a way of conveying and connecting with their versions of Arab identity. In my interviews, ideas of Fairouz, ‘Arabness’, and ‘Arab identity’ translated to terms such as ‘authenticity’, ‘nationalism’, ‘unity’, ‘the Palestinian cause’, ‘Arab struggles’, and ‘childhood’. Answers also included ‘Arab roots’ that parents wanted to pass on to their children, the ‘village’ and its innocence, and shared ‘hope’ for the Arab world. While there are some commonalities in the understandings of Arabness and its manifestations, these various articulations of the same term showcase that its meanings are negotiated and interpreted at both individual and collective levels. Through their relationships with collective forms of identity, members of the Arab diaspora are able to recognize their positions within these social structures according to their individual trajectories. Arabness was thus defined and explained according to sociopolitical, economic, religious, and cultural intersections. The social terrains of Fairouz as a figure incorporated and radiated meanings of Arabness, in which the components of a recognizable Arab identity subsequently emerge.

Fairouz & Al-Watan 

Through a lyrical discussion of Fairouz’s songs, members of the Arab diaspora were also able to provide insight into differing ideas of home and homeland. In her work, Fairouz takes her listeners on a journey to a simpler time, of life in the village, with ripe imagery of lush greenery, the Mediterranean Sea, and cobblestoned alleys. It is an affective return to a pre-modern state, a concept which has been discussed at length by Peter Blickle in his book, Heimat.⁴ The title describes a German concept that refers to the homeland in both tangible and intangible ways. It is discursive in meaning, and relies heavily on context while drawing on both individual and common understandings of the idea. It is laden with sociopolitical attributes, but its essence lies in its cultural implications and interpretations. With his discussion on Heimat, Blickle introduces notions of space, belonging, and self-perception.

In the Arab world, the closest counterpart to Heimat would be the term Al-Watan. While there is some body of work aimed at defining Al-Watan, most of it remains focused on the political and religious development of the term rather than providing an exploration of its sociocultural evolution. Political ideologies and religious affiliations can impact the ways in which Al-Watan is perceived, and the term has been used interchangeably with Al-Umma, Mawtani, or even Al-Balad. Political and philosophical scholar, Said Bensaid, who references historical Arab thinkers and philosophers in his work, discusses the semantic differences between Al-Umma and Al-Watan.⁵ In English, Al-Umma translates to ‘nation’, ‘people’, or ‘body politic’, whereas Al-Watan translates to ‘homeland’, ‘fatherland’, ‘(home) country’, ‘native country’, ‘native land’,  or ‘home’.⁶ Contemporary uses of the term and its derivative Wataniyya, meaning patriotism, are seen as more affective. According to Bensaid, the term surfaced in the resistance against Ottoman rule, where Arab countries viewed Al-Watan as something to defend and liberate.⁷ Although Bensaid offers an informative and detailed description of Al-Watan, there was a need to expand on its political and historical trajectories. It is through discussions with the Arab diaspora that Al-Watan can be seen as a dynamic and visual concept that incorporates multiple understandings. Through the lyrics of  Fairouz, members of the diaspora were able to exchange perspectives of Al-Watan, which showcased similarities and differences in its understanding.

In her songs, Fairouz also emphasizes the pre-modern elements of nature. One participant in my research, Ali, was living in London, and made references to “the rustling leaves, the chirping birds, and the running water” of one of her songs during our interview.⁸ He described the singer and her songs as “genuine” and symbolic of a “shelter”. This description of authenticity was also expressed by other participants in relation to identity and Arabness. It is a pre-modern Arabness found in the remnants of Al-Watan, which Amin, another respondent from London, describes as:

The life and time when people had each other’s back, and when the neighbor had the support of the other neighbor, the authentic Arab life that has now disappeared in the Arab world, and doesn’t exist anymore. Fairouz gives you the feeling of being ‘Arab’ and authentic.⁹  

Although many participants discussed the beauty found in the depictions of the pastoral and Mediterranean landscapes found in Fairouz’s songs, or focused on the communal and familial themes she describes, others vocalized their sadness at the destruction and subsequent unattainability of this idealized Watan: 

Li Beirut, (a song which translates to ‘For Beirut’ or ‘To Beirut’), […] makes me cry. To me, Beirut is an Arab city wrecked and ruined, although not like Baghdad and Damascus, but it has been ruined several times, it is under the ashes […] it is really sad what happened to our Arab world, and Beirut is an example of what happened to all the Arab cities. People still have the desire to live and love life, that’s fine, but there is still destruction, like the song says.¹⁰

On the same note, Maya, a Lebanese respondent living in Doha, said: 

A lot of her songs, like Sanarja’ou Yawman (which means ‘We shall return one day’), Raji’oun (or ‘We are returning’), and so on, are of course about Palestine. I’m not Palestinian, but somehow, it’s about a lost homeland, which I feel I have lost in Lebanon, and so they make me sad. Generally speaking, it’s a mixture of pride, but sadness as well. It’s pride and surrender. I feel more that I’m celebrating a time that is a paradise lost forever, and I’m grateful that I can document it in her songs.¹¹

These excerpts showcase the ways in which Fairouz, through her songs, was able to somehow document the violence and devastation the idealized Watan has endured, a forceful and significant transformation from a pre-modern state, or a paradise lost. This sense of loss attributed to Al-Watan is a direct response to the work of Fairouz, but also indicative of the sadness toward the destruction and violence the Arab world continues to experience. In addition, the differences in the reception of Fairouz’s songs highlight the complexity of trying to streamline definitions of Al-Watan among members of the Arab diaspora, who come from a variety of backgrounds, nationalities, religions, and ages. Consequentially, Al-Watan is able to take on a plethora of meanings and descriptions that are negotiated through the lyrics.

Linking Al-Watan to concepts of ‘home’ is significant here, since participants had different responses. The answers were dependent on a number of factors, including the nationalities of participants, and whether they were able to acquire citizenship from the countries they were living in. Evidently, some participants were uncertain about where their home was, they felt as if they were in transition, but had nowhere else to go. Other participants who felt a sense of bitterness toward their countries of origin, or otherwise felt comfortable in their current environments, stated that ‘home’ was mobilized within them, and that it was something they carried around and could access whenever they wanted. In some cases, respondents were sure of their home, they could define it spatially or geographically. It was either a place to which they wanted to return someday, or somewhere they never wanted to live in again. Even if participants were confused about their home, they were able to recognize elements of their Watan in the songs of Fairouz, even if they had never been there physically.

In this discussion, ‘home’ and Al-Watan need to be seen in relation to one another, but not as dependent on one another. For the Arab diaspora, home can be an emotional place or a location that participants can identify with. Similarly, Al-Watan can be an imagined place that is drawn and adapted by listeners through the lyrics of Fairouz. As a term, home is not homogenous in its understanding, but rather it can be understood according to the personal and communal experiences of Arab listeners.

Conclusion 

Discussing Fairouz with the Arab diaspora opens up opportunities for understanding different forms of identity in conjunction with contextual forces and global factors. It can be argued that the further Fairouz’s listeners are from her geographically, as they culminate into diasporic communities across the globe, the deeper the appreciations are of her songs. For listeners, Fairouz allows for the reflection and negotiation of identity across several spheres. These structures of identification need to be seen as dynamic and flexible, and as dependent on factors that move beyond individual perspectives to incorporate the living environments of the Arab diaspora, as well as the sociopolitical and economic undercurrents that are shaping their lived experiences. Trying to bind Fairouz, or the Arab diaspora as a whole, to a rigid and unaltered framework, ignores vital forces that give context and meaning to the subjective lives of her listeners. In turn, members of the Arab diaspora are active in disseminating and acquiring aspects of their identities in relation to the environment in which they are living. 

Many participants commented on the ways in which Fairouz allows for positive representations of ‘Arabness’. This ‘Arabness’ was one that participants wanted to identify with, and which was divorced from other negative portrayals and stereotypes Arabs are often labeled with. Through the lyrics of Fairouz, deep insights into perceptions of Al-Watan were given. This liberates the term from its confinement to political and religious definers, and moves it toward an active and living understanding that is personal as well as communal. In this way, Fairouz travels along with her listeners, and takes them on an inward journey through the realms of time and space, archiving their experiences along the way.

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The statements made and views expressed are solely the responsibility of the author, and do not represent Fiker Institute.