On Oral History and Folk Music: An Interview with Tara AlDughaither
* Portrait taken by Mohammed Hamdi
Tara AlDughaither is a researcher and curator interested in the arts of the Arabian Peninsula. She completed her Bachelor’s degree in mass communication from the American University in Sharjah in 2013 and later joined the criticism and curation Master’s program at Central Saint Martin's London in 2015.
Art and music have always fueled Tara’s academic and research interests. She was specifically fond of the history and stories of folk music, so she created Sawt Asura to document and archive the overlooked and unknown musical history of Saudi women. Although the archive was officially launched in May 2021, Tara shared in an interview with Ward back in January 2021 the journey behind the archive.
In this interview, Tara reflects on her experience with exploring and learning rich the oral and musical history of Saudi women and her desire to reveal and share it. She also shares with us all of the stories and moments that ignited her passion to build a social platform that is considered one of its kind in Saudi.
Art projects dedicated to social change are often lost in translation because their message is inaccessible to the public. If you were asked to explain what Sawt Asura is briefly, how would you answer?
Since I began the project, I decided to avoid using academic jargon that others may find difficult and inaccessible. In short, Sawt Asura is a social collaborative platform and archive dedicated to collecting record of women’s musical history in Saudi Arabia. We can explore music and songs performed and created by women through this archive. And since it’s collaborative, everyone can contribute to it by recording and uploading on it. Moreover, this archive has no author or owner — it’s for anyone interested in documenting the music of Saudi women.
Some would say it could’ve been easier if I simply created a playlist on YouTube or other platforms. But I wanted to create and build a space for women to collaborate, document, and narrate their history on their own terms.
Sawt Asura logo
Our definition of knowledge is often limited to science or material heritage. However, Sawt Asura is focused on oral history, which is often overlooked when we think of knowledge. How did understanding this history inspire you to create Sawt Asura?
I thought about this a lot, and I can answer you with two points. First, like you mentioned, the predominant conception is that our knowledge and information about history and world culture are only gained through written documents and material heritage. But these documents and sites don’t provide us with the full picture because they don’t include the emotional and cultural state accompanying their production. Therefore, it’s important to be more holistic when we study history and culture and go beyond material heritage. For example, if we look at our history, we’ll see it depends heavily on oral history, like poetry and songs and stories. That’s why it’s crucial to begin looking at our oral history, especially that of women, not to only understand our past, but to be able to understand our future and where we’re heading.
Second, as a singer and music lover, I’m curious about music and its role in shaping the culture of communities all around the world. But I can’t research the history of women’s music in Saudi — the main idea behind Sawt Asura — because most of us don’t know who those singers are unless they have a public presence. Since this presence is mostly rare and only includes a few women, it doesn’t fully reflect the different cultures within Saudi and their relationship with music and singing.
A mix of tapes Tara found during her research in informal market
What was the event that inspired the idea of Sawt Asura?
I participated in the Arabic Music Retreat one summer. I didn’t realize while applying that this Program was 29 years old. The founder is also the director of the Eastern Music Department at the Berklee College of Music, one of the best music institutes in the world. The administrative director was the famous journalist Kay Hardy. She visited Saudi and was interested in documenting and writing about the folk music of Saudi women. When I received my admission letter, she mentioned that I was the first Saudi to join their program. I was proud, but I felt it was a miracle — how could I be the first one to be admitted to such a prestigious program? After I enrolled, I took different vocal courses with incredible instructors who I learned a lot from.
The idea of Sawt Asura was then naturally ignited as a response to the curiosity and sense of responsibility I felt towards Arabic music whose history I never learned. Journalist Hardy taught me about her journey in Saudi. She was the first to tell me about different Saudi women singers, including Toha, Ibtisam Lutfi, Etab, and Safia Al-Shteiwi. I was embarrassed after our conversations because I didn’t know who those singers were. But I was also very curious to learn who they were, as well as their stories. I also knew that if I didn’t know these names, someone else may not be familiar with them. So there must be a longer list of names that I need to explore.
Once the idea of the archive crystalized, what were the first steps you took?
I lived for a while in Oman. There, I was observing the rapid developments taking place in Saudi in 2016 and 2017. And I realized it was time to move back to my country and explore the musical history of women I learned about at the Retreat, which is still hidden for social reasons.
I got the opportunity to apply to the Prince Clause Fund in the summer of 2019. I introduced the idea of Sawt Asura in my application, and how I wanted to travel around Saudi and record and document songs and their stories. I thought I wouldn’t be accepted because the idea is bigger than me. To my shock, the idea was accepted with the beginning of the pandemic in 2020. Due to the circumstances back then, the initial stages of the project were completed entirely through online research.
Did you hesitate before going back to Saudi and beginning a project without knowing how others would react to it?
I was actually scared about going back to Saudi and continuing my career as a researcher and curator. I was hesitant because I thought there would be no interest in oral history since the predominant interest in the contemporary art scene is in big installations and other similar work. But I’m glad that I didn’t give in to this hesitation and fearlessly began this project.
After your initial online research, what steps did you take?
I began four months ago (around August 2020). I decided to take off in Jeddah because there are already popular names there, and I wanted to begin in a place where recording wasn’t a strange idea. By the way, the hardest part of creating this archive is introducing the idea of being recorded to Saudi women by a stranger (me) and getting their trust. This doesn’t mean that the music of other Saudi regions isn't as important. But as I mentioned, I took the first step in Jeddah due to social reasons and moved on from there to other cities and towns.
