ABSTRACT
The time has come to stand back and look at the entire study so far. Our analysis of some major themes and frames of the rebetiko debate has made it clear that rebetiko is a deeply ambiguous genre. No matter from which angle one approaches it, the genre appears to be partially incompatible with the set of beliefs that influence the way people behave in a particular sphere of social life such as business, science, the arts or politics. And this partial incompatibility is constantly expressed by means of spatial attributes. Perhaps it is no exaggeration to say that the idea of rebetiko being a music that ‘defies’ (classification, for instance) or expresses ‘defiance’ (of the law, the authorities, social norms etc.) is one of the foremost topoi – to use another spatial metaphor – of the public debate about it. Let me illustrate:
• Certainly the most characteristic example of the ‘topology’ of rebetiko is what I have called the nonconformity frame: the belief that rebetiko, especially in its early stages, reflected the views and experiences of outlaws, outcasts, dropouts – generally speaking, of people outside the mainstream of Greek society. In the Cretan port city Heraklion at the turn of the twentieth century, these people were also called kalderimidzídhes (cf. Zaimakis 1999, 90-93), which derives from the Turkish kaldırım (‘cobbled street’ in a town) and kaldırımcı (‘he who hangs around in the street’, fig. ‘pickpocket, thief, swindler’) – another spatial metaphor denoting marginality in the sense of being ‘outside the house’ (where respectable citizens are expected to spend their time).
