Creativity and Sorrow in Kyrgyzstan

In this article, I explore the interconnections among society, ritual, and art in present-day Kyrgyzstan as manifested in koshok, a ritualized expression of grief in which melody is paired with affective performance. Like other ritualized performances of emotion, koshok incorporates a spectrum of learned affective behavior; thus phrases, utterances, vocal qualities, movements, gestures, and stances expressed in koshok are also dispersed throughout a range of non-ritual social activity. The transposition of koshok performance into new contexts and alternative media has lent new meanings and possibilities to the genre. For instance, mediated koshok as performed during a period of national mourning for the writer Chingiz Aitmatov demonstrated how ritual and art can be used by the state for the purpose of nation building. At the same time, it satisfies a desire to participate in a broader human experience as imagined through the shared experience of sorrow and beauty.