Music and Memory

This thesis explores the relationship between music and memory and the role of remembering through music in a migrant community, focusing on the experiences of New Wave migrants from Turkey in Berlin. Music holds a special place in the act of remembering, often evoking powerful emotions and memories for individuals and communities. For migrant communities, music serves not only as an artifact but also as a tool for remembering and community formation. It helps build bridges to the past and fosters a sense of collective identity in the present. This study examines the role of Turkish music in the lives of New Wave migrants and how the act of remembering through music functions within this migrant community through semi-structured in-depth interviews. While exploring the role of Turkish music in the everyday lives of migrants, the formation of community and collective identity, as well as collective remembering, this research also aims to discover the possibilities of the formation of a cultural memory and music’s relation to cultural memory within the migration context. By analyzing the relationship between music and memory while taking those two concepts as functions of each other in relation to the experience of migration, this study aims to contribute to music and memory studies in migrant communities.