A Sociological Reflection on Hosein Nasehi’s Flute Concerto: Compositional Agency and Symbolic Violence from a Bourdieuusian Perspective

Abbasi, Shervin; Kashfi, Mina

doi:10.30465/scs.2026.53587.3094

A Sociological Reflection on Hosein Nasehi’s Flute Concerto: Compositional Agency and Symbolic Violence from a Bourdieuusian Perspective

Document Type : .

Authors

shervin abbasi ¹

mina kashfi ²

¹ Master of Music Composition, Soure University, Tehran, Iran

² PhD in Art Research. Faculty of Art. Islamic Azad University Central Tehran Branches

10.30465/scs.2026.53587.3094

Abstract

Introduction
The study of musical works cannot be limited to formal or aesthetic analysis alone, particularly when those works emerge within complex social and historical contexts. Modern sociology of art has emphasized that artistic production is inseparable from the structures of power, legitimacy, and symbolic recognition that shape cultural fields. Among contemporary theoretical frameworks, Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of the field provides a powerful lens through which artistic works can be understood not merely as autonomous creations, but as socially situated practices embedded in networks of capital, habitus, and symbolic struggle.
Within the historical development of Iranian art music in the mid-twentieth century, composers trained in Western academic traditions attempted to introduce new compositional languages and formal structures. These efforts often unfolded in a musical field characterized by competing poles of legitimacy: on one side, the authority of traditional music, and on the other, the growing influence of media-driven popular forms. In this polarized environment, works that did not fully conform to either pole frequently occupied marginal positions, regardless of their structural or aesthetic innovation.
Hossein Nasehi’s Flute Concerto represents a significant example of such a case. The work reflects a compositional approach grounded in modern academic techniques while simultaneously engaging rhythmic and expressive elements that resonate with local musical sensibilities. Yet its reception history suggests a form of symbolic marginalization shaped by the institutional and discursive dynamics of the Iranian musical field. From a Bourdieusian perspective, this marginalization cannot be understood simply as an issue of taste or visibility; rather, it reflects mechanisms of symbolic power that regulate what becomes recognized, performed, and historically remembered.
This study seeks to examine Nasehi’s Flute Concerto through an integrated analytical framework that combines musicological analysis with Bourdieu’s sociological concepts of field, habitus, and symbolic violence. By reconstructing the historical musical field in which the work emerged and analyzing the concerto as a symbolic action within that field, the research aims to reveal the dialectical relationship between musical structure and social structure. Ultimately, the article argues that understanding the work requires recognizing both its internal musical logic and the broader social forces that shaped its reception and positioning within Iranian music history.
Materials and Methods
This study adopts a qualitative historical–analytical approach grounded in Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of the field. Rather than using Bourdieusian concepts as purely interpretive metaphors, the research operationalizes the notions of field, habitus, and symbolic violence as analytical tools for examining both musical structure and its socio-historical context. The methodological framework is organized into four interconnected stages.
Stage 1: Reconstruction of the historical musical field
The first stage focuuses on reconstructing the structure of the Iranian musical field during the mid-twentieth century (approximately 1940s–1960s). Primary and secondary sources—including historical writings on Iranian music, archival materials, institutional records, and contemporary commentaries—were examined to identify dominant actors, institutional frameworks, and competing poles of legitimacy. Particular attention was given to the distribution of cultural, symbolic, and institutional capital that shaped the conditions of musical production and reception.
Stage 2: Analysis of the composer’s historical habitus
In the second stage, Hossein Nasehi’s habitus is analyzed as a historically formed system of dispositions shaped by education, professional positioning, and aesthetic orientation. Operational indicators include academic training background, compositional priorities, institutional affiliations, and patterns of professional engagement. This analysis situates the composer’s artistic choices within broader structural tensions of the musical field rather than interpreting them as purely individual preferences.
Stage 3: Musicological analysis of the work as symbolic action
The Flute Concerto is examined through structural musicological analysis, focusing on form, rhythmic organization, harmonic language, and orchestration. These musical features are interpreted in relation to the dominant aesthetic norms of the historical field. The goal is to understand the work not only as an autonomous composition but as a symbolic intervention that negotiates and challenges prevailing conventions.
Stage 4: Identification of mechanisms of symbolic violence
The final stage evaluates the reception and positioning of the work within the musical field. Indicators of symbolic violence include patterns of institutional omission, absence from pedagogical repertoires, limited performance circulation, and marginal presence in historical narratives. These elements are analyzed to reveal how symbolic power structures influence artistic visibility and legitimacy.
Through the integration of historical reconstruction, sociological analysis, and musicological examination, the methodology establishes a dialectical framework that connects musical form with social structure. This multi-layered approach enables a comprehensive understanding of the concerto as both an artistic artifact and a socially situated cultural act.
Discussion and Result
The analytical findings indicate that Nasehi’s Flute Concerto operates simultaneously as a structured musical composition and as a symbolic intervention within the Iranian musical field of its time. From a musicological perspective, the work demonstrates a strong commitment to formal coherence and structural clarity, reflecting academic compositional training. The concerto employs balanced formal sections, controlled thematic development, and rhythmic asymmetries that diverge from both dominant traditional idioms and commercially oriented musical forms. These characteristics suggest an aesthetic orientation toward autonomy and compositional discipline rather than immediate accessibility.
The rhythmic organization of the concerto reveals deliberate engagement with irregular metric groupings, producing tension between expectation and resolution. This structural feature can be interpreted as an intentional departure from stabilized rhythmic conventions prevalent in the dominant musical practices of the period. Similarly, the harmonic language avoids overt tonal predictability while maintaining internal logic, reinforcing the work’s position within a modernist compositional framework.
When interpreted through Bourdieu’s concept of habitus, these musical decisions reflect a historically formed disposition shaped by academic training and critical distance from prevailing aesthetic norms. The concerto embodies a compositional habitus oriented toward structural rigor and artistic autonomy, positioning the work outside the symbolic comfort zones of the dominant poles of the musical field. This structural positioning contributed to the work’s ambiguous reception: it neither fully aligned with the legitimacy of traditional musical discourse nor conformed to the expectations of popular or media-driven production.
The reconstruction of the historical musical field suggests that such aesthetic positioning limited the institutional circulation of the work. Evidence of restricted performance history, marginal pedagogical presence, and limited incorporation into canonical narratives points to mechanisms of symbolic exclusion. Rather than explicit rejection, the concerto appears to have been subjected to forms of symbolic violence manifested through institutional silence and selective recognition. These mechanisms effectively constrained the accumulation of symbolic capital associated with the work.
Taken together, the findings demonstrate that the concerto’s musical structure cannot be separated from its social positioning. The work functions as both an artistic artifact and a socially embedded act that negotiates legitimacy within the field. The tension between structural innovation and institutional reception illustrates a dialectical relationship in which musical form both reflects and challenges the power relations governing cultural recognition.
Conclusion
This study demonstrates that Hossein Nasehi’s Flute Concerto can be meaningfully understood only when its musical structure is examined in relation to the social dynamics of the historical musical field in which it emerged. By integrating musicological analysis with Pierre Bourdieu’s theoretical framework, the research reveals that the work is not merely an autonomous artistic object but a socially situated symbolic act shaped by tensions within the field of cultural production.
The findings indicate that the concerto’s structural rigor, rhythmic experimentation, and compositional autonomy reflect a historically formed habitus grounded in academic training and critical distance from dominant aesthetic norms. This orientation positioned the work outside the principal poles of legitimacy in the Iranian musical field of the mid-twentieth century. Consequently, its reception was mediated by institutional mechanisms that limited its circulation and symbolic recognition. These dynamics exemplify how symbolic violence may operate through omission, selective visibility, and the reproduction of normative hierarchies rather than through explicit exclusion.
The dialectical relationship between musical form and social structure emerges as a central insight of this study. The concerto simultaneously reflects the constraints of its field and acts as a symbolic challenge to its established boundaries. In this sense, the work represents both the product of a particular historical configuration and an intervention that exposes the power relations embedded in processes of artistic legitimation.
More broadly, the study underscores the importance of combining sociological theory with close musical analysis to avoid reductionism on either side. Understanding musical works as socially embedded practices enables a richer interpretation of artistic production, reception, and historical memory. Future research may extend this approach to other composers and repertoires in order to further illuminate the interaction between musical creativity and the structures that shape cultural recognition.

Keywords

Hosein Nasehi

Pierre Bourdieu

Music Field

Symbolic Violence

Cultural Capital

Subjects

Society and education

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