Ethnography has been central to my work since the earliest stages of my training in ethnomusicology. For my MA thesis, I conducted fieldwork on Iranian Azerbaijani ashiq culture and music in the Zanjan region of Iran. I examined how interactions among musicians, hosts, and audience members, together with financial transactions and the circulation of money, helped shape the repertoire performed at wedding ceremonies. During this period, I was trained by Sasan Fatemi, whose scholarship in Iranian ethnomusicology influenced my approach to fieldwork and musical analysis.
I later worked as a research assistant to Hajar Ghorbani on an ethnographic project in cemeteries, particularly Behesht-e Zahra in Tehran, where I focused on sound, music, mourning practices, and death rituals. For my PhD at the University of Alberta, Canada, I conducted extended ethnographic fieldwork in Baku under the supervision of Professor Michael Frishkopf, whose ethnographic expertise spans diverse musical and cultural contexts across Africa, including Ghana and Egypt.
Across these research projects, I developed a grounded approach to argument-making and theorization. Rather than beginning with abstract explanations and applying them to the field, I learned to build interpretations from close observation, interviews, social interactions, performance practices, institutional structures, and the everyday conditions in which music is produced and experienced. Ethnography has therefore shaped not only my research methods, but also the way I formulate questions, develop concepts, and connect broader theoretical arguments to specific social and musical realities.