hamed soltanzadeh

From the Nasserite period to the mid-1930s, LalehZar Street was one of the main centers of modernism in Tehran. A significant number of theaters and cinemas, as well as cafes and offices of some of the press, were located in this street. The impotant matter is that our knowledge about many of these cases is limited and inaccurate. As an example, we can point to the serious weakness of the researches about LalehZar theaters. In an unpublished paper, we have explained the situation of LalehZar theaters from the time of the first performance in the upper floor of Faros Printing house in 1909 until the end of the reign of Reza Shah (1941). In this research, we seek to explain the situation of LalehZar theaters from 1941 to 1979.  The main question of this research is about factors which were effective in the ups and downs of LalehZar theaters in the period between 1941 and 1979. We have used the library research method for collecting information about Laleh-zar theaters. Our findings indicate that political, cultural and economic factors were influential in the situation of LalehZar theaters in this period. Following the expansion of social and political freedom after the fall of the government of Reza Shah, the desire to perform theater increased and various theater groups began to work. In this relatively free space, critical views on social or political issues were presented in the songs performed in the interlude. Theater Performances of Nushin group in Farhang and Ferdowsi theaters increased the quality level of other theaters. After the coup 1953 a number of theater artists were arrested because of affiliation with Tudeh Party or National Front. However, political change did not make serious influence on LalehZar theaters. Of course, increasing the popularity of Cinema in the 1950s caused the LalehZar theaters to face economic problems. So they started performing attraction in the theater from 1956. Meanwhile, as a result of the geographical development of Tehran, from the mid-1930s, wealthy people and middle-class members gradually turned to other entertainment centers instead of LalehZar theaters, and the lower classes became the main clients of these theaters. Finally, during the Islamic Revolution, there were serious changes in the situation of LalehZar theaters.

The Emergence of Cultural history in the 1970s and 1980s and its subsequent dominance was in part a response to the perceived limitations of the social history. In describing the behavioural tendencies of social groups and emphasizing normative behaviour, often in the abstractions of numbers and charts, social historians had moved beyond an elite-dominated political paradigm but had ignored both the uniqueness of individual experience and the ways in which social life is created through politics and culture. By bringing more marginal practices out from the shadows, cultural historians expose the presumed hegemonic assumptions to which social historians had previously been tied. But cultural history, in the absence of theories about ordinary experience as supplied by economists, sociologists and psychologists, even by biologists, has begun seriously to erode historical knowledge about large slices of human experience. We, cultural historians, have never needed social historians more than we do today. We need to ask searching questions about the theories that have become the commonplace of cultural analysis. We need to make explicit the connections between the theory and the historical behaviour. But most of all, we need to return to that aspect of social history which asked sharply put questions and communicated them through the manner in which the research was organized.

Pahlavi's magisterial modernity has brought changes in Iranian society. Afterwards, the everyday life of people, including their entertainment, has changed. The clerics saw some of these changes in conflict with the Islamic Shari'a and thus criticized this situation. The aim of this research is to study the approach of Darsshaee az Maktab-e Islam (Lessons from the School of Islam), the most popular and durable religious magazine during Pahlavi period, towards the common entertainment of that era. The main questions of this research are which characteristics of common entertainments of that period criticized more by writers of this magazine? From their point of view, which factors led to the promotion of unhealthy entertainment? This research has been done in descriptive method. The findings of this research indicates that in the years preceding the 28 Mordad coup d'état the free consumption of alcoholic beverages was considered the great sin by the religious persons. After the coup, due to the increasing of sexual contents in the press and cinematic films, the criticism of writers of the Maktab-e Islam magazine focused on this issue more than any other subject. During the early days of its publication, regarding the reason for the spread of unhealthy amusements the writers of the magazine raised the possibility that Colonialists are going to stupefied individuals in order to dominate the society. At the end of Pahlavi era and under the influence of the leftist intellectuals, they emphasized on the Western Capitalism’ usage of these tools for stupefying the society in order to maintain its influence and gain more benefit.