The politicization of Islam and the journey of Islamism (III): Arab Nationalism, Islamism, and Orientalism
NURAY MERT
This study aims to draw attention to the problems of reducing the scope and boundaries of criticism about Orientalism to the “criticism of the cultural hegemony of the West”, although it includes many complex issues, through a few striking examples of Orientalism. In this study, Orientalism and Orientalists’ conceptualizations of East and Islam found more response than it is thought in the discourses of Islamism that claim to represent the world of East and Islam and it is claimed that the two exit points that form the basis for Orientalist discourses coincide with the political discourses of Islamism. One of these points of departure is the view that claims that the “East” or “Islamic” world cannot be modernized, cannot modernize, and therefore lags behind its age, which shows the East as a concrete expression of backwardness, underdevelopment and legitimizes the intervention to it. The other starting point is the romantic view of the Westerners who are interested in the East and the Islamic world as an alternative to the modern West, who are fascinated by the East and perceive it as a place of escape or admiration as described in some examples. The conceptualization of Orientalism and the criticisms that question the hegemony of the West exclude the economic, social, political power and hierarchy forms and relationships of the East or the Islamic world, the object of Western hegemony. Therefore, because of the Enlightenment and progressive view of history, the idea that the East was behind the history and should be modernized despite the East paved the way for authoritarian modernist politics in places classified as “East”. Similarly, Orientalist thought, which paralleled the tradition of anti-lightenment/anti-modernism, also fed the ground of anti-modernist authoritarian political traditions in places classified as “East”.
Keywords: Orientalism, Ottoman, Islamism, Westernism, Arab Nationalism.
Escape from modernity: Collective nostalgia and New Turkey’s back-to-the landers
GÖZE ORHON
Nostalgia, in its popular and vernacular uses, is widely understood as a form of fondness of the past or tending towards a “past with the pain removed” (Lowenthal, 1985). Some conceptual ramifications, Boym’s (2007) discussion on the “reconstitutive nostalgia” being in the lead, enables nostalgia easily aligned with conservatism. However, nostalgia as negation of the present also holds utopian potentials. The roots of the concept lay in the feelings of unrest and anxiety over against the modern, and thus, comtemporary nostalgia is a convenient conceptual tool while examining our relationship with the modern. The main argument of this article is that some responses produced against the destructive appearances of the modern, migration to the rural/coastal which has become more observable in recent years, in particular, can be interpreted as utopian, nostalgic structures of feeling. Some appearances of this migration trend which is not peculiar to Turkey and may be related to the implications of the back-to-the-land movements worldwide, are examined through situating it in current Turkish context and drawing on the discussions on utopian nostalgia and back-to-the-land literature. Keywords: Nostalgia, utopia, modernity, new agrarianism, back-to-the-land.
Change and modernization in the small town: A comparative look at Mübeccel B. Kıray’s Ereğli
EROL DEMİR
Mübeccel B. Kıray (1923-2007), one of the leading sociologists of the recent decades in Turkey, studied the process of social change and modernization in a Black Sea coastal town in the 1960’s. In this study, titled as Ereğli: A Coastal Town Before Heavy Industy, Kıray developed a theoretical approach based on mainly a historical and structural-functional perspective, and formulated the concept of “buffer mechanisms” which plays a generating/ intermediary role in the transition from feudal to modern society, with some distinctive findings from the empirical research. The theoretical arguments and concepts developed in this study have continued in Kıray’s subsequent studies even though it seemed some theoretical shifts in her later studies. In this article I try to locate her approach and concepts devel oped in Ereğli within a wider literature chain, to compare with some sociological perspectives and sociologists’ views, especially Behice Boran’s early texts, and to indicate the continuities and shifts of her main arguments in the course of her subsequent studies. From this, I explore new meanings and problematics both on the facts of the small town, which is a less studied sociological issue, and of modernization process, in addition to Kıray’s contributions. In this framework the article deals with and discuss the issues like transition period, multiple modernities, triggering factors, urban-rural continuum, center-periphery relations and class differentiation on the fact of small town in Turkey in a comparative perspective.
Keywords: Mübeccel B. Kıray, Behice Boran, modernization, small town, transition period.
Germany, sportive integration and the frame of “us”
SELİM RUMİ CİVRALI
Migration refers to the movement of the geographical location of individuals or groups for a relatively long term. Sports historians dealt with the concept of immigration chiefly within the context of colonial history, addressing it as a natural outcome of the policies pursued by colonial powers. Recently, however, there has been a marked increase in the number of studies focusing on the integration of immigrant communities through sport. One reason for this surge could be the efforts to gain better insight into the integration processes in Europe, particularly in Germany, which is now considered a country of immigration and an immigrant society. In the face of increased ethnic and religious diversity, the country is now confronted with big controversy surrounding the social integration and adaptation of immigrants. Such controversy have made migration a hotly debated issue in both academic and public circles. In an effort to successfully integrate this large immigrant population into society, the German government effectively uses club activities, recreational activities and physical education lessons in schools. Under the “Sport and Migration” policy, the German Olympic Sports Confederation states that organized sport promotes “intercultural understanding” and “can make an important and valuable contribution to an atmosphere of tolerance”. By investigating the impact of sport and sports clubs on the integration of Turkish immigrants into the German society, we can devise a more sophisticated theoretical framework regarding the integration policies of Germany and also bring a nuanced perspective to the sports history’s new stance on migration.
Keywords: Migration, Germany, integration, sport, Turkish immigrants.
Possibilities of writing and pleasure in Ana Yurdu
GÜL YAŞARTÜRK
Ana Yurdu focuses on the relationship between Halise and her daughter, Halise and Nesrin is constructed as antithetical. Nesrin is a prospective author that had an abortion and divorced, with no regular jobs. On being a teacher, Halise becomes a metaphor of the Turkish modernization project. The new woman of the Republic were seen as the symbols of modernization, and were assigned to be teachers as long as they prioritized being wives and mothers. Women’s participation in the public space was only possible by balancing between modernization and traditionalism. Ana Yurdu doesn’t repress motherhood, it doesnt portray the mother as a monster or an angel, its not only representing the mother-daughter relationship as a competitıon or jealousy in its abstract view. The common decisive agent of Halise and Nesrin is the patriarchy. In this context, Ana Yurdu is examined within the framework of the status of women in Turkish Modernization. Slyvia Walby and R. W. Connell’s definitions of patriarchy and mother-daughter relationships in feminist theory, and Gilbert and Gubar’s analyses on the women writer.
Keywords: Ana Yurdu, motherhood, Turkish modernization.
