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| Semester | spring semester 2021 |
| Course frequency | Once only |
| Lecturers | Özhan Kapici (oezhan.kapici@unibas.ch, Assessor) |
| Content | Professional history writing in Turkey developed under the influence of westernization in the second half of the nineteenth century. In this period, history writing was inevitably influenced by the tradition of the official chroniclers. However, traces of the western historicism could be seen alongside the classical “Ibn Khaldunism” of late Ottoman historiography. Turkish history writing fell under the influence of western positivist historiography and promoted progressivism and nationalism during the Second Constitutional Period. The Institute for Ottoman History (Tarih-i Osmani Encümeni) was founded at that time to construct the past and build up an identity for the integration of Turkish national components into the Ottoman Empire. Turkish nationalist historiography (or Kemalist official historiography) in the early republican period inherited late Ottoman nationalist and positivist historiography. The historiography was institutionalized in the service of the legitimacy of a new nation-state and quest for a national identity. The foundation of the Turkish Historical Society in 1930 meant the beginning of a new period in historiography. The society’s establishment came in the shadow of the Congresses of Turkish History, held in order to fabricate a new historical thesis under the patronage of the one-party regime. Of course, the new exclusionary and speculative arguments conceptualized by the prominent representatives of Kemalist historiography were not necessarily approved by the entire community of historians in Turkey. The opponents of Kemalist historiography launched a movement with the popular historical journals and publications as an alternative to the official historiography. This popular historical trend created a Turkish-Islamic synthesis, which began to be supported by the government at the beginning of the Cold War. By 1970, Turkish historiography merged gradually into the mainstream of Turkish-Islamic synthesis. However, this era also witnessed a decisive growth of critical historiography inspired by the Western or Soviet historiographies. This course aims to classify the periods of the Turkish historiography and analyze the discourse of the current situation in the historiography in Turkey. |
| Learning objectives | By the end of the course students are expected to be able to: - explain ideas or concepts of the Turkish historiographical mindset - compare the Turkish historiography with that of its neighboring countries - critically analyze the relationship between historical knowledge and power in Turkey - analyze the contribution of the historiography to nation-building and state-making in Turkey |
| Bibliography | Büşra Ersanlı. The Ottoman Empire in the Historiography of the Kemalist Era: a Theory of Fatal Decline, The Ottomans and the Balkans: A Discussion of Historiography, edited by Fikret Adanır and Suraiya Faroqhi, Leiden: Brill, 2002. Cemal Kafadar-Hakan Karateke. Late Ottoman and Early Republican Turkish Historical Writing, The Oxford History of Historical Writing, vol.IV, ed.Stuart Macintyre-Juan Maiguashca-Atilla Pòk, 2011, pp.559-577. Christoph K. Neumann. Bad Times and Better Self: Definitions of Identity and Strategies for Development in Late Ottoman Historiography (1850-1900), The Ottomans and the Balkans: A Discussion of Historiography, edited by Fikret Adanır and Suraiya Faroqhi, Leiden: Brill, 2002. Erik J. Zürcher. Village and Empire: Recent Trends in the Historiography of the Late Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, Iran and the Middle East: Transnational Encounters and Social History, eds. H.Shehabi, P.Jafari, M.Jefroudi, London: I.B.Tauris, 2015. Étienne Capeaux. Espaces et temps de la nation turquie, Analyse d’une historiographie nationaliste 1931-1993, Paris: CNRS Edition, 1997. Ferdan Ergut. Institutionalization of History in the Ottoman Empire. Turkish Studies vol.16, no. 2 (2015): 219–239. Selim Deringil. From Ottoman to Turk: Self-Image and Social Engineering in Turkey. Making Majorities: Constituting the Nation in Japan, Korea, China, Malaysia, Fiji, Turkey and the United States, edited by Dru. C. Gladney, 217–226. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998. Stefan Plaggenborg. Ordnung und Gewalt: Kemalismus-Faschismus-Sozialismus, Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2012. Suavi Aydın. Use and Abuse of Archeology and Anthropology in Formulating the Turkish Nationalist Narrative, Nationalism in the Troubled Triangle: Cyprus, Greece and Turkey, edited by Ayhan Aktar et al., 36–46. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. |
| Comments | This course is complemented by the practical course (Übung) “Main Trends in the Historiography of Turkey: Reading and Interpreting Turkish Sources.” |
| Language of instruction | English |
| Use of digital media | No specific media used |
| Interval | Weekday | Time | Room |
|---|---|---|---|
| wöchentlich | Thursday | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz - |
| Date | Time | Room |
|---|---|---|
| Thursday 04.03.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 11.03.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 18.03.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 25.03.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 01.04.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | Ostern |
| Thursday 08.04.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 15.04.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 22.04.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 29.04.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 06.05.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 13.05.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | Auffahrt |
| Thursday 20.05.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 27.05.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Thursday 03.06.2021 | 10.15-12.00 | - Online Präsenz -, -- |
| Modules |
Modul: Areas: Europa Global (Master's degree program: European History in Global Perspective) Modul: Forschung und Praxis (Master's degree subject: East European History) Modul: Themen der Near & Middle Eastern Studies (Master's degree subject: Near & Middle Eastern Studies) Wahlbereich Master Geschichte: Empfehlungen (Master's degree subject: History) |
| Assessment format | continuous assessment |
| Assessment registration/deregistration | Reg.: course registration; dereg.: not required |
| Repeat examination | no repeat examination |
| Scale | Pass / Fail |
| Repeated registration | no repetition |
| Responsible faculty | Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, studadmin-philhist@unibas.ch |
| Offered by | Fachbereich Nahost-Studien |