Public Seminar: Turkish Nationalism Revisited
Thursday January 26, 2017, 14:00-17:00
at University of Helsinki, Fabianinkatu 24 F24, venue room 135
It is obvious even to the casual observer that nationalism persists in Turkey. Therefore it is crucial to study nationalism in order to understand politics and society in Turkey. An ongoing topic in the academic debate is the content of Turkish nationhood. What are its core components? How is the nation defined? Who can be included, and who is excluded? How does this influence Turkish politics and society? In this public seminar, expert speakers from Turkey and Finland will discuss these issues.
Prof. Mesut Yeğen, Istanbul Sehir University:
”Turkish Nationhood: Civic, yet ancestral, and yet cultural”
Commentary by Toni Alaranta, Senior Research Fellow at the Finnish Institute of Foreign Affairs
Research Fellow Johanna Vuorelma, University of Warwick:
“Politics of exclusion: Military coups in Turkey”
Chair: Hannu Juusola, Professor in Department of World Cultures (Middle Eastern Studies), University of Helsinki
Mesut Yeğen is a faculty member at the Department of Sociology in İstanbul Şehir University. He received B. Sc. and M. Sc. degrees in sociology from Middle East Technical University and Ph. D. in sociology from Essex University. He taught at the Department of Sociology of Anatolia University and the Department of Sociology of Middle East Technical University. His research and publications have focused on Turkish nationalism, Kurdish question and citizenship in Turkey.
Johanna Vuorelma is a Research Fellow at the Department of Politics and International Studies in University of Warwick. Her research focuses on Western narratives of Turkey in foreign policy analysis. She is also the editor-in-chief of Politiikasta.fi, a popular science online journal of the Finnish Political Science Association. Her PhD dissertation “Losing Turkey? Narrative traditions in Western foreign policy analysis” will take place in Warwick in January 2017.
The seminar is organised by University of Helsinki (Middle Eastern Studies) and Finnish Institute in the Middle East (FIME). Welcome!