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hande Birkalan-Gedik | muslim | martyr | masculine
in this formative period of the Turkish state is that secularist and religious
elements were not yet as visible in Turkish nationalism. They had to rely on
each other to follow the nationalist narrative further.
Yet, an official vision of a Turkish Islam emerged in the 1980s. In particu-
lar, the Turkish army propagated the “Turkish-Islam synthesis” (Türk-Is-
lam sentezi) during this period and borrowed Islamic elements in support of
its vision of nationalism. In fact, this resulted in religion being “officially”
and “legally” (re)claimed by nationalists. As many scholars argued (Gü-
venç et al. 1991, Bora/Can 1990), this was the “official ideology” behind the
military coup on 12th September, which aimed to suppress leftist ideologies
that they blamed for the increasing anarchism in the 1970s, leading to a
bloody coup on 12th September 1980. Religion, as the idea of Turkish Islam
shows, was used as a means of political leverage to fight against the so-
called “anarchist” groups.7
As already mentioned, the so-called “secular” nationalism during the
1920s and1930s, however, was not free of Islamic connotations. In the po-
litical realm, secular ideas seemed to work for the new polity, but on the
social and cultural level this was not necessarily the case. The İstiklal Marşı
(Turkish National Anthem/Anthem of Independence), which was adopted
in 1921, praised and celebrated martyrs and martyrdom evoking Gallipo-
li – 1915:
“Who would not sacrifice their lives for this paradise-like country?
Martyrs would burst out, Martyrs, if one simply crushes the soil!”
The above verses are open to interpretation from various angles. Clearly,
martyrdom is for the nation (millet) and homeland (vatan/memleket), which
is only implied here as gendered. While Turkish is considered as a “gender-
neutral” language, the language is not void of gendered references. Owing
its roots to Arabic, the word millet in Turkish largely refers to brotherhood,
while vatan is imagined to be a female entity. As Afsaneh Najmabadi dem-
onstrated, Iranian nationalism is related to the male nature of the nation
and the female nature of the homeland:
“closely linked to the maleness of millat and femaleness of vatan is the
concept of namus [honor]. Rooted in Islamic thought, namus was de-
linked from its religious affiliation [namus-I Islam] and reclaimed as a
national concern [namus-i Iran], as millat itself changed from a reli-
gious to a national community” (Najmabadi 1997, 444).
million. Reliable scholarly sources
estimate the number to be around
12–13 million. According to a survey
in 2014, carried out by the CHP (Re-
publican People’s Party), a secular
pro-Alevi party and the largest op-
position party in Turkey, the total
population of Alevis is 12,521,792.
There are also estimates by the CHP
estimating the Alevis population
between 13–15 million (Gedik/Ma-
deira/Birkalan-Gedik 2019).
7 The Turkish-Islamic Synthesis
was originally formulated by the
right-wing nationalist Intellectual
Hearths (Aydınlar Ocakları) in the
1970s, but after the 1980 coup it rose
to become the de facto state ideo-
logy. Banu EligĂĽr points out that to
stabilize the country, to legitimize
the state, and to counter the threat
of leftist radicalism, the military
employed what is referred to as
the “Turkish-Islamic Synthesis,”
which used Sunni Islam to create an
“Islamic sense of community and
prevent a recurrence of ideological
clashes and the political violence of
the 1970s,” because “the military
regarded Sunni Islam as a unifying
instrument against anarchy and
as the source of the nation’s moral
life.“ (2010, 95–96).
Limina
Grazer theologische Perspektiven, Band 2:1
- Titel
- Limina
- Untertitel
- Grazer theologische Perspektiven
- Band
- 2:1
- Herausgeber
- Karl Franzens University Graz
- Datum
- 2019
- Sprache
- deutsch
- Lizenz
- CC BY-NC 4.0
- Abmessungen
- 21.4 x 30.1 cm
- Seiten
- 194
- Kategorien
- Zeitschriften LIMINA - Grazer theologische Perspektiven