letter of acceptance (EDU 2022)

2022

The process of nation-building can be seen as a never-ending attempt for a considerable number of nation-states. Education has been one of the primary tools in this process. It can be argued that nation-building policies should be seen as aspects of an attempt rather than a project that can be realized successfully in all terms. Following this argument, this study has two main objectives: to draw a detailed literature review addressing the dynamics, actors and stages of the nation-building process and nationalism and to critically analyze how Turkish academia has dealt with nationalism education. This study will proceed via the following sections: Firstly, the main theoretical discussions concerning nationalism will be covered. In this regard, ethnic/civic nationalism and other types of nationalism, including the concept of "banal nationalism" coined by Michael Billig (1995) will be under scrutiny. Secondly, the state-formation process from a cultural viewpoint will be analyzed. In this part, the works of thinkers such as Pierre Bourdieu, Michel Foucault and Antonio Gramsci will be referred to. Next, 'the nation-building process as a never-ending attempt' will be addressed. Finally, the teaching of nationalism in Turkish academia will be discussed from a historical viewpoint.

2019

Nationalism, a modern sociopolitical phenomenon, bears a close connection with the rise of modern educational institutions. Additionally, modern educational institutions, in line with the ideology of nationalism, take upon themselves to consolidate ethnic and cultural diversities and transform them into a solid national identity in order to constitute the nation as a political unit. This article aims to survey the role of modern educational institutions in constructing a shared national identity. The present article, employing a comparative-historical analysis, will shed light on how modern nation-states were constituted in Iran and Turkey. Ultimately, based on theory of nationalism by Ernest Gellner (1925-1995) the results of the study indicated that both in Iran and Turkey, the notion of nation was fabricated via the nationalist ideology. Thus, in both countries, the educational institutions, which were in charge of political forces, did their best to help the state in order to bu...

2019

2022

The Teaching of Nationalism and Nation-Building in Turkey The process of nation-building can be seen as a never-ending attempt. Education has been one of the primary tools in this process. It can be argued that nation-building policies should be seen as aspects of an attempt rather than a project that can be realized successfully in all terms. Following this argument, this study has two main objectives: to draw a detailed literature review addressing the dynamics, actors and stages of the nation-building process and nationalism and to critically analyze how Turkish academia has dealt with nationalism education. This study will proceed via the following sections: Firstly, the main theoretical discussions concerning nationalism will be covered. In this regard, ethnic/civic nationalism and other types of nationalism will be under scrutiny. Secondly, the state-formation process from a cultural viewpoint will be analyzed. In this part, the works of thinkers such as Pierre Bourdieu, Michel Foucault and Antonio Gramsci will be referred to. Next, ‘the nation-building process as a never-ending attempt’ will be addressed. Finally, the teaching of nationalism in Turkish academia will be discussed from a historical perspective

a turkish and social science education, gaziosmanpaşa University, tokat, turkey; b turkish and social science education, ahi evran University, Kırşehir, turkey ABSTRACT Nation-states needed various ideological apparatuses when they wanted to eliminate traditional loyalties to the pre-modern era and establish a new superordinate identity. As frequently emphasised in conceptual discussions, two elements among these ideological apparatuses come to the fore: historiography and education. While social values that create a national identity have been constructed by historiography continuously from the past to the present, it aims at spreading such values through education. History education at the intersection of these two concepts has occupied a privileged place in the nation-building process. The most concrete examples of this phenomenon are the developments experienced in the context of history teaching in Turkey from 1923 to 1938, also known as the early republican period. The present study, using history textbooks, analyses changes in history teaching and expectations of it between 1923 and 1938, which were the most active years of the nationalisation period in Turkey. The findings of this study indicate that the historiography of the early republican period adopted an anthropology-based understanding in line with the conjuncture between the two world wars and that, in accordance with this understanding, a national identity with ethnic, religious, and political dimensions was intended to be promulgated through history teaching.

This paper explores contemporary Turkey through the lens of education. Special attention is given to the recent curriculum reform of 2005 and the new Social Studies textbooks that have been redesigned as an aspect of Turkey’s seeking admission to the European Union. The Ministry of Education policy statements about the new curriculum and textbooks involve a claim that they promote critical thinking and open-mindedness, along with a student-centred approach. However, a close analysis of the new textbooks shows that they are still imbued with an exclusive and narrow definition of nationalism and citizenship, backed by the myth of origin, ethnocentrism and essentialism. The paper discusses these issues in the context of the compatibility of a State-generated national ethos with democratic citizenship and argues that a notion of cosmopolitan education would extend the borders of a narrowly defined Turkish national identity.

History of Education, 2019

In the modern world, festivals and commemorative ceremonies, national pledges, songs are all used to help students connect to each other and their wider society, particularly to the nation state and its ideals. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate how such rituals were used to different ends in terms of nationbuilding in the Republic of Turkey. The Western-oriented identity of the Turkish Republic began to take shape during the Ottoman era, and education played a very significant role in this. This paper first introduces the educational rituals of the Otoman state to set the scene for the main discussion, which centres on the development of new rituals in the Turkish Republic. Religious and sultanic rituals were replaced by new rituals which fostered Turkish identity and promoted secular nationhood. To this end, the most effective educational ritualsnational festivals, flagraising ceremonies and Turkey's student pledgeare examined in detail.

2024

Turkey is a country of perennial importance for multiple world regions (notably Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, and Western and Central Asia). A review of the century-long social and political history of the Turkish Republic is valuable for understanding not only processes and relationships that converge at the national or subnational scale but also processes and relationships that far exceed the territorial boundaries of Turkey. Our course examines historical and contemporary processes and patterns of social and political life in Turkey. This course is organized around key themes in the study of Turkey, including nation building, state formation, social-cultural difference, popular culture and cultural production, political violence, and landscape change. Our learning will draw from multiple disciplines and fields of study including anthropology, art and architectural history, cultural studies, geography, and political science. Informed by an interdisciplinary literature, most of our learning will focus on dynamics within the national territory or at sub-national scales (for example, particular urban regions, cities, or provinces). In addition to developing a command of these dynamics in national context, we will also learn to situate the perspectives of the authors we are reading in wider fields of debate. Beyond the national scale, you will also develop an understanding of Turkey that illuminates ongoing and headline-grabbing dynamics at larger scales. Turkey is a country of enormous geo-strategic importance. You can accordingly anticipate developing proficiency in, among other things, debate around the composition of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Turkey’s fraught relationship with the European Union (EU), a much-heralded rapprochement of Greece and Turkey in the Aegean, the enduring conflicts and shifts in population geography related to the Syrian civil war, and geoeconomic and geopolitical realignments that are prompted and tested by intensification of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and regional tensions in the wider Eastern Mediterranean.

Journal of Education and Practice, 2017

The purpose of this paper is to reveal the perception of nationalism of pre-service teachers who will teach Social Studies course in a multidimensional manner. In the study, a total of 381 pre-service teachers who study in department of Social Studies from different universities located in different regions of Turkey was defined as the study group and a descriptive model was used as the basis of the research design. The data include both quantitative and qualitative dimensions. In the scope of the research, a questionnaire was created to determine pre-service teachers' perception of nationalism. This form consists of three sections. The participants' demographic data, opinion questions and the nationalism perception scale are presented in the sections, respectively. The questionnaire was applied to the pre-service teachers studying in different regions of Turkey. At the end of the research, various results were obtained regarding the nationalism perceptions of pre-service social studies teachers.