Turkey Book Talk

Marc David Baer on the Ottomans as khans, caesars and caliphs

Marc David Baer on “The Ottomans: Khans, Caesars and Caliphs” (Basic Books). The book argues for the Ottoman Empire as an inseparable part of European history - not as antithesis of the Christian West but as an intimate and active participant in the continent's shifting cultural and political tides.

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Federico Donelli on Turkey‘s push into Africa

Federico Donelli on “Turkey in Africa: Turkey's Strategic Involvement in Sub-Saharan Africa” (IB Tauris/Bloomsbury). The book looks at Ankara's bid to boost its diplomatic, cultural, economic and security influence in Africa, the effects it has had on the ground, and what to expect in the coming years.

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Yonca Köksal on Ottoman modernisation from the ground up

Yonca Köksal on “The Ottoman Empire in the Tanzimat Era: Provincial Perspectives from Ankara to Edirne” (Routledge). The book compares the empire's modernising, centralising reforms of the 19th century in the Balkan province of Edirne and the central Anatolian province of Ankara.

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Giancarlo Casale on Osman of Timişoara, Ottoman captive in 17th century Europe

Giancarlo Casale on “Prisoner of the Infidels: The Memoir of an Ottoman Muslim in 17th Century Europe” (UC Press). Casale edited and translated the book, the first English-language edition of Osman of Timişoara's fascinating memoir describing his years as prisoner and slave in the Habsburg Empire from 1688 to 1699.

Become a member to support Turkey Book Talk. Members get a 30% discount on all Turkey/Ottoman History books published by IB Tauris/Bloomsbury, transcripts of every interview, transcripts of the whole archive, and over 200 reviews covering Turkish and international fiction, history and politics.

Soner Çağaptay on the crises facing Turkey’s Erdoğan

Soner Çağaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, on “A Sultan in Autumn: Erdogan Faces Turkey's Uncontrollable Forces” (IB Tauris/Bloomsbury). The book describes the myriad challenges facing the Turkish president at home and abroad.

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Natalie Rothman on dragomans of the Ottoman Empire, between East and West

Natalie Rothman on “The Dragoman Renaissance: Diplomatic Interpreters and the Routes of Orientalism” (Cornell University Press). The book shows how Istanbul-based translator-interpreters were key in shaping outside understanding of the Ottoman Empire, as well as in the Ottoman elites' diplomatic moves.

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Ömer Tekdemir on the Kurdish issue from the 19th century to today

Ömer Tekdemir on “Constituting the Political Economy of the Kurds: Social Embeddedness, Hegemony and Identity” (Routledge). The book is a sweeping account of the social, political and economic circumstances shaping the emergence of collective Kurdish identity from the late Ottoman era to today's Turkey.

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Nicholas Danforth on memory and modernity in contemporary Turkey

Nicholas Danforth on “The Remaking of Republican Turkey: Memory and Modernity since the Fall of the Ottoman Empire” (Cambridge University Press). The book upends conventional wisdom about social and political shifts from 1945 to 1960, with many implications for our understanding of today's Turkey.

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Buke Uras on the Balyan family and the Ottoman Armenian architectural legacy

Büke Uras on “The Balyans: Ottoman Architecture and the Balyan Archive” (Korpus). The Balyan family served as Ottoman imperial architects for three generations in the 19th century and are responsible for some of Istanbul's most iconic monuments, including Dolmabahçe Palace and Ortaköy Mosque.

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Suna Çağaptay on the many lives of Bursa from antiquity to today

Suna Çağaptay on “The First Capital of the Ottoman Empire: The Religious, Architectural and Social History of Bursa” (IB Tauris/Bloomsbury). The book examines Bursa's history from antiquity to today, particularly its hybrid and plural character after transitioning from Byzantine to Ottoman rule in the 14th century.

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Dimitris Kamouzis on the emergence of Greek nationalism in Ottoman Istanbul

Dimitris Kamouzis on “Greeks in Turkey: Elite Nationalism and Minority Politics in Late Ottoman and Early Republican Istanbul” (Routledge). The book explores the spread of nationalism and ideas of unity with Greece among Istanbul's Greek Orthodox community from the 19th century to 1923 and beyond.

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Christine Philliou on reimagining Turkish history and the roots of political dissent

Christine Philliou, associate professor of history at UC Berkeley, on “Turkey: A Past Against History” (University of California Press). The book examines the life of the writer Refik Halid Karay (1888-1965), interrogating the shifting meaning of political dissent from Ottoman to republican eras.

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Malte Fuhrmann on cosmopolitan life in port cities of the late Ottoman era

Malte Fuhrmann, research fellow at the Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient, on “Port Cities of the East Mediterranean: Urban Culture in the Late Ottoman Empire” (Cambridge University Press). The book paints a panorama of cultural and social life in the diverse cities of Salonica, Istanbul and Izmir in the late Ottoman era.

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Noel Malcolm on the Ottoman Empire and Islam in Western political thought

Sir Noel Malcolm, senior research fellow at All Souls College, University of Oxford, on “Useful Enemies: Islam and the Ottoman Empire in Western Political Thought 1450-1750” (Oxford University Press).

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Evren Savcı on Turkey's LGBT movement, from flourishing to crackdown

Evren Savcı, author of "Queer in Translation: Sexual Politics Under Neoliberal Islam" (Duke University Press), on shifting discourse around LGBT rights in Turkey and the government's mounting rhetoric against activists.

Support Turkey Book Talk by becoming a member. Members get a 30% discount on all Turkey/Ottoman History books published by IB Tauris/Bloomsbury, English and Turkish transcripts of every interview, transcripts of the whole archive, and over 200 reviews covering Turkish and international fiction, history and politics.

Ahmet Erdi Öztürk on Turkey's cultural, political and religious footprint in the Balkans

Ahmet Erdi Öztürk on “Religion, Identity and Power: Turkey and the Balkans in the 21st Century" (Edinburgh University Press). Based on extensive fieldwork, the book examines how Turkey's religious nationalist transformation under Erdoğan is reflected in its expanding footprint in the Balkans.

Support Turkey Book Talk by becoming a member. Members get a 30% discount on all Turkey/Ottoman History books published by IB Tauris/Bloomsbury, English and Turkish transcripts of every interview, transcripts of the whole archive, and over 200 reviews covering Turkish and international fiction, history and politics.

Jenny White on the deep scars of political violence in Turkey's 1970s

Jenny White, professor at Stockholm University's Institute for Turkish Studies, on "Turkish Kaleidoscope: Fractured Lives in a Time of Violence" (Princeton University Press). The graphic novel, illustrated by Ergün Gündüz, tells the story of young protagonists caught up in the social turbulence leading to Turkey's 1980 coup.

Support Turkey Book Talk by becoming a member. Members get a 30% discount on all Turkey/Ottoman History books published by IB Tauris/Bloomsbury, English and Turkish transcripts of every interview, transcripts of the whole archive, and over 200 reviews covering Turkish and international fiction, history and politics.

Jeremy Seal on Adnan Menderes and the long shadow of Turkey's 1960 coup

Jeremy Seal on “A Coup in Turkey: A Tale of Democracy, Despotism and Vengeance in a Divided Land” (Penguin). The book explores the legacy of Adnan Menderes, who became the Republic of Turkey's first democratically elected prime minister in 1950 before being overthrown in a military coup in May 1960.

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Taner Doğan on ideology and charisma in Erdoğan's communication strategy

Taner Doğan on “Communication Strategies in Turkey: Erdogan, the AKP and Political Messaging” (IB Tauris/Bloomsbury).

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Murat Erdoğan on Syrian migrants' future in Turkey

Murat Erdoğan, director of the Turkish German University's Migration and Integration Research Centre, on the future of Syrians in Turkey. Erdoğan oversees “Syrians Barometer”, an annual UNHCR-supported research project tracking the views of Syrians in Turkey and Turkish citizens' views of Syrians.

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