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ABSTRACT
Popular imagination of an age-old and very common phenomenon – migration – depends on images and stories in circulation. Mediated images of migration, refugees and diasporas play an important role in ethnic and cultural identification processes. This article explores how Turkey has accounted for its own diasporic subjects through cinematic narratives. Focusing on two salient Turkish examples from the 1980s that contradict the dominant narrative tendencies in Turkish–German/German films of the time, this article aims to present a fresh outlook. It strives to explore how these films question stereotypes and problematize essentialist readings of Turkishness and nationhood via a descriptive-interpretive analysis.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 Appadurai, Modernity, 35.
2 Halle, The Europeanization, 2014.
3 According to a recent report by the European Commission, the current number of refugees in Turkey is over 3.4 million, rendering Turkey the country with the highest number of refugees in the world right now (Avrupa Komisyonu, “Turkiye: Mülteci Krizi”). The issue is further complicated by the fact that “various groups arriving from Syria – Kurds, Assyrians, Turkmens, Armenians, and Yezidis – carry with them varied contentious political histories. Thus, refugees may be initially classified as Syrian, but may then subsequently be grouped as either friend or enemy along lines of ethnicity and/or religion” (Erder, “Preliminary Thoughts,” 119). This inevitably implies exclusionary practices either during the physical border crossing or across the domains of economic, political, social and cultural interaction in the country. Yet, bound by the legal requirements of 1951 Geneva Convention and a recent deal signed between Turkey and the EU in 2016, most of these refugees are destined to settle in Turkey, regardless of how they are perceived or what they expect. In other words, Turkey, having been considered mostly as a “migrant-sending country”, especially from a European perspective, will soon have to deal with diverse diasporic communities on its soil. See Toğral Koca, “Deconsctructing,” and Kaya, “A Tale,” for the legal status of Syrian refugees, and see Dinçer et al., Turkey and Erdoğan, “Perceptions,” for their experiences in Turkey. Also, further refer to http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2016/03/18-eu-turkey-statement/ for the details of the deal, and to https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2016/06/eus-reckless-refugee-returns-to-turkey-illegal/ for a criticism of this deal. Also see Safran, “Diasporas,”; Clifford, “Diasporas,”; Brah, Cartographies; Cohen, Global Diasporas; Braziel and Manur, “Nation, Migration,”; Ember et al. Encyclopedia,; Alonso and Oiarzabal, Diasporas; Ziemer and Roberts, East European; Başer, Diasporas and Homeland; and Carment and Sadjed, Diasporas as Cultures, for detailed analyses of the concept of diaspora.
4 Even though it is hard to reach actual audience numbers for the films made before the 1990s in Turkey, the existence of dedicated satellite TV channels such as Sunal TV and Şaban TV that broadcast Kemal Sunal films, including those analyzed here, proves their popularity (See Eyüboğlu, “İnek Şaban.”). Even though the study investigates a different country, one can also refer to Smets et al., “Centre and Periphery,” to understand how Turkish film culture among diasporic Turks has been heavily based on the circulation of VHS, Betamax and later on the DVD copies of Turkish films.
5 Malik, “Beyond the Cinema,” 203–204.
6 Tunç, “Three Generations,” 119.
7 This section of the paper provides a significantly shortened and updated version of a sub-chapter in my Ph.D. dissertation entitled “Diasporic Cinema: Turkish-German Filmmakers with Particular Emphasis on Generational Differences”, 2011, 52–66.
8 Yalçɩn-Heckman, “Negotiation Identities,” 311.
9 Turkish-German relations predate the signing of this agreement: Turkey and Germany were allies in the First World War, and during the war many young people migrated from the Ottoman Empire to Germany under an “on-the-job training scheme.” Furthermore, in 1933, many German academics opposing Hitler found refuge in Turkey since the government at the time offered political asylum and work. See Akgündüz, “Migration to,” and Horrocks and Kolinsky, “Migrants or.”
10 Akgündüz, “Migration to,” 113.
11 Münz and Ulrich, “Germany,” and Mani, Cosmopolitical Claims, 2007.
12 Münz and Ulrich, “Germany,” 6.
13 Following the failed coup d’etat in July 2016, the Turkish government announced a state of emergency, which was in effect for two years.
14 Tunç, “Three Generations,” 117.
15 Werbner, “Theorising Complex,” 900.
16 The main ethnic groups are Turks and Kurds. Some of them are Sunni Muslims while others are Alevis, who constitute a religious minority group in Turkey. Moreover, some Turks and Kurds are leftists whereas some are on the right wing of the political spectrum. Currently, the most defining difference appears to be the political orientation in the sense that whether individuals are AKP supporters or not. People even further diversify based on which city in Turkey they come from.
17 The latter particularly has caused problems in the context of Turkish domestic affairs since those who live in Turkey increasingly verbalize their discontent for diasporic Turks who are exempted from the atrocities in Turkey (especially due to the political turmoil in the aftermath of the attempted coup d’etat in 2016), and yet, have a say in Turkish politics, implying how fragile is these diasporic subjects’ perceived sense of belonging and identity in the country of origin.
18 Vertovec, “The Political.”.
19 Paul and Schmidt, Turkey’s Relations.
20 See Şenbaş, Türkiye’nin Kuzey Irak, for a detailed analysis of Turkey’s diplomatic positioning with regard to Iraq. Also refer to Aras, “Turkish-Syrian Relations,” for an analysis of the shift in Turkey’s Syrian policy.
21 The 1960 leftist military coup; the military memorandum in 1971, which is better known as 12 Mart Muhtırası; and the 1980 military coup.
22 See Buğra, Kapitalizm, for a detailed discussion of social policies during the Özal years.
23 Turkey’s prolific film industry, which was predominantly famous for its melodramas.
24 Şaban Darsübekoğlu a.k.a. İnek Şaban is a fictional literary character created by author Rıfat Ilgaz first in the periodic Dolmuş and then in the novel series Hababam Sɩnɩfɩ (1957–1987).
25 İzgü, “Gülmecenin İşlevi,” 74.
26 Yɩldɩz, “Şaban ve Recep.”
27 Ibid.
28 Sunal, “TV ve Sinemada.”.
29 One should certainly allude to the long-lasting zenne (male belly dancer) tradition in the Turkish culture here. They have a place in the Turkish folkloric tradition, and yet, zennes would never be chosen to represent the everyday Turkish man, let alone be heroes of conventional popular narratives. In fact, a recent critically acclaimed Turkish film, based on a true story, titled Zenne, (Caner Alper and Mehmet Binay, 2011) was excluded from screening in several film festivals in Turkey due to various reasons. See Başyiğit, Türkiye’deki Film, for details of covert censorship mechanisms in Turkey.
30 This is another intriguing similarity between the two periods for the AKP government put an extra emphasis on the advancement of the relationship with the EU, particularly during their first electoral period. See Karabulut, “Anavatan Partisi,”; Ertosun, “Dış Politikada,”; and Daban, “Turgut Özal,” for detailed analyses of Turkish-EEC relations during the Özal period.
31 Tunç, “Three Generations,” 119.
32 Göktürk, “Turkish Women.”
33 Tunç, “Three Generations,” 119.
34 Burns, “Turkish-German Cinema,” 128.
35 Bhabha, The Location.
36 See Gőktürk, “Turkish Women,” for the employment of the term “voyeuristic ethnographic gaze” in the context of Turkish-German cinema.
37 Benjamin, The Arcades, 427.
38 Germany is still among the countries with exclusive citizenship regimes that ask for the renunciation of the former citizenship. “It is a characteristic of Germany as a self-declared non-immigration country that the naturalization of foreign immigrants and their children is still the exception, not the rule” (Münz and Ulrich, “Germany,” 48). Only through the introduction of a new Immigration Act in 2005 was Germany officially recognized as a country of immigration.
39 The term “Almancı”, formed by adding the suffix –cı to the Turkish word for German, linguistically means they fancy Germany and German culture. Thus, Turkish immigrants have been humiliated by being addressed as “Almancı” in Turkey.
40 de Certeau, The Practice, 17.
41 Baudrillard, Symbolic Exchange.
42 Robinson, Jean Baudrillard.
43 Mary L. Pratt explains “the contact zone” as “the space in which peoples geographically and historically separated come into contact with each other and establish ongoing relations, usually involving conditions of coercion, radical inequality and intractable conflict” (Imperial Eyes, 6). “It can be a dangerous place, where people are easily misunderstood and hurt. It can also be a place of mutual understanding, new wisdom, and the wonder that comes when people learn from each other” (Watkins, “The art of,” 1).
44 Güney et al., “Diasporic Music.”
45 Hutcheon, The Politics, 89.
46 Aytemiz, “Thoughts on,” 43.
47 Ibid., 43.
48 One should of course be attentive to the fact that use of city landscape is inevitable, even prerequisite, here, since the original comical tensions for the character Şaban, who is an Anatolian migrant in the city, are derived from familiar dichotomies such as urban-rural, modern-tradition, technology-nature, evil-good and so on.
49 Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social.
50 See Asimaki and Koustourakis, “Habitus,” for a discussion of the contested use of the term in various fields.
51 Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social, 170.
52 Ibid., 170.