Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Monday, September 22, 2008
Week 4: Post your Blog Entries as Comments to my Main Post Each Week
Post by Sunday at midnight.
1. Mark Whitaker
2. Inbetween Regions, Turkey's public ideology of secular, open state endangered by its own history of Armenian Genocide in the early 20th century as the state was founded
3. Turkey was mentioned in the last week's blogs. I mentioned that countries, polities or histories of border areas between different presumed regions are an interesting way to view the congnitive element of how people deal with the stereotypes about a 'region' when they are given more of a geographical choice of whether to identify with one region they are near or another one. Turkey's 'modern state' has identified with the European side for all of the 20th century, from after World War One when the Turkish secular state was founded and Islam and other religious expressions were repressed in public. This is an interesting article that shows how the self-image of 'modern Turkey' depends on an ongoing construction that their state foundation was 'clean.' Instead quite a few atrocities happened during its foundation, and as the article wryly puts it, whether we look at their leader Attaturk as helping found a democracy or whether we think about him as someone like Lenin and the USSR's totalitarian model depends on how a country structures its own history. Seems that most Turks were 'educated' without awareness that there WAS a genocide against their Armenian minority during the 1920s.
Interesting how the 'region' and the history had to be constructed as pure nationalist. We will talk about this artificial community of the nation/region when we discuss Benedict Anderson's book Imagined Communities later in the semester.
------------------------
Turkey scared to admit Armenian genocide, says historian
· Remarks cast shadow over efforts to rebuild relations
· Turkish show interest in museum of tragedy
* Robert Tait in Yerevan
* The Guardian,
* Monday September 22 2008
* Article history
Members of the Armenian community join a demonstration march in London in 2005. Photograph: Edmond Terakopian/PA
Turkey risks a collapse of its secular political system akin to that of the Soviet Union if it bows to international pressure to recognise the 1915-22 Armenian genocide, the head of Armenia's state memorial to the event has told the Guardian.
Hayk Demoyan said Ankara could not acknowledge the systematic killing of up to 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman troops during the first world war because it would lead to a wholesale re-writing of history and undermine the ideological [clean] basis of the Turkish state.
In remarks that will cast a shadow over attempts to forge a new Turkish-Armenian rapprochement, he said those implicated included Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founder of modern Turkey and a figure Turks are taught to revere. Historical documents proved Atatürk committed "war crimes" against Armenians and other groups in his drive to create [artifically] an ethnically homogeneous Turkish state, Demoyan insisted.
"Fear of rewriting history is the main fear of modern Turkey," said Demoyan, director of The Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute in Yerevan, Armenia's capital.
"It is a fear of facing historical reality and causing a total collapse of the ideological axis that modern republican Turkey was formed around. Turks get panicked when you compare Atatürk's legacy to Lenin. Atatürk was sentenced to death in absentia by a military judge to punish war crimes during the first world war. There are documents from non-Armenian sources listing him as a war criminal."
Demoyan's remarks come amid fledgling attempts to re-establish links between two countries which have not had diplomatic relations since 1994, following a war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Turkey's ally.
Tentative efforts towards normalising ties occurred this month when the Turkish president, Abdullah Gül, visited Yerevan [capital of Armenia] to attend a World Cup football match between Turkey and Armenia at the invitation of his Armenian counterpart, Serge Sarkisian.
Unlike most visiting heads of state, Gül did not visit the genocide museum, which displays documentary and photographic exhibits proving, Armenian officials say, that their ethnic brethren were subjected to deliberate genocide. Turkey vehemently denies this and has jailed Turkish citizens who argued otherwise. However, rising numbers of Turkish tourists and journalists have visited the museum recently.
"More than 500 Turks have visited this year. They've come in unprecedented numbers," Demoyan said. "Their reaction is one of shock. At first there is denial. Sometimes they ask: 'What is our sin?' or 'How can we be responsible for this?'. It's not taught in Turkish schools, so we understand their reaction."
Turkey claims the Armenian death toll has been exaggerated and that most victims died from starvation or disease. It also argues that many Turks were killed by Armenian groups.
---
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/sep/22/turkey
1. Mark Whitaker
2. Inbetween Regions, Turkey's public ideology of secular, open state endangered by its own history of Armenian Genocide in the early 20th century as the state was founded
3. Turkey was mentioned in the last week's blogs. I mentioned that countries, polities or histories of border areas between different presumed regions are an interesting way to view the congnitive element of how people deal with the stereotypes about a 'region' when they are given more of a geographical choice of whether to identify with one region they are near or another one. Turkey's 'modern state' has identified with the European side for all of the 20th century, from after World War One when the Turkish secular state was founded and Islam and other religious expressions were repressed in public. This is an interesting article that shows how the self-image of 'modern Turkey' depends on an ongoing construction that their state foundation was 'clean.' Instead quite a few atrocities happened during its foundation, and as the article wryly puts it, whether we look at their leader Attaturk as helping found a democracy or whether we think about him as someone like Lenin and the USSR's totalitarian model depends on how a country structures its own history. Seems that most Turks were 'educated' without awareness that there WAS a genocide against their Armenian minority during the 1920s.
Interesting how the 'region' and the history had to be constructed as pure nationalist. We will talk about this artificial community of the nation/region when we discuss Benedict Anderson's book Imagined Communities later in the semester.
------------------------
Turkey scared to admit Armenian genocide, says historian
· Remarks cast shadow over efforts to rebuild relations
· Turkish show interest in museum of tragedy
* Robert Tait in Yerevan
* The Guardian,
* Monday September 22 2008
* Article history
Members of the Armenian community join a demonstration march in London in 2005. Photograph: Edmond Terakopian/PA
Turkey risks a collapse of its secular political system akin to that of the Soviet Union if it bows to international pressure to recognise the 1915-22 Armenian genocide, the head of Armenia's state memorial to the event has told the Guardian.
Hayk Demoyan said Ankara could not acknowledge the systematic killing of up to 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman troops during the first world war because it would lead to a wholesale re-writing of history and undermine the ideological [clean] basis of the Turkish state.
In remarks that will cast a shadow over attempts to forge a new Turkish-Armenian rapprochement, he said those implicated included Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founder of modern Turkey and a figure Turks are taught to revere. Historical documents proved Atatürk committed "war crimes" against Armenians and other groups in his drive to create [artifically] an ethnically homogeneous Turkish state, Demoyan insisted.
"Fear of rewriting history is the main fear of modern Turkey," said Demoyan, director of The Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute in Yerevan, Armenia's capital.
"It is a fear of facing historical reality and causing a total collapse of the ideological axis that modern republican Turkey was formed around. Turks get panicked when you compare Atatürk's legacy to Lenin. Atatürk was sentenced to death in absentia by a military judge to punish war crimes during the first world war. There are documents from non-Armenian sources listing him as a war criminal."
Demoyan's remarks come amid fledgling attempts to re-establish links between two countries which have not had diplomatic relations since 1994, following a war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Turkey's ally.
Tentative efforts towards normalising ties occurred this month when the Turkish president, Abdullah Gül, visited Yerevan [capital of Armenia] to attend a World Cup football match between Turkey and Armenia at the invitation of his Armenian counterpart, Serge Sarkisian.
Unlike most visiting heads of state, Gül did not visit the genocide museum, which displays documentary and photographic exhibits proving, Armenian officials say, that their ethnic brethren were subjected to deliberate genocide. Turkey vehemently denies this and has jailed Turkish citizens who argued otherwise. However, rising numbers of Turkish tourists and journalists have visited the museum recently.
"More than 500 Turks have visited this year. They've come in unprecedented numbers," Demoyan said. "Their reaction is one of shock. At first there is denial. Sometimes they ask: 'What is our sin?' or 'How can we be responsible for this?'. It's not taught in Turkish schools, so we understand their reaction."
Turkey claims the Armenian death toll has been exaggerated and that most victims died from starvation or disease. It also argues that many Turks were killed by Armenian groups.
---
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/sep/22/turkey
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Monday, September 8, 2008
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Week 1: Opening Thread: Post your Blog Entries as Comments to my Main Post Each Week
Post Comments like this:
1. Your Name
2. A Title
3. A short personal commentary what you learned from it or what made you curious about it given the week's class content. However, it doesn't have to be about the week's content, only something related to human-environmental interactions.
4. Then put a long line ('-------------------)'.
5. Then cut/paste the article or topic you found.
6. Then a small line '---'.
7. Then, finally, paste the URL (link) of the post.
Post for this week on this thread. I'll set up a new main post each week, and then we will do the same.
1. Your Name
2. A Title
3. A short personal commentary what you learned from it or what made you curious about it given the week's class content. However, it doesn't have to be about the week's content, only something related to human-environmental interactions.
4. Then put a long line ('-------------------)'.
5. Then cut/paste the article or topic you found.
6. Then a small line '---'.
7. Then, finally, paste the URL (link) of the post.
Post for this week on this thread. I'll set up a new main post each week, and then we will do the same.
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