This seminar introduces students to major works of literature that have influenced Turkish history and culture and continue to have an impact on our understanding of contemporary Turkey. Seminar materials combine such literary works with theoretical and historical writings on Turkey, focusing on topics such as nationalism, gender, theories of third world narratives and aesthetics in a non-western context, canon-formation and the construction of a national canon, minority literatures, and prison literature. Compared to a introductory survey course on Turkish Literature (such as LIT 394), LIT 692 encourages in- depth analyses of fewer literary works. The authors to be covered include (but are not limited to) Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar, Oğuz Atay, Orhan Pamuk, Adalet Ağaoğlu, Latife Tekin, Elif Şafak, Emine Sevgi Özdamar, Mehmet Uzun, and Mıgırdıç Margosyan The language of instruction is Turkish. Subject to the completion of a long (approx. 30 pages) research paper largely based on primary sources, this seminar counts towards the fulfillment of the research seminar requirements for the MA and PhD degrees in History.
