AQCI 3
Lecture : Race equality directive
Lecturer: Antonin Mikes
Student: OZTAMAN Hazal
Date: 02/11/2015
AQCI: Dr. Tessa Hofmann (2003):
“Armenians In Turkey Today/ A Critical Assessment of the Situation of the Armenian Minority in the
Turkish Rebuplic”
Central Quotation: “(...)’Armenian’ remains a term of abuse and polls indicate that Armenians are
the most hated people in Turkey, while 73% of Turkish children think Armenians are ‘bad people’.”
(p.6)
Argument: Hofmann argues that discrimination policies and practices towards non-Muslims in
general, Armenians in particular from 18th century to beginning of 20th century had in some ways
different but still mostly similar character under the reign of Ottoman Empire than after from
establishment of Turkish Rebuplic to nowadays. She backs up her thesis with lots of records, reports
that were got set by international organizations, non-governmental organizations fighting against
dicrimination and violation of human rights both conducted internally and internationally. She claims
that there is a continuity of set of approachments, beliefs, policies applied by supreme power(in our
case first Ottoman Empire and then Turkish Republic) towards ethnic or religious minorities who lived
and still live within Anatolian geography. She mentiones about cases occured between 1908-1920,
(i.g. systematic assimilation and deportation policies after losing the Balkan Wars, forced migration of
non-Muslim population in 1913-1914, Armenian genocide in 1915-1916, etc.) and cases occured after
1920s (i.g. expulsion of estimated 30.000 Armenians from eastern provinces of Turkey, laws and
regulations which contained confiscation of certain properties of non-Muslims, restrained nonMuslims from certain occupations, etc., the property tax for non-Muslims 1942-1944, incident of 6-7
September 1955, deportation of 1964, etc.) are in furtherance her arguments about continuity.
Questions: She enucleated overall subject with many proofs and details. At the end of article she
mentioned several recommendations that should have been followed in order to erose discrimination.
She guided us through her recommendations but I couldn’t find answer to questions ‘ How these
problems that minorities experienced and still experience can be solved ?’
Experiential connection: I was raised in neighbourhood that characterized as values, beliefs of
middle class and mostly homogenous ethnically and religiously similar. Till mid of high school I don’t
have nearly any friends who identified themselves as Kurd, Armenian, Rum, Alevi, Christian and so
on. After murder of Hrank Dink on 19 January 2007 , well-known Armenian journalist and activist in
Turkey, I began to understand that those who have strong nationalistic feelings and religiously fanatic
can not stand people who belong different religious or ethnic background and prefer to live and
express themselves who they are actually, not according to dominant culture, religious beliefs, set of
values and so on. Till my 16, I thought that every differences in our society are threats for our unity
and if they ignore to obey and respect the set of rules, beliefs, values which were constituted by
‘founding fathers’, then they should be subdued. Ranging from education system to daily language,
every area of our lives are occupied by the notion of ‘single flag, single religion, single state, single
ethnicity’. As far as I managed to elude ‘official’ point of view, began to expand my perspective, I
realized that nearly everything they taught us about ‘differences’ are made up prejudices, deceptions.
Textual connection: “The Kemalist conception of nationalism that defined the criterium of
membership in the Turkish national community or in the Turkish nation as “being part of the Turkish
eth-ic group” was very different both from the “Ottoman Nationalism” of the reign of Sultan
Abdülhamid II, and from the conception of “cultural nationalism” formulated by Ziya Gökalp. These
differences become blatantly obvious in expres-sions of Kemalist nationalism, particularly in official
publications and in theKemalists’ speeches and statements. In his pioneering study on the official ide-
ology of the single party period, Taha Parla reveals the two faces of Kemalist nationalism. The first is
a defensive, egalitarian, ethnically pluralistic, and cultural conception of nationalism. The other is a
conception of nationalism that is implemented especially against non-Muslim minorities,
foregrounding the Turks as an “ethnically dominant-monopolistic-exclusionary” majority. Parla argues
that minorities became the target of the second conception of nationalism and “in the Republic of
Turkey, they have been perceived as people with ‘conditional citizenship’ and ‘limited rights,’ who
have been ‘relegated to the fringes of society’ as people who ‘do not belong to us after all’” (Parla
1992, 209). You will notice that the situation described by Parla as “being relegated to the fringes of
society” was described by Marsel Franko as “part-time citizenship, visitor status, and mere Civil Code
Turkishness.” Franko’s wish was for this situation tobe remedied by means of positive steps to be
taken by the central
authorities. As far as we know, such steps were never taken. Quite to the contrary, by means of laws
like the Wealth Tax Law, which was passed during World War II, the position of non-Muslim
minorities as “part-time citizenship, visitor status,and mere Civil Code Turkishness” has been further
reinforced. “(1)
Implication: Thanks to Dr.Hofmann’s refined and detailed article, I’ve learned more details about
treatments, persecutions that Armenians were and are exposed. She gave us a lot of valuable
informations and recommendations not only for solving problems of particularly Armenians who live
in Turkey but also her recommendations are valid for people who have suffered and still suffer from
discrimination.
1)Aktar, Ayhan, “Turkification policies in the early republican era”, Tarih ve Toplum ( No:156,
1996, 4-18)
Sample Self assessment form
Department of Public and Social Policy, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University
AQCI ASSESSMENT FORM
Student’s
name:
Essay title:
OZTAMAN Hazal
Name of
assessor:
myself
Date:
02/11/15
Dr.Tessa Hofmann(2003) “ Armenians In Turkey Today/ A Critical Assessment of the
Situation of the Armenian Minority in the Turkish Rebuplic ”
Excel
lent
1) Is the chosen quotation central to the
author’s argument?
Go
od
Aver
age
Po
or
+
+
2) Has the main argument been fully
understood (including its ‘for’ and
‘against’ sides, if applicable)?
+
3a) Is the question raised
important/relevant/interesting?
3b) Has this question not been fully
answered in the text?
+
+
4) Is the experiential connection
relevant/interesting?
+
5a) Is the textual connection
relevant/interesting?
5b) Has it been cited properly?
5c) Has it been adequately explained
how the present text's argument
contrasts with, contradicts, confirms,
clarifies, or elaborates the other text's
argument or point?
+
+
+
6) Have the implications been well
understood, can they have a practical
impact for policy making?
7) Expression/Presentation
a) Are the style, grammar and general
Not
accept
able
Comments
use of English adequate?
b) Is the AQCI professionally presented?
Essay grade:
Further comments: