Asst. Prof. F. Meltem Gürle
Boğaziçi Üniversitesi, Yabancı Diller Yüksek Okulu, Bebek - İstanbul, Phone: +90-212-259 6624
mgurle@boun.edu.tr
EDUCATION
Sept. 2010 - Sept. 2011
Jan. 2004 - Feb. 2008:
Visiting Scholar at UC Berkeley, CA
Comparative Literature
Bogazici University, PhD. in Western Languages
and Literatures
Ph.D. Thesis Title: “Oguz Atay’s dialogue with the
western canon in The Disconnected”
Feb. 1994 - June 1996:
Bogazici University, MA. in Philosophy
MA Thesis Title: “The concept of Bildung in
Hegel’s Phenomenology and nineteenth century
European novel”
Sept. 1984 - June 1990:
Bogazici University, BA. Department of Western
Languages and Literatures
DISSERTATION
Title: “Oguz Atay’s dialogue with the western canon in The Disconnected”
Abstract: Drawing centrally upon the work of the Russian critic Mihail Bakhtin, this study compares
Oğuz Atay’s poetics with those of the canonic authors, and demonstrates how he copes with the
authority of the past while building a new structure upon it. It also aims to show that the recognition of
the impossibility of a language “untainted” by others and the awareness of the echoes from the past is
central to The Disconnected, Atay’s masterpiece and most cherished novel. Bakhtinian concepts, such
as dialogism, heteroglossia, polyphony and carnival, are employed in revealing the dialogue Atay
establishes with his literary “fathers,” such as Cervantes, Shakespeare, Goethe, Dostoevsky, and
Joyce.
GRANTS AND FELLOWSHIPS
TÜBİTAK-BIDEB Postdoctoral Travel and Research Grant in Comparative Literature,
2010 – 2011
RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
Postdoctoral Research: “The Turkish Bildungsroman: a new genre or an impossible endeavor?” at UC
Berkeley, CA (2010-2011)
Research Program at Buffet Center, Northwestern University, Chicago (June 28-August 20, 2013)
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
AE 111-112 Advanced English
AE 221-222 Critical Reading I - II
AE 261-262 English for Philosophy I –II
Phil 444 Philosophy and Literature
TKL 301-302 Literary Theory and Criticism
WORK EXPERIENCE:
Feb. 2000-present:
Instructor, Bogazici University, Advanced English
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Feb. 2009-present:
Literary Columnist, BirGün
April 1997-Jan. 2000: Correspondent, Yomiuri Shimbun (Japanese daily)
April 1995-June 1996: Research Assistant, Bogazici University, Philosophy
PUBLICATIONS
Books:
-
Carnivalizing the Turkish Novel: Oğuz Atay’s Dialogue with the canon in The Disconnected,
European University Studies, Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 2012. (PhD Thesis)
Articles:
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“Hermits, Stoics, and Hysterics: Turkish democracy and the female Bildungsroman,”
NOVEL: A Forum on Fiction 47.1 (Spring 2014). Special issue: "Is the Novel Democratic?"
“Wandering on the Peripheries: The Turkish Novelistic Hero as Beautiful Soul,” Journal of
Modern Literature Volume 36, Number 4, Summer 2013, 96-112
“Reasoning with the Murderer: The killing of Clarence in Richard III,” Journal of the Wooden
O, Volume 11, Southern Utah UP, 2011, 51-67.
“Cinema Grande and the Rhetoric of Illusion in Uyurkulak’s Har,” New Perspectives on
Turkey, No. 36, Spring 2007, 125-144.
“Tracing the carnival spirit in A Confederacy of Dunces: Modern reworkings of the grotesque
in defying authority,” in Power and Victimization - The Rhetoric of Sociopolitical Power and
Representations of Victimhood in Contemporary Literature, Proceedings of a Symposium at
Haliç University, Istanbul, 13-15 April 2005 Berk, Oya und Sirma Soran Gumpert (eds.),
ibidem-Verlag: Stuttgart. 2005.
Editorial Contribution:
-
Sanat ve Sorumluluk [Art and Answerability], Mikhail Bakhtin, trans. Cem Soydemir, Error!
Reference source not found. (ed.) İstanbul: Ayrıntı Yayınları, 2005.
Rabelais ve Dünyası [Rabelais and his World], Mikhail Bakhtin, trans. Çiçek Öztek. Meltem
Gurle (ed.) İstanbul: Ayrıntı Yayınları, 2005.
Tango: Tutku'nun Ekonomi Politiği [Tango and the Political Economy of Passion], Marta E.
Savigliano, trans. Serdar Aygün, Meltem Gurle (ed.) İstanbul: Ayrıntı Yayınları, 2004.
Other Publications:
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“Masumiyet ve Kader: Oyalanmanın Estetiğine Dair,” Bir Kapıdan Gireceksin, İstanbul:
Metis Yayınları, 2012, 31-45.
“Ulysses’ten Tutunamayanlar’a Öznel Anlatının Sınırları” (The limits of subjective narration
from Ulysses to The Disconnected) Kitap-lık 122, December 2008.
“Masumiyet Müzesi ve “muadil” medeniyetler seviyesi” (Museum of Innocence and the level
of “ersatz” civilization) Birgün, November 16, 2008.
“Karnaval Ruhunun Peşinde” Virgül 88, October, 2005. (On Bakhtin’s concept of the
carnivalesque)
MANUSCRIPTS IN PROGRESS
- Beyond Property and Propriety- The Turkish Bildungsroman and its Dynamics (Book Project)
- Batı Kanonu karşısında Tutunamayanlar – İletişim Yayınları (hazırlık aşamasında)
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TALKS
- “The Third Man Argument: Problems of O’Brien’s Dualistic Ontology,” Problems with
Authority: The II International Flann O'Brien Conference, Dipartimento di Lingue Letterature
e Culture Straniere Università Roma Tre, June 19-21 2013.
- “Democracy without dissent – The limits of dialectics in Turkish Bildungsroman,” invited
speaker at the annual conference by Stanford University’s Center for the Study of the Novel
under the theme "Is the Novel Democratic?" 20-21 April 2012.
- “Wandering on the Peripheries: The Turkish Novelistic Hero as Beautiful Soul,” guest speaker
at Northwestern University, Buffet Center, 18 April 2012.
- “Gilgamesh Regained: Reading Oğuz Atay’s Tutunamayanlar as a metaphysical novel,” 2nd
International Aksit Göktürk Conference: "Myths Revisited" 28-29 November 2011.
- “Swimming on one’s back: “A Portrait of the Turkish Novelistic Hero as Beautiful Soul”
Annual Conference of ACLA (American Comparative Literature Association, at Simon Fraser
University in Vancouver, March 31-April 3, 2011.
“Another Return to Ithaca: The ‘Inexhaustible’ Object and Hegelian Problems of Totality in
Ulysses” XXII International James Joyce Symposium, Charles University, Prague 13-18 June
2010.
- “Stream of Consciousness a la Turca: Atay’s reading of Joyce in The Disconnected,”
Conference of “Anglophone Literatures in International Contexts,” Department of English
Language and Literature, Bilkent University, Ankara, October 2008.
- “Literary Siblings: Joyce and Atay, A Comparative Study,” paper presented at “Re-Nascent
Joyce: XXI International James Joyce Symposium,” hosted by Université François-Rabelais,
Tours, France, June 2008.
- “The Prince as Jester: The “Hamletization” of Turkish intellectual in Atay’s novel, The
Disconnected,” Seminar at Bilgi University, Istanbul, March 2008.
- “Cinema Grande and the Rhetoric of Illusion in Uyurkulak’s Har,” paper presented at the
National Association for Ethnic Studies Conference on “Transnational Perspectives:
Intersections of Race, Ethnicity, and Religion” Bogazici University, Istanbul, November
2006.
- “Tracing the carnival spirit in A Confederacy of Dunces: Modern reworkings of the grotesque
in defying authority,” Symposium on “Power and Victimization, Halic University, Istanbul,
April 2005.
RESEARCH INTERESTS Modernism, 19th century philosophy, contemporary Turkish literature,
Bildungsroman, theory of the novel, and James Joyce.
LANGUAGES English (fluent), German (fluent)
REFERENCES
1. Victoria Kahn, Comparative Literature Department at UC Berkeley, Chair and Professor of
English, e-mail: vkahn@berkeley.edu
2. Cevza Sevgen, Western Languages and Literatures at Bogazici University, Professor of
English, e-mail: sevgen@boun.edu.tr
3. Pınar Canevi, Department of Philosophy, Professor of Philosophy, e-mail:
pcanevi@yahoo.com
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