Cultural encounters in the social sciences and humanities: western emigre scholars in Turkey

Abstract

Turkish modernization relied on the western social sciences and humanities not only as an abstract and distant model, but also in the form of close encounters and interactions with western refugee scholars. This article examines the activities of western intellectuals and experts who visited Turkey in the early republican era (1923-50), especially focusing on a group of emigre scholars who were employed in Turkey after the university reform of 1933. While European and North American social scientists were drawn to meticulous comparisons of 'East' and 'West' in this period, elites in the former component of this comparative dichotomy were seeking creative ways to turn this taxonomy to their advantage. In the Turkish case, the project of adopting modernity contained universalistic aspects intended to function for particular local needs. A body of racial, historical and linguistic theories attempted to create and sustain a nationally homogeneous society while, at the same time, emphasizing the contributions of Turkishness to western and modern history. Republican scholars tried to establish the Turkish origins of western civilization with the help of western social sciences in general and of western emigre scholars in particular. In the process of facilitating the local efforts to import western modernity into the specificity of Turkishness, refugee scholars encountered contradictory demands and employed different strategies to respond to these demands.