08 turkey

Slide1: 

Turkey lies where Asia, Africa and Europe are closest to each other and it straddles the point where Europe and Asia meet. Conversion to Islam was gradual and varied from one group to another, but by the 10th century Islam dominated. The hugely powerful, influential and sprawling Ottoman Empire, c.1300 - 1922, originated in north-western Anatolia. The state of Turkey was created in 1923 from the Turkish remnants of the Ottoman Empire. It has a population of about 67 million, 80% Turkish and 20% Kurdish and other minorities. 98% of the population is Muslim, mainly Sunni. Note to images: where not attributed, the early historical images have been taken from Women of Istanbul in Ottoman Times, a wonderful book “dedicated to all the women of the world”, compiled by Pars Tuğlaci, Istanbul, 1984.

Dress History: 

There are thousands of historic images of Turkish women. Turkish and western artists have long been fascinated by the rich variety of Turkish dress of both sexes. In women’s dress, the contrasts of home and street dress are shown again and again as are the variations of urban and rural costume and that of women from the many ethnic backgrounds who lived in Turkey, especially in Istanbul. Dress History

Slide3: 

Ibn Battuta, in the 14th century, wrote about the Sultan’s lady: “On the Khatin’s head is a bughtaq which resembles a small ‘crown’ decorated with jewels and surmounted by peacock feathers – and she wears robes of silk encrusted with jewels, like the mantles worn by the Greeks. On the head of the lady vizier and the lady chamberlain is a silk veil embroidered with gold and jewels at the edges, and on the head of each of the girls is a kula; which is like an aqruf; with a ciraht of gold encrusted with jewels round the upper end – and peacock feathers above this, and each one wears a robe of silk gilt, which is called nakh.” Travels of Ibn Battuta 1325-1354

18th Century: 

18th Century The costume books show the richness of fabrics and the fashion variations on a theme of home wear worn by the better-off. But outside, all women wear the voluminous feraje or carshaf and a headcover. Home dress Street dress Street dress

Second Half of the 18th Century: 

Second Half of the 18th Century Home dress Street dress

Slide7: 

Early 19th Century Home and Street dress

Slide8: 

“Misunderstanding of the concept of concealment led the Turks to consider the charshaf (long robe worn out in the streets) as the religious dress of Muslim women, and thus it has been interpreted as a product of fanaticism. …According to Dr Levinson in Histoire de la Vie Sexuelle the charshaf and the harem are very ancient concepts dating back to the earliest periods of history, and are both the result of male jealousy, having no connection with Islamic principles at all.” Women of Istanbul in Ottoman Times, Pars Tuğlaci, 1984

Slide9: 

Russian slave Arab Turkish Armenian Jewish Greek Jewish Artist’s depictions of various types of dress

Slide10: 

“They wear a towel (cloth or woollen underscarf) round the neck and head, so that one can only see their eyes and mouth, and these they cover with a thin silk scarf a palm’s width each way, through which they can see and not be seen by others. The scarf is fastened with three pins to a suitable part of the head above the forehead, so that when they go through the streets and meet other women, they raise the scarf that hangs over their faces and kiss one another.” I Costumi et i modi particolari de la vita de Turchi, Bassano da Zara, 1545

Slide11: 

Women and children going to the baths. 18th century.

Slide12: 

“Turkish women first began covering themselves in public by wrapping themselves in a bedsheet when they went out of the house, and this practice continued for hundreds of years in the villages. Meanwhile in Istanbul and other large cities women wore the feraje and yashmak, or a yeldirme and headscarf.” Tuğlaci, 1984 Street dress. 19th century.

Slide13: 

“From the earliest days of the Ottoman Empire, the state had taken upon itself to issue decrees and edicts on even the minutiae of women’s dress. … The detailed nature of these regulations, affecting the thickness of the material used in the yashmak (face veil worn in Turkey), the length of skirts, and the degree to which women should be covered in public by charchaf (cloak) and yashmak, indicate the importance the authorities attached to the physical appearance of women in public.” “… during the Ottoman period this concern had been expressed in a conservative view of how women should be seen, in subsequent decades it became a device through which the state could signal its desire for change.” Images of Women, Sarah Graham-Brown, 1988 Turkish Imperial Edict. 1725

Slide14: 

Edmundo de Amicis, an Italian visitor in the 1880s, remarked: “After hearing so much about the life of captivity led by Turkish women, it is most astonishing for any visitor to Istanbul to see women about in every place at every hour, just as in any European city.” Turkish women gathered in front of a mosque in Istanbul, late 19th century. Abdullah Biraderler

Slide15: 

Turkish women doing shopping for the bairam, mid- 19th century.

Slide16: 

Turkish women at a picnic.

Dress History – Early last century: 

Dress History – Early last century Gradually in the nineteenth century European fashions influenced Istanbul and slowly spread to other cities amongst the middle and upper classes. Rural women, poor women and those of the many ethnic groups continued to wear their traditional dress. Upper-middle class family, early 20th century. coll. Alev Lytle Croutier, Harem – The World behind the Veil, 1989

Slide18: 

Upper-middle class women friends dancing in a private house courtyard, early 20th century. Lytle Croutier

Slide19: 

Harem lady visited by a bundle woman and a gypsy fortune teller, early 20th century. Lytle Croutier

Slide20: 

A Turkish lady in outdoor costume. Living Races of Mankind, 1900

Slide21: 

A woman wearing a ferage and dark veil. Lytle Croutier

Slide22: 

A Turkish woman wearing a ferage and a yashmak 1890s.

Slide23: 

Some modes adopted were not appreciated by the authorities.

Slide24: 

Then, as now, some women adopted styles of dress for political reasons: “Another interesting phenomenon is the use of Islamic dress code (carsaf) by women activists during the Independence War between 1918-1923, although this was not at all the fashion for the socio-economic classes to which these women belonged. Ilyasglu concludes that this reflected an effort by women activists to bridge the gap with the “women on the street”. Moreover, by wearing the carsaf, women activists felt that they were able to establish equality with women of other classes and anonymity for the goal of fighting for independence.” The Women’s Movement in Turkey – The influence of political discourses, Pinar Ilkkaracan, Iran Bulletin, I995

Slide25: 

From Atatürk’s address to women in Konya, March 21, 1925 However, by the early 1920s the official tide had turned and Kemal Atatürk was exhorting women to abandon the veil.

Slide26: 

“Where women had taken it upon themselves to change their style of dress, it might be taken as an assertion of freedom, a defiance of convention, or a flouting of family authority. But where the wearing of a western-style dress and hat had been sanctioned by community or state, it could just as well imply conformity and was certainly not a reliable guide to a women’s freedom of choice or action.” Graham-Brown, 1988

Women in Political Struggle: 

“All through the 19th century Ottoman society had been under the spell of modernizing reforms,” [Özdalga] but it was not until after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and after the 1914-18 World War that change accelerated. The Republic of 1923 and the Constitution of 1924 enshrined Kemal Atatürk’s vision of modernised, secular Turkey. The legal reforms of 1925/6 made “sweeping alterations in women’s legal status, freedom of movement and prospects for education and employment” [Graham-Brown] …all reflected in the following three photographs. Women in Political Struggle

Slide29: 

Three of the first women parliamen-tarians in Turkey, 1937. Graham-Brown, 1988

Slide32: 

The “Sapka Kanunu” of 1925 banned the fez and imposed the use of a Western (modern) type of felt hat, with dire punishments for non-compliance. The law initiated by Atatürk was levelled at men’s, not women’s, dress. “The veil was not forbidden, though, because it was felt that it would lead to an uprising by the vast majority of Muslims who were of a patriarchal persuasion.” Geschiedenis Van Turkije ­ed Bakker, Vervloet, Gailly, 1997

Modern Turkey: 

“Turkey is the only country in the Middle East – perhaps in the whole Muslim world – where secularism became the official ideology of the state. … The most controversial issue on which official secularism has been challenged in recent times is the headscarf. All through the 1980s, that problem was the issue around which secularism clashed with Islamism.” The Veiling Issue in Modern Turkey, Elizabeth Özdalga, 1998 Modern Turkey

Slide34: 

“Contrary to a widely held belief, there have never been any laws prohibiting the use of the veil in universities or elsewhere in modern Turkey. …[however]… even if there have not been any laws, there have certainly been various kinds of regulations relating to clothing.” Özdalga, 1998 Newspaper headlines 1999-2002.

Slide35: 

“In Turkey, the secular regime considers the head scarf a symbol of extremist elements that want to overthrow the government. Accordingly, women who wear any type of head-covering are banned from public office, government jobs and academia, including graduate school. Turkish women who believe the head-covering is a religious obligation are unfairly forced to give up public life or opportunities for higher education and career advancement.” An Identity Reduced to a Burka, Laila al-Marayati and Semeen Issa, 2002

Again we see Saudi influences in dress. Atatürk would be as critical as he was over Western fashion.: 

Islamist women “proclaim their need to cover their heads with reference to their civil right to practice religion without the hindrance of the state. Paradoxically, in doing so they propagate a belief system where civil rights as such have no relevance.” On Gender and Citizenship in Turkey – MER 1996 No.198, Yesim Arat Again we see Saudi influences in dress. Atatürk would be as critical as he was over Western fashion.

Slide37: 

Those women who dress in extreme styles, and those who imitate the garb of European women, should remember that every nation has its own traditions, ethics and characteristics. No nation should be an imitation of any other, because such a nation cannot be the same as that which it imitates, nor retain its own national character. Such an attempt is bound to result in disappointment. Kamal Atatürk, 1925

Slide38: 

Newspaper headlines 1999-2002.

Everyday clothes: 

Everyday clothes “Historically, periods have varied in the extent to which people have signalled or obscured their religious identities. Usually it is not necessary to mark explicitly the religion of the majority unless a frenzy of piety imbues religious symbols for a time with special meaning.” Reveal and Conceal, Andrea B Rugh, 1986

The Village of Nar – Central TurkeyThe Women of Nar, Joyce Roper, 1974: 

The Village of Nar – Central Turkey The Women of Nar, Joyce Roper, 1974 Village Wedding 1971 – the women celebrating in a private house

Slide41: 

Kazim and Gulazar Grand-mother Grand-daughter

Slide42: 

“Traditionally, in most villages, women did not wear veils; the entire village was considered an extended family. Even nowadays, while women work unveiled with men in the fields, as soon as they see a stranger from another village, they pull down their scarves to hide their faces.” Harem – The World Behind the Veil, Alev Lytle Croutier, 1989 Farming women of South Eastern Turkey, near the Syrian border

Slide43: 

Elderly woman and her friend. South-central Turkey, 1985 Shopkeeper in Istanbul. Sean Sprague, 1996

Slide44: 

Market at Edirne. Caroline Simpson, 1992

‘Traditional’ dress to ethnic chic: 

‘Traditional’ dress to ethnic chic As in many countries “traditional” regional dress is now most commonly seen by the general public at Cultural Festivals and used as inspiration for modern fashion shows:

Slide46: 

Young women in traditional costume. UNESCO, 1980s