Turkish Americans

This article aims to provide a retrospective view of the Peace Corps in Turkey. It is based on a number of books and articles written by returned Peace Corps Volunteers as well as personal and email interviews and correspondence with some of the surviving volunteers who are now in their late seventies or early eighties. It also includes the ideas of a number of Turkish academics and educators, whom this author interviewed, on the Peace Corps and the volunteers they met.

In this paper, I suggest to compare recent critical approaches and debates in the cultural field of transnational migration studies, with a focus on ‘cross-cultural’ and ‘post-migrant’ theatres. This focus will be narrowed down by looking particularly at the discourses of Turkish migration and diaspora surrounding the Ballhaus Naunynstrasse in Berlin (Germany), the Arcola Ala-Turka company in Dalston-Hackney (UK), Theater RAST in Amsterdam (the Netherlands), the Turkish American Repertory Theater in Baldwin New York (U.S.), the ReOrient Festival in San Francisco (U.S.) and the Cornerstone Theater Company in Los Angeles (U.S.).
My main concern is not the idiosyncrasies in artistic vision or contents regarding the representation of cross-cultural communities by individual theatre artists in their respective local and national settings. Rather, I would like to question the differences in the companies’ self-definitions in relation to their cultural climates and the retellings of the different pathways artists make within the scope of their works and careers. I would like to question how these founding ‘narratives of self’ in view of an increased social mobility could be explained through the wider discourses of transnational migration studies, as they are currently being developed in Europe and the U.S. Alternatively, I will problematize how these theatre developments challenge migration and cultural studies to think together transnationally. The multi- and cross-disciplinary making of transnational migration studies has inevitably engendered diverse and sometimes opposing definitions of transnationalism. As such, I would like to explore several aspects of transnational dynamics in the art – and business – of contemporary theatre making while searching for a common ground where European and American concepts, despite their very different geographical and historical parameters, could meet.
Hence, inspired by (post)migration practices on the theatre stage, I suggest boundary crossing within our own disciplines, particularly within American Studies, to start thinking of societies and communities as translocal, transnational and de-territorialized (Appadurai, 1996) beyond the old, restraining discourses of cultural imperialism.

People become a part of the place they inhabit. Even if they resist to change and assimilation, they cannot avoid being shaped by the social, cultural and physical conditions of their new environment; and they inevitably start to redefine themselves. Although this transformation does not necessarily require giving up old identities and ties, it encourages a new sense of belongingness, hence formation of a new identity. The number of Turks and Turkish-Americans residing in the United States is estimated to be around 500,000. However, there is not enough information on what kind of assimilation and transformation process they undergo while they become a part of mainstream America. We also do not know much about the challenges they encounter, if and how they maintain their contact with the culture and country they left behind, and if they welcome or resist assimilation. Our presentation will seek answers to the above questions in personal accounts and memories of Turkish-Americans derived from a survey given to Turks residing in the United States and have ties with Turkish-American associations. The survey includes mainly semi-structured and open ended questions to increase the variety of responses.

A.B.D. Senatosu, bütün göçmenlik hukuku meselelerini kapsayan hem Cumhuriyetçiler hem de Demokratlar tarafından desteklenen torba yasa tasarısını 2013 yılında geçirmiştir. Kapsamlı göçmenlik reformu, A.B.D.’nin gelecekteki ekonomik ve siyasi yapısını derinden etkileyecektir. Şu anda A.B.D.’ye gelen Türk göçü asgari miktardadır. Bu çalışma göçmenlik hukuku tartışmalarını Türk-Amerikan toplumunun bakış açısı ile genişletmeye çalışmaktadır. Kapsamlı göçmenlik reformunun geçişi ile birlikte Türkiye kaynaklı göçün ana yolu kesilmiş olacaktır. Türkiye yüksek teknoloji istihdamında kayıp yaşayacaktır. Son olarak bu Çalışma, Türk-Amerikan toplumunun lobi çabalarını artırmasını kuvvetle önermektedir.

Robert College, founded in Istanbul in 1863, was the first American institution of higher education outside the United States. It was followed by numerous American schools including the Syrian Protestant College (American University in Beirut) established three years later. The first “girls’ college” in the Ottoman Empire was opened in 1871, in Istanbul.  The paper focuses on memoirs of Cyrus Hamlin, the founder of Robert College, and Mary Mills Patrick, the founder of the “Girls’ College” in Istanbul. It explores the motives of these pioneers of education; their relations with the American Board, Ottoman leaders and politicians; their perception of the Ottoman Empire and its peoples; and their roles in shaping the social, political and intellectual atmosphere through education. The paper also relates the memoirs Hamlin and Patrick to memoirs of several Peace Corps volunteers who served and taught in Turkey in 1960s as “secular missionaries.”
The paper aims at proving that education and educational institutions have served and will continue to serve as indispensable tools of US foreign policy to portray a positive image of America, promote American values and perspective, perpetuate America’s regional existence and influence through education of the elite, establish bridges rather than erecting walls.