Institute of Turkish Studies
Encyclopedia
The Institute of Turkish Studies (ITS) is a foundation based in the United States with the avowed objective of advancing Turkish studies at colleges and universities in the USA.
In recent years controversy has surrounded the ITS in regards to its relations with the Republic of Turkey and its denial of the Armenian Genocide
.
become the first executive director of the Institute, before becoming the incumbent of the Atatürk Chair of Turkish Studies at Princeton, which was financed by the Turkish government. The Institute is housed at Georgetown University
in Washington, DC.
OFFICERS AND MEMBERS OF THE BOARD OF GOVERNORS:
OFFICERS
Nabi Şensoy
, Honorary Chairman and Ex-Officio Member of the Board of Governors, Ambassador of the Republic of Turkey to the US.
W. Robert Pearson
, ret., Chairman , former United States Ambassador to Turkey
David C. Cuthell, Executive Director
In recent years controversy has surrounded the ITS in regards to its relations with the Republic of Turkey and its denial of the Armenian Genocide
Armenian Genocide
The Armenian Genocide—also known as the Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, by Armenians, as the Great Crime—refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I...
.
History
The Institute of Turkish Studies was established in 1982, with a $3 million dollar grant from the Turkish government. It is a non-profit, private educational foundation based in the United States "dedicated to the support and development of Turkish Studies in American higher education". Heath W. LowryHeath W. Lowry
Heath Ward Lowry is the Ataturk Professor of Ottoman and Modern Turkish Studies at Princeton University. He has written several books on the history of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey.-Background:...
become the first executive director of the Institute, before becoming the incumbent of the Atatürk Chair of Turkish Studies at Princeton, which was financed by the Turkish government. The Institute is housed at Georgetown University
Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...
in Washington, DC.
Mission
- To support individual scholars of the academic profession in the United States, for advanced research in Turkish history and culture as well as contemporary political, social, and economic developments in Turkey;
- To assist American universities in developing their library resources, programs of study, scholarly conferences, and outreach activities in the field of Turkish Studies
- To support the publication of books and journals on Turkey and broaden the understanding and knowledge of Turkish history, society, politics, and economics in the United States;
- To promote better understanding of Turkish politics, economy, and society through lectures and conferences.
OFFICERS AND MEMBERS OF THE BOARD OF GOVERNORS:
OFFICERS
Nabi Şensoy
Nabi Sensoy
Nabi Sensoy is a former ambassador of Turkey to the United States. He has been holding that office since January 2006. He was recalled back to Turkey in October 2007 after the United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs passed a resolution condemning the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman...
, Honorary Chairman and Ex-Officio Member of the Board of Governors, Ambassador of the Republic of Turkey to the US.
W. Robert Pearson
W. Robert Pearson
W. Robert Pearson is a former Foreign Service Officer who served as United States Ambassador to Turkey and later as Director of Human Resources in the Foreign Service until his retirement in 2006...
, ret., Chairman , former United States Ambassador to Turkey
David C. Cuthell, Executive Director
Grants
Since 1983, the Institute has sponsored an annual grant program to scholars, colleges and universities in the United States. The principal purpose of the grant program is to support the development of research, and scholarship in the field of Turkish Studies. The grant applications submitted to the Institute are evaluated by committees composed of the Board of Governors and Associate Members of the ITS. These standing committees present their recommendations to the Board of Governors for approval. The Institute offers grants and fellowships in the fields of Ottoman and Modern Turkish Studies to graduate students, post-doctoral scholars, universities, and other educational institutions through its Grant Program for the 2009-2010 academic year.Publications
The ITS has published a number of books in conjunction with other publishers. Some of the publications supported by the Institute include:- Gülru Necipoğlu The Age of Sinan: Architectural Culture in the Ottoman Empire (London: Reaktion Books Ltd, 2005)
- Donald Quataert and Sabri Sayari (eds.), Turkish Studies in the United States (Bloomington: Indiana University, Ottoman and Turkish Studies Publications, 2003)
- Leslie Peirce, Morality Tales: Law and Gender in the Ottoman Court of Aintab (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003)
- Jenny B. White, Islamist Mobilization in Turkey: A Study in Vernacular Politics (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2002)
- Sibel Bozdoğan, Modernism and Nation Building: Turkish Architectural Culture in the Early Republic (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2001)
- Scott Redford, Landscape and the State in Medieval Anatolia (Oxford, England: Archaeopress, 2000)
- Caesar E. Farah, The Politics of Interventionism in Ottoman Lebanon 1830-1861 (Oxford, London: The Center for Lebanese Studies, 2000)
- Palmira Brummett, Image and Imperialism in the Ottoman Revolutionary Press, 1908-1911 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000)
- Howard Crane (ed. & transl.) The Garden of Mosques: Hafiz Hüseyin al-Ayvansarayî’s Guide to the Muslim Monuments of Ottoman Istanbul Netherlands: Koninklijke Brill NV, 2000)
- Dictionary of Turkish Acronyms and Abbreviations: A selected List (1928–1995) Compiled by Suzan Akkan, (Madison, Wisconsin: Turco-Tatar Press, 1999)
- Kemal Silay (ed.), Turkish Folklore and Oral Literature: Selected Essays of Ilhan Basgöz (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Turkish Series, 1998)
- Daniel Goffman, Britons in the Ottoman Empire (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1998)
- John Goulden (transl.), Adalet Agaoğlu, Curfew (The University of Texas at Austin: The Center for Middle Eastern Studies, 1997)
- Reşat Kasaba and Sibel Bozdoğan (eds.), Rethinking Modernity and National Identity in Turkey (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1997)
- Seyfi Karabas and Judith Yarnall (transls.), Poems by Karacaoglan, A Turkish Bard (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Turkish Series, 1996)
- Avigdor Levy (ed.), The Jews of the Ottoman Empire (Princeton, New Jersey: Darwin Press: 1994)
- Karen BarkeyKaren BarkeyKaren Barkey is currently a professor of sociology at Columbia University.- Education :Karen Barkey holds a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago, an M.A. from the University of Washington, Seattle, and an A.B. from Bryn Mawr College.- Personal :...
, Bandits and Bureaucrats: The Ottoman Route to State Centralization (Ithaca: Cornell University, 1994) - Kemal Silay, Nedim and the Poetics of the Ottoman Court (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Turkish Studies Series, 1994)
- Henry Glassie, Turkish Traditional Art Today (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1993)
- Halil Inalcik, The Middle East and the Balkans Under the Ottoman Empire: Essays on Economy and Society, (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Turkish Series, 1993)
- Heath W. Lowry and Donald Quataert (eds.), Humanist and Scholar: Essays in Honor of Andreas Tietze, (Istanbul: ISIS Press, 1992)
- Aron Rodrigue (ed), Ottoman and Turkish Jewry, Community and Leadership (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Turkish Series, 1992)
- Fatma Müge Göçek, East Encounters West: France and the Ottoman Empire in the Eighteenth Century (New York & Washington, DC: Oxford University Press & ITS), 1987)
- Aptullah Kuran, Sinan : The Grand Old Master of Ottoman Architecture (Washington, DC & Istanbul, Turkey, ITS & Ada Press, 1987*)
Controversies
- In the 1980s, the Turkish government began founding a series of chairs in Turkish studies at major American universities (including the Atatürk chair in Turkish studies at Princeton UniversityPrinceton UniversityPrinceton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
), and research centers like the Institute of Turkish Studies, founded in Washington, DC. These endeavors were to give a polished look to the academic's genocide denial. Some of the key members of the Institute, Stanford ShawStanford J. ShawStanford Jay Shaw was an American historian, best known for his works on the late Ottoman Empire, Turkish Jews, and the early Turkish Republic...
, Heath W. LowryHeath W. LowryHeath Ward Lowry is the Ataturk Professor of Ottoman and Modern Turkish Studies at Princeton University. He has written several books on the history of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey.-Background:...
, and Justin McCarthyJustin McCarthy (American historian)Justin A. McCarthy is an American demographer, professor of history at the University of Louisville, in Louisville, Kentucky. He holds an honorary doctorate from Boğaziçi University, Turkey, and is a board member of the Institute of Turkish Studies...
, argue against defining the Armenian events as genocide. In 1985, Lowry was instrumental in getting 69 academics to sign a letter against the recognition of the Armenian GenocideRecognition of the Armenian GenocideArmenian Genocide recognition refers to the formal acceptance that the massacre and forced deportation of Armenians committed by the Ottoman Empire in 1915-1923 constitute genocide...
. The letter was printed in the New York Times and Washington Post.
- Amy M. Rubin, in the Chronicle of Higher Education, disclosed a petition of scholars that charge the Turkish government with a campaign to manipulate history to enforce its views of the Armenian Genocide. A year later, a story ran in the New York Times accusing Princeton of "fronting for the Turkish government." The university had accepted a large gift from Ankara to establish an Atatürk chair of Turkish studies, with the first occupant being Heath Lowry, executive director of the Institute of Turkish Studies, in 1994.
- In 1997, the University of California, Los AngelesUniversity of California, Los AngelesThe University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...
, returned a $1 million grant to establish a chair in Ottoman studies, from the Turkish government, after it was revealed that scholars using archives in IstanbulIstanbulIstanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...
would be refused access to any material that might confirm the Armenian GenocideArmenian GenocideThe Armenian Genocide—also known as the Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, by Armenians, as the Great Crime—refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I...
of 1915.
- Donald QuataertDonald QuataertDonald Quataert was a Middle East/Ottoman historian at Binghamton University. He taught courses on the Middle East/Ottoman history, with an interest in labor, social and economics, during the early and modern periods. He also provided training in the reading of Ottoman archival sources...
, a professor of history at the State University of New York at Binghamton, served as chairman of the Institute of Turkish Studies board of governors from 2001 until 13 December 2006. He was forced to resign by Turkish Ambassador Nabi SensoyNabi SensoyNabi Sensoy is a former ambassador of Turkey to the United States. He has been holding that office since January 2006. He was recalled back to Turkey in October 2007 after the United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs passed a resolution condemning the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman...
after he refused to retract a scholarly book review in which Quataert wrote "what happened to the ArmeniansArmenian GenocideThe Armenian Genocide—also known as the Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, by Armenians, as the Great Crime—refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I...
readily satisfies the U.N. definition of genocideGenocideGenocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
." A few years before, Quataert said, members of the board checked what they thought was an irrevocable blind trust "and to our surprise it turned out to be a gift that could be revoked by the Turkish government." But in the fall, around the same time that Congress was debating the Armenian QuestionArmenian QuestionThe term "Armenian Question" as used in European history, became common place among diplomatic circles and in the popular press after the Congress of Berlin; that in like Eastern Question, refers to powers of Europe's involvement to the Armenian subjects of the Ottoman Empire beginning with the...
, Quataert was asked to speak at a conference about what had happened at the institute. He told members of the Middle Eastern Studies Association that the ambassador told him he must issue a retraction of his book review or step down—or put funding for the institute in jeopardy.
- Since the May 27 letter from the scholars association was sent, several associate and full members of the board have left. Marcie Patton, Resat Kasaba and Kemal Silay resigned; Fatma Muge Gocek said she would resign as well.