Anti-Veiling Campaigns in Turkey: State, Society and Gender in the Early Republic

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The veiling and unveiling of women have been controversial issues in Turkey since the late-Ottoman period. It was with the advent of local campaigns against certain veils in the 1930s, however, that womens dress turned into an issue of national mobilisation in which gender norms would be redefined. In this comprehensive analysis of the anti-veiling campaigns in interwar Turkey, Sevgi Adak casts light onto the historical context within which the meanings of veiling and unveiling in Turkey were formed. By shifting the focus from the high politics of the elite to the implementation of state policies, the book situates the anti-veiling campaigns as a space where the Kemalist reforms were negotiated, compromised and resisted by societal actors. Using previously unpublished archival material, Adak reveals the intricacies of the Kemalist modernisation process and provides a nuanced reading of the gender order established in the early republic by looking at the various ways women responded to the anti-veiling campaigns. A major contribution to the literature on the social history of modern Turkey, the book provides a complex analysis of these campaigns which goes beyond a simple binary between liberation and oppression.

Reviews

Sevgi Adaks study of the anti-veiling campaigns in 1930s Turkey is a pioneering and successful attempt to get away from the perspective of the central state and to depict realities on the ground, giving agency both to the local party elites who were the driving force behind the campaigns and to those who were at the receiving end." * Erik Jan Zurcher, Professor Emeritus of Turkish Studies, Leiden University, The Netherlands *
This is a superb piece of scholarship based on rich archival material that challenges conventional wisdom about early republican era policies in Turkey. Its sustained focus on the role of local elites and on womens agency in analyzing the local reception of the anti-veiling campaigns in the 1930s singles it out as a truly innovative work. Essential reading for those with an interest in modern Turkey, the politics of gender and modernizing reforms in the Middle East and beyond. * Deniz Kandiyoti, Emeritus Professor, SOAS, UK *
"This is an important and timely book. In its focus on the politics of female dress in early republican Turkey, it has much to say about gender battles in the Middle East. It goes further, however, dissecting the wider objectives of Kemalism and the character of the emerging modernizing state. An exemplary piece of research." * Stephanie Cronin, University of Oxford, UK *

Author Bio

Sevgi Adak is Associate Professor at the Aga Khan University, Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilizations, London, UK. She is one of the four editors of the Contemporary Turkey book series of the British Institute at Ankara (BIAA) published by I.B. Tauris.