Domesticating Modernity: The Turkish Magazine Yedigün,1933–9

There was a time when Turkey was foreign even to its own population: it had a new constitution, a new head of state, a new capital, a new place of religious worship, a new alphabet, new social laws, a new penal code, new dress codes, a new education system, new names, a new calendar, a new weekly holiday, all as a result of the top-down modernization process enforced by the Kemalist regime. Much like tourists travelling abroad, the citizens of the new Turkish republic were in need of guidance: what to do, how to act, what to wear and how to speak. By publishing the weekly magazine Yedigün (yedi: seven, gün: day), the editor Sedat Simavi took it upon himself to manage and supervise their journey through everyday life. ¹

Simavi and his journalists were multilingual, familiar with the cultural heritage of Turkey and the West, and capable of mediating cross-cultural communication between the cosmopolitan empire of the past and the national republic, between the public and private spheres, between generations and between the genders. Yedigün not only provided its readers with the necessary social coordinates to find their bearings in the new landscape of modern Turkey, but also positioned Turkey as a modern country on the European map. Transcending ‘mere’ translation, Yedigün domesticated modernity into the Turkish household, through appropriation and conversion.

Passing on the Ottoman intellectual legacy of liberalism and internationalism, Simavi and his journalists challenged not only the West’s monopoly on modernity, but also its Kemalist interpretation. As a challenge from within the modernizing elite, it could not be written off as either behind the times or reactionary.

The 1930s were not the best of times for press freedom in Europe, and Turkey was no exception. Under Turkey’s Press Law of 1931, it was not necessary to apply for permission to set up a publishing house or to publish a newspaper or a magazine, but only people with a higher education were entitled to do so. People thought to have hostile intentions towards the nation, the national struggle, the republic or the revolution were not allowed to publish. All staff had to be registered with the authorities. Propaganda in favour of the Sultanate, the Caliphate, communism or anarchy was prohibited, and it was also forbidden to publish any articles or writings received from the exiled Sultan’s family. Publications that upset or disturbed the country’s general political situation could be closed down by an administrative decision. In 1936, however, three new articles – 142, 161 and 163 – were inserted in the Penal Code, all of which had a bearing on the freedom of the press. These articles prohibited propaganda against the official policy of the state, public agitation, and exploitation of religion or religious symbols for political ends. ²

In his memoirs, Vedat Nedim Tör assessed the curbs on press freedom during his period as General Director of Publication, from 1933 to 1938: ³ During that period there was no direct press censorship, but there was rigorous state control (titiz bir Devlet murakabesi vardır) … The domestic press was inspected by Sadri Etem … Every day he and his assistants would closely examine all the daily newspapers, magazines and books to see if they were in conflict with the Press Law or the principles of the revolution. Domestic and foreign media were scrutinized for any kind of deviation from, or criticism of, the basic tenets of Kemalism and the principle of laicism. ⁴

Sedat Simavi, grandson of Sultan Abdülhamid II’s Grand Vizier Süleyman Pasa and a man firmly tied to the ruling elite of the Ottoman Empire, promoted Yedigün as a cinema screen, where you would watch not only fiction and imaginary tales, but also true stories from all walks of life. ⁵ Addressing his readers directly, Simavi made the magazine’s intended status and cognitive and emotional value clear:

… imagine that you were the publisher of Yedigün, what would you do? The events taking place around you, the things making you upset and causing complaint, the enjoyable things in life, and the stories you want to share – these are what you would like to reflect in your publication, aren’t they? … Yedigün is like a new friend among your friends, a new relative among your relatives … as sincere (sadık) to you as your best friend, as close (yakın) to you as a relative and as affectionate (muhabbetli) to you as a sister … ⁶

Mustafa Kemal, the self-styled champion of modernity, might have been expected to figure prominently, and given the strict censorship under which the press operated during this period, you would only expect positive references. As it turned out, Mustafa Kemal, Kemalist politics and the Republican Party never appeared as explicit topics in any of the columns, and only two references were made to them in columns on other subjects. ⁷

Without referring directly to Mustafa Kemal, one column actually reads well as a criticism of Mustafa Kemal’s style of leadership:

… I want to point out the difference between a symphony orchestra and military barracks. Military barracks are like a machine part, and the main source of energy must be powerful enough to make the wheels turn round … but the competence of the soldiers (who need a strong leader in command) cannot be compared to the orchestra members and their relationship to the conductor. Every musician is an integral part of the totality of the orchestra, moved by internal laws and finding their balance according to inner rules, in harmony with the other orchestra members. The conductor’s directions are not made to make the individual musician bend his neck, but rather to adjust and point out the intended road. ⁸

Simavi’s camera created a gaze critical of the official Turkish narrative by giving space to multiple voices of modernity, voices that neither equated modernity with Kemalism nor with Westernization. Its leader writers included people like Hüseyin Cahit Yalçın, who was arrested and found guilty of high treason in 1923, and exiled in 1925, for writing a leader in the newspaper Tanin suggesting that the Republic had been proclaimed without the consent and knowledge of the Great National Assembly, which had once again been confronted with a fait accompli (arka arkaya verilmiş kararlar karşısındayız). ⁹ Other writers included Halide Edip Adıvar, living in self-imposed exile in Britain following the 1926 ban on Turkey’s first opposition party, the Progressive Republican Party, along with Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, who was condemned for exploiting religion or religious symbols for political purposes, thus violating article 163 of the Penal Code.

The first issue of Yedigün was published on 15 March 1933. It ran until 1951, and was the most popular Turkish magazine throughout its existence, with a circulation of 54,000. ¹⁰ Yedigün was the leading lifestyle magazine, read and related to by a relatively wide audience: the Westernized cosmopolitan elite, for whom modernity had already become a part of their personal identity; the emerging class of bureaucrats and intellectuals in the process of incorporating modernity into their everyday lives; and lastly, the largest group, the city dwellers of all trades and migrants from the countryside yearning to belong in modern Turkey. ¹¹ In its time, Yedigün was a rare voice of an alternative, liberal modernity, crucial to navigating the continuities and breaks between empire and republic. Today Yedigün is a highly important, yet hitherto unexplored, source for broadening our understanding of 1930s Turkey. ¹²

With its wide selection of topics and writers, its abundance of photos and art deco fonts, Yedigün framed modernity as a buffet from which individuals could choose the dishes most agreeable to their own palates: travel, art, beauty, health, relationships, foreign politics, history, education, architecture, serial novels, fashion, housekeeping, poetry, scientific experiments, caricatures, curiosa and advertisements.

The main goal of this article is to map how the appropriation and conversion of modernity was facilitated, arguing that:

through its feature stories and photographic material Yedigün shaped modernity to fit an existing body of values, practices and social dynamics, facilitating its appropriation through culturally matched role models; and

By assessing the feature stories, photographic material and columns, a new image of 1930s Turkey appears: dissociating modernity from a crumbling Europe and a totalitarian Kemalism, Yedigün broadened the criteria for identification with modernity. Neither present, nor past, had to be sacrificed to participate in the realization of Yedigün’s vision for the future Turkey.

The importance of observational learning and the impact of modelling in the symbolic environment of the mass media have been well researched by social cognitive psychologists.

By introducing new ideas and social practices using notable examples – modelling – the media both: ‘… teach new forms of behaviour and create motivators for action by altering people’s value preferences, efficacy beliefs, outcome expectations, and perception of opportunity structures’. ¹⁴

Yedigün’s strategy for facilitating the appropriation of modernity was exactly this: to point out the right path by presenting its readers with role models whose lifestyles and personal images were deemed to be in accordance with the new reality of being Turkish. Through richly illustrated feature stories and photographs, biographical experiences of modernization were articulated. The ‘cast’ included people of both genders and from across the generations, as well as from different strata of the social hierarchy. These role models were subjects who had successfully overcome the challenges of incorporating modernity as part of their everyday lives. As such these role models functioned as ‘boundary objects’, embodying a dialogue with the past, but also between the public and private spheres. ¹⁵

Based on a close study of these photos and the feature stories accompanying many of them, it was possible to construe and identify three different prototypes who acted as boundary objects (or rather boundary subjects) in the magazine. I chose to name the prototypes in accordance with Turkish naming traditions and their normative connotations:

Dilber Taşbebek – Dilber: beautiful, captivating; Taşbebek: a mere doll, pretty but cold

Dilber and Pınar are women’s names, and Kamil is a man’s name, but the prototypes that carry these names are not gender specific, even though my analysis showed that nearly 90 per cent of the ‘Dilbers’ and 74 per cent of the ‘Pınars’ were female, whereas 76 per cent of the ‘Kamils’ were male. These prototypes were then used to map all of the individuals featuring in the magazine, in photographic material or feature stories, through a quantitative analysis using SPSS. ¹⁶ Table 1 shows that as many as 150 of 269 recorded units, or 55.8 per cent of the total photographic material, fell within the predefined role model categories. This is a very high score given the rich use of photos throughout the magazine. Within the category of role models, ‘Kamil’ was most prevalent with 61 recorded units, or 40.7 per cent of the total. ‘Pınar’ was second, with 46 units, or 30.7 per cent, followed closely by ‘Dilber’ with 43, or 28.7 per cent. ¹⁷

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Table 1.

Role model categories: frequency and percentage

Category	Frequency	Cumulative frequency	Percentage of grand total (269 items)	Percentage within role model category (150 items)
Dilber	43	43	16.0	28.7
Pınar	46	89	17.1	30.7
Kamil	61	150	22.7	40.7
Curiosa	30	180	11.2	0
Miscellaneous	89	269	33.1	0
Total	269	269	100.0	100.0

However, the significance of the editor’s use of the three role models cannot be measured in frequency alone: ‘Dilbers’ were mainly found in captions, snapshots, illustrations or cover photos, whereas ‘Pınars’ and ‘Kamils’ generally appeared in several-page-long interviews and articles. ¹⁸ Thus the importance of ‘Pınar’ and ‘Kamil’ as role models as measured in actual space in the magazine is much higher than their frequency suggests.

To describe each of the prototypes, quotations and extracts from novels, feature stories and interviews in Yedigün that portray the individual role models were selected. This section includes some lengthy quotations also intended to demonstrate the strategies and style of the journalists writing for Yedigün.

The beautiful Dilber Taşbebek. This role model represented a femininity dissociated from the traditional gender role of marriage, children and housekeeping. Her main interests were fashion, make-up, travel and shopping. On 10 November 1934, Yedigün published the first chapter of the novel Taşbebek, written by Mahmut Yesari. The opening lines of the novel are representative of the public image of this female role:

She was wearing white silk, and her skin was so white that it was impossible to detect where the low-cut neckline and her skin met. Were it not for the manicure, her hands could have been mistaken for jasmines. Her shining auburn hair hanging down loose was like sunshine on her body. Her long, curly, dark auburn eyelashes covered her sea-green eyes with the sweetest of shadows … ¹⁹

Yedigün offered allowed its readers to participate in the dream of becoming ‘Dilber Taşbebek’ through the notion of ‘buy me – be me’. ‘Dilber’ figured most frequently on cover photos; in fact, as many as 48.5 per cent of all the magazine covers had a ‘Dilber’ as their main photo, but she was also a popular motif in feature stories and illustrations. In the article ‘Advice on Charm and Attraction for Young Girls and Women’, ‘Dilber Taşbebek’ is portrayed as an ambitious professional. In an interview with a famous film star, Norma Shearer, the journalist asks how she manages to be so well-groomed and good-looking no matter the place or time of day. Norma answers:

Before becoming a film star, I disciplined myself: every day before leaving home I told myself that today might be the day when you will accidentally run into a stage director or a film producer, and so I prepared for that kind of chance meeting. I would examine myself in front of the mirror and if there was anything lacking with my appearance, clothes or make-up, I would correct it. Every single hair on my head was obliged to obey my regime. ²⁰

Ranked above all other ‘Taşbebeks’ was the blonde. In ‘The Attraction of the Blond’, the author explains why a blonde woman is every man’s dream. ²¹ The writer then offers three explanatory factors: blondes look more fragile and thus arouse the man’s instinctive protectiveness; blondes are a minority (if you discount the artificial ones); and, finally, blondes are more challenging to conquer. Marked by the harsh living conditions of their original habitat, the North, they are less prone to excessive emotions, their character is more serene, they are like ‘a lake without ripples (dalgasiz bir göle benzerler), now what man can protect himself from such an influence?’ ²²

As a cover girl, ‘Dilber’ was part of Simavi’s marketing strategy: she provided erotic stimulation, grabbing attention and attracting potential buyers to the magazine. In the feature stories, however, ‘Dilber’ was given a voice: proclaiming a high level of self-efficacy she represented herself as a self-reliant woman, with a hedonistic, egocentric self-image.

The optimistic Pınar İyimser. ‘Dilber’ was not the female image favoured by the editorial voice in the columns. That position was reserved for ‘Pınar İyimser’, whose self-realization project was based on the pursuit of a professional career, albeit without sacrificing her duties at home:

The new way of living that we have embraced presents us with a new kind of young girl. We have in our midst a brand new stereotype for young girls, the working girl (çalışan genç kız). Before the revolution, a working girl was synonymous with a servant … But today, even girls from the best of families have entered the world of work. She instils admiration (hayret) and respect (hürmet); she succeeds with courage (cesurluk) and heroism. In all branches of life, wherever you look around, behind the typewriter, or doing the accounts, you will find a serious, hard-working young girl or woman. Getting up early in distant districts of the town, resisting the temptations of sleep and the warm laziness of the bed, putting on make-up in a hurry, throwing on some plain clothes … providing for their mothers, helping their younger brothers with their studies, not trusting anything but their own pay cheque to keep them warm and safe … ²³

The actual existence of ‘Pınar İyimser’ was documented through a series of feature stories from various kinds of educational institutions and workplaces. In January 1935, Yedigün paid a visit to the campus at Ege University, and interviewed female law students.

The story starts with a presentation of a conversation overheard by the journalist upon his arrival:

‘I think the Italian campaigns in Ethiopia will have more influence on the financial situation than on the economy.’

‘I think exactly the opposite.’

‘Friends, if you ask me, the League of Nations has played a very passive role.’

‘What could be done?’

‘If you grant the organization any moral authority they should immediately have taken action to prevent war.’

‘They could have sent an international armed force against Italy.’

‘Good idea, but that is not permitted according to paragraph 16.’

‘It is permitted!’

‘No it’s not.’

‘Permitted!’

‘No it’s not.’

‘I’ll get the law book and show you.’

‘Go get it!’

The journalist then asked about their plans for the future, including which profession they would choose, and explained that he had to suppress a smile when several of the girls expressed a wish to become diplomats:

‘Is that not a profession more suitable for men?’

‘Most certainly not … women make much better diplomats …’ ²⁴

Playing the role of the non-participant observer, the journalist’s account of the students’ discussion lends a strong sense of authenticity to this story of young, ambitious Turkish women, studying law and discussing international politics and diplomacy. And Yedigün is full of similar stories, stories of girls taking up all sorts of jobs, from traditional occupations such as nursing and teaching, to those of doctor, pilot or MP. Issue after issue, the same image of the young Turkish woman was distributed to its readers: a woman who combined the value preferences of the private and public spheres, who had high outcome expectations and who exemplified the opportunity structures of the new Turkish society by telling their own personal life stories.

The pure-hearted Kamil Temizkalplı. The ‘Kamil Temizkalplı’ category is composed of individuals from all walks of life: doctors, retired army officers, bureaucrats, politicians, musicians, teachers, midwifes, etc. The common denominator of the people in this category is how the journalist presents them: as role models not based on what they do, but on who they are and how they act. By personalizing these interviewees, Yedigün makes it possible for readers to identify equally easily with the doctor, the midwife and the politician.

In March 1934, Yedigün journalist Naci Sadullah conducted an interview with the famous and highly respected Turkish doctor Besim Ömer Paşa. A typical setting for interviews in the ‘Kamil Temizkalplı’ category is somewhere private, most often the interviewee’s home. The journalist plunged straight into the doctor’s private life, asking him why he never married. ²⁵

‘Paşam, why did you never get married?’

‘What do you mean? I have been married for more than half a century.’

‘We thought you were a bachelor.’

‘But I’m married. Happily married …’

‘!!!’

‘And unlike other wives my wife does not try to hide her age, she is never jealous, and she doesn’t spend time on make-up, she is like an angel.’

‘!!!’

‘You are imagining a woman, a child. Intriguing people … But I’m married to my books, my books!’

(Oh, what a relief. The Paşa was only joking; if he had continued his game a little longer I would have started questioning my own memory.)

‘But why did you never marry?’

‘When I was of the proper age to marry, my family suffered a lot of difficulties: we became victims of Abdülhamid’s [Sultan Abdülhamid II] tyranny and my father died in exile. Spies were on my back. I had to move on as fast as possible … I couldn’t marry, I didn’t marry.’

The liberal bent of Yedigün reveals itself in this story of Besim Ömer, the self-made man who, in spite of a difficult childhood and being orphaned, managed to create a good life for himself as a doctor. But being Turkey’s most famous and recognized doctor did not make Ömer unapproachable; he opened his home and he willingly told his life story to the journalist.

Another highly respected citizen of public standing was Ş ükrü Saraçoğlu, Minister of Justice. Even though the interview took place in Saraçoğlu’s office, it was his private persona that was the focus of the journalist’s interest:

‘I have met many modest people in my life. But I have seldom come across someone as modest (mütevazi) as Saraçoğlu. He is the true incarnation of ‘human’ …

‘Sir,’ I said, ‘apart from this heavy burden of work, how do you spend your time?’

‘Let me tell you … I have a small house in Bozda. Every year I manage to go there for about 15 days, it is such a pleasure … It’s far away from everything. No documents, no pen and papers, no inspections. I even disconnect my phone when I’m there. As soon as I arrive I put on my old everyday clothes. A cap on my head, drinking coffee in the village … under the enormous plane tree, the coffee is delightful. The villagers say: “Oh, Saraçoğlu has come”. There is no “Minister”, only Saraçoğlu the villager … We speak about the village for a long time.’ ²⁶

This emphasis on Saraçoğlu as a villager was obviously intended to humanize and personalize the Minister of Justice, making it possible for Yedigün’s readers to feel a bond with him.

Last, but not least, is Mrs Ş ahin, the midwife, who during her 40-year-long career had delivered more than 15,000 children. Ş  ahin received the Yedigün journalist in her garden:

‘The first time you delivered a child must have been very exciting?’

Her response was immediate:

‘I will never forget it … Maybe also because I have spoken about it so many times. I smile when I think about it. My mother was also a midwife. [But o]ne night they called for me. An Italian woman was giving birth. I grabbed my mother’s bag and ran to the house of the patient. Standing on the threshold my legs and my whole body were trembling. What if I couldn’t manage? As I approached the woman, I felt sicker than her … While she suffered I ran out and prayed to God: Allah please help me! …’

‘What is the difference between midwives today and midwives practising forty years ago?’ Without hesitation she answered:

‘No difference at all. I left school forty years ago, having been taught by Besim Ömer Paşa … It is absolutely necessary for a midwife to have some medical knowledge. When practising in Anatolia many years ago, people told me to go and use my diploma in Istanbul. What is the value of a diploma? God be praised, when the time has come we must all die … But today there is no one who speaks like that anymore …’

‘Do you have any advice for pregnant women?’

‘Pregnant women should be careful not to use any medicine that might be dangerous. Abortion can put the woman’s life at risk … There are also some mothers who want the umbilical cord to be cut long, believing it will make the child’s voice stronger. This is wrong: a long umbilical cord becomes a nest of bacteria.’

Finally I asked the midwife of 15,000 children my last question:

‘Are you satisfied with your life?’

‘Very … the other day one of my sons came by. I consider all the children I have delivered as my children: “Mother,” he said, “my wife is about to give birth” …’ ²⁷

The well-balanced answers, the self confidence, the approval of education, the refutation of superstitious beliefs, the warm-hearted stories of births and babies all contributed to making midwife Ş ahin a true, universal mother figure. A person rooted in past values, with a modern outlook, she reflected the dominant societal values. Together with the other ‘Kamils’, she gave a warm face to the cold new modernity.

The role models thus construed, identified and described were then used as categories in the analysis of the photographic material and their related feature stories by gender, age and nationality. ²⁸ The age dimension was operationalized using the nominal categories youth, middle-aged or old/historic, whilst nationality was split into ‘Turkish’ and ‘non-Turkish Western’.

Table 2 shows the interrelation between the role model categories and gender, age and nationality. The overall results show that the majority of people portrayed in the ‘Pınar’ category were female (74.3 per cent), young (82.4 per cent) and Turkish (90.5 per cent). ‘Dilbers’ were likewise female (87.5 percent) and young (97.6 percent), but not Turkish; in fact, a full 75.6 percent of the ‘Dilbers’ were ‘non-Turkish Western’. The ‘Kamil’ category comprised 50.0 per cent old or historic people, who were mainly male (76.0 per cent) and predominantly Turkish (94.9 per cent).

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Table 2.

Interrelation of category and gender, age and nationality

Category	Gender		Age			Nationality
	Male	Female	Young	Middle-aged	Old/Hist.	Turkish	Non-Turkish Western
Dilber	12.5	87.5	97.6	2.4	0.00	24.4	75.6
Pınar	25.7	74.3	82.3	11.8	5.9	90.5	9.5
Kamil	76.0	24.0	26.1	23.9	50.0	94.9	5.1

Yedigün provided a large public stage for women, literally unveiling them. Comparing the visibility of women in Yedigün with their actual presence in the public sphere, it is possible to conclude that Yedigün in this respect played a prescriptive rather than reflective role. Within a feminist discourse it is easy to write off both ‘Dilber’ and ‘Pınar’ as yet another patriarchal abuse of power, creating the perfect ‘image of woman’ to show off the nation’s level of modernity, without admitting her any real agency as an autonomous actor capable of speaking in her own right. ‘Dilber’ the dazzling cover girl is a mere object to arouse men’s desire, whilst ‘Pınar’ is working under the false expectation of a professional future. However, considered from the perspective of social cognitive theory, the fact that issue after issue, year after year, Yedigün was filled with female success stories, portrayed in a personalized style consonant with the prevailing social norms and value systems, would have had a substantial impact: motivating, enabling and informing readers, displaying preferences and exemplifying new practices:

By exemplification one can get people to behave altruistically, to volunteer their services, to delay or seek gratification, to show affection, to select certain foods and drinks, to choose certain kinds of apparel, to converse on particular topics, to be inquisitive or passive, to think creatively or conventionally, or to engage in other permissible courses of action … [models are] shapers of values and conceptions of reality. ²⁹

Young women, a hitherto silent community, were given a narrative voice asserting women-centred interests and points of view. Carefully selected and branded, they were boundary objects: images of continuity rather than a break with the Ottoman past. The fact that the public image of women as educated professionals was always combined with reassurance that they were not neglecting their family responsibilities did not consign women to the domestic sphere, but was rather a necessary part of the domestication of modernity, in 1930s Turkey as well as in the rest of the West.

The category of ‘Kamil’, on the other hand, had a majority (76.0 per cent) of male representatives. But just as the women in Yedigün did not correspond to the stereotypical virtuous Turkish mother, nor was ‘Kamil’ the stereotypical brave Turkish man. Most men were defined in their capacity as professionals, often in high status occupations, but portrayed through their personal life. Thus the qualities ascribed to them were strikingly ‘feminine’: modesty, empathy, respect for tradition, and great concern for their duties as fathers. In contrast to the categories of ‘Dilber’ and ‘Pınar’, where the majority of representatives were young (97.6 and 82.4 per cent respectively), there was a greater age distribution within the ‘Kamil’ category, with as many as 50 per cent being ‘old/historic’: old men (and women) who were tradition-minded and expressed great expectations for the promises of modernity.

Likewise, the youths of Yedigün did not voice distress, identity conflicts, or tension between tradition and innovation, between the world of their parents and their own one: intergenerational harmony prevailed. To everyone, youth carried connotations of hope, optimism, energy and new beginnings, and thus symbolized the new Turkish republic. The generational differences that existed between the younger generation and their elders due to the rapid cultural change of the era was debated and bridged by the application and framing of these role models.

Nationality was the last subcategory applied in the analysis of the role models’ characteristics. The results show that of the three categories, only the ‘Dilber’ category had a majority of non-Turkish Western, with 75.6 per cent. The stereotypical Western concept of beauty was imperative for all European ‘Dilbers’ during this period. The cover girl was a symbol of the aesthetics of consumer-based modernity. And because the blonde was especially favoured, the ‘Dilber’ category was more likely to feature non-Turkish Westerners. ‘Dilber’ represented a consumption-based approach to the pursuit of happiness typical of Western materialism, and as such she played an important part in the appropriation of modernity.

‘Pınars’ and ‘Kamils’, on the other hand, were predominantly Turkish: 90.5 and 94.9 per cent respectively. It was vital for ‘Pınar’ and ‘Kamil’ to be recognizable to readers; they had to be non-Western Turkish, emphasizing the importance of staying Turkish while being modern. Yedigün journalists framed the role models’ life stories and made them into documentaries of people who had actually made themselves at home in the new republic. By presenting these well-adapted role models through print material, Simavi helped his readers to recognize their needs, emphasized the personal relevance and importance of the information, and demonstrated that modernity was a way of life open to them (the readers) as well, supporting and increasing the appropriation of modernity. The fact that it was the best-selling magazine of its time suggests that the editor’s assessment of his readers must have been quite accurate.

But the readers of Yedigün were not a homogenous group. While some were still in the appropriation phase, others were beginning to suffer from a kind of ‘post-purchase dissonance’: people in the process of evaluating the promised effect and usability of their newly appropriated commodity (modernity) and finding it lacking. Their needs were met not by the various feature stories nor through the simple photographic documentation of progress, but by the columns written by some of Turkey’s sharpest pens.

Yedigün’s columns represented the editorial voice of the magazine and contained an explicit opinion or point of view. Appearing regularly on page three, with a specific header called ‘The number one in Yedigün’ (Yedigün’de bir), they were written by specially invited writers such as Ali Ridvan, Turhan Tan, Ercumend Ekrem, Ömer Riza, Mahmud Yesari, Nurullah Ata, Peyami Safa and Hüseyin Cahit Yalçın. These contributors, who occupied various spheres of politics, literature, education and media, were household names in Turkey. ³⁰ By assessing the columns in terms of the domestication theory, the aim here is to map the conversion that took place as Yedigün addressed the needs of those readers that were in the process of re-evaluating their appropriation of modernity. This is supported by a quantitative analysis of all of the columns in all of the issues from March 1933 to February 1939, operationalized by the following questions. What topics were discussed? To what extent was the West a standard reference to which all domestic issues were compared? When compared, where was Turkey situated with respect to the West: was the West conceived as a bloc, as a self-sufficient entity to which Turkey did not belong? Which image of the West did the columns represent: positive, negative or did they point out common ground? What perceptions of the Western ‘other’ and the Turkish self were articulated by the magazine?

Sedat Simavi’s selection of column topics helped to set the agenda of Yedigün’s readers, but also had to be matched by the readers’ own interests. The quantitative content analysis of the columns involved performing a first reading to generate a list of topics that were discussed. Based on this, it was possible to group the topics into the following clusters: travel, relationships, politics, media, education, values and religion:

Travel: includes columns written on the basis of the writers’ travels in Turkey and to other European countries.

Table 3 shows the topic salience by frequency and percentage. The most prevalent topics were ‘Values’ and ‘Politics’, with 61 and 60 units each, in total 43.8 per cent of a total of 276 recorded units. ³¹ With only seven recorded instances, equivalent to 2.5 per cent, ‘Religion’ had the lowest score of all of the analysed topics. Of these seven columns, one discussed the concept of laicism, one discussed Christmas celebrations, and five concerned religious holidays, which were re-framed as traditional ‘get-togethers’ with food and family as core ingredients. Among the reforms implemented by the Kemalist regime, those concerning religion were without doubt the most controversial. The secularization policies of the Kemalist regime were substantially deficient in democratic principles, but were protected by strong legislation. Both the Press Law and the Penal Code included paragraphs that made any open discussion of religion impossible. One was allowed to address religion according to the new secular principles, of course, but Yedigün declined to do so. Nor was there any expression of negative sentiments towards religion, apart from the odd remark about religion being something that belonged to the past. Religion was the ‘invisible elephant’ in the room. ³²

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Table 3.

Topic salience, frequency and percentage

Topic	Frequency	Percentage
Values	61	22.1
Politics	60	21.7
Travel	45	16.3
Relationships	36	13.0
Education/language	36	13.0
Media	19	6.9
Religion	7	2.5
Other	12	4.3
Total	276	100

To President Mustafa Kemal and his fellow modernizers, the West was the ideal, the place of tomorrow, the quintessence of contemporary civilization, an ‘other’ to be joined, thus clearly distinct from Turkey, which was still in need of major material and spiritual transformations. One might therefore expect that a lot of the topics would contain references to the West, and that these references would be positive. After analysing the columns with respect to both the frequency and type of ‘Reference to the West’ and ‘Image of the West’, it turned out that the columnists in Yedigün had a much more nuanced image of the West and of Turkey. Table 4 shows the results of a cross-tabulation of topics with references to and images of the West.

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Table 4.

Interrelation of topics and references to and images of the West (total units = 264)

Per cent and count within topic	No reference	Reference to the West (total no. of units = 161)			Images of the West (total no. of units = 161)
		As bloc	Country	Individuals	Positive	Negative	Common ground
Values %	45.9	36.3	21.2	42.4	18.2	33.3	48.5
Count	28	12	7	14	6	11	16
Politics %	11.7	28.3	56.6	15.1	7.5	73.6	18.9
Count	7	15	30	8	4	39	10
Travel %	44.4	24.0	68.0	8.0	28.0	48.0	24.0
Count	20	6	17	2	7	12	6
Relationships %	72.2	40.0	30.0	30.0	10.0	20.0	70.0
Count	26	4	3	3	1	2	7
Education/language %	33.3	25.0	50.0	25.0	54.2	0.0	45.8
Count	12	6	12	6	13	0	11
Media %	31.6	23.1	53.8	23.1	30.8	46.2	23.1
Count	6	3	7	3	4	6	3
Religion %	57.1	33.3	66.6	0.0	0.0	0.0	100.0
Count	4	1	2	0	0	0	3
Total within column %	39.0	29.2	48.4	13.6	21.7	43.5	34.8
Total within column count	103	47	78	36	35	70	56

‘Reference to the West’ was operationalized by four nominal categories: reference to the West; the West seen as a bloc; the West as individual countries; and references to well-known individual Westerners such as Lloyd George, Napoleon or Hitler. ³³ These are key dimensions in mapping how Turkey positioned itself with respect to Europe. The frequency of references to the West is a marker of the perceived significance of the West to Turkish questions. When such a reference was made, referring to the West as a bloc would indicate a conception of Turkey as not forming part of the West. When the columnist referred to individual Western countries or Western individuals, there was no indication whether or not Turkey was seen as an insider belonging to the same social and cultural category, or an outsider to the Western community. The overall impression in these cases was that Turkey and the other Western countries drew on the same knowledge resources.

‘Image of the West’ describes how the West was evaluated: positively, negatively or as being on equal terms or sharing common ground with Turkey. The last applied when the columnist used individual Western sources and connections for inside information.

Table 4 shows that out of a total of 264 recorded units, 103, or 39.0 percent, contained no reference to the West. Of the 169 units that referred to the West, 47, or 29.2 per cent, referred to the West as a bloc, 78, or 48.4 per cent, included references to individual Western countries, and 36, or 22.4 per cent, referred to Western individuals. From this it is absolutely clear that the West was not the standard reference to which all domestic issues were compared, nor was the West considered as a closed entity to which Turkey did not belong.

Of the 169 units that contained a reference to the West, 70, or 43.5 per cent, were negative, 34.8 per cent suggested that Turkey and the West shared common ground, whilst only 35 units, or 21.7 per cent, saw the West as positive. According to the journalists at Yedigün, then, the West in many respects represented a worst-case scenario.

Moving down one level to look at the individual topic clusters, ‘Values’, which was the most frequent column topic, included no reference to the West in 45.9 per cent of cases. In so far as there were references, the majority were to well-known Western individuals. In 48.5 per cent of these cases Turkey and the West were considered to share ‘common ground’. A column written by Peyami Safa shows how a belief in that common ground could co-exist with positive and negative views of the West:

[The Turkish intellectuals] only believe in the value of our culture after it has been evaluated and priced at the European cultural market. André Gide has taught us to appreciate Yesil Türbe, Eugene Borel taught us to appreciate Itriyi and Dedeyi, Pierre Loti has taught us to appreciate Turkish tiles, … Western technology, the toys of the devil, cast a spell on our taste (zekalarımız büyüledi), and the material wonders [of the West] made us devalue our own spiritual assets … Foreigners understand us better than the cosmopolitan Turks of Beyoglu. ³⁴

Many columns in the ‘Values’ topic cluster dealt with the difficulty and importance of staying Turkish while being a European; Yalçın wrote that: ‘In this war our most important weapons are education and knowledge. Western culture, Western methods, Western technology, but not Western feelings … a difficult but honourable duty is awaiting the young’. ³⁵

The decline of traditional values, along with materialism and the hazards of modern living, were other frequently discussed questions in this topic cluster. Columnist Dr Ali Ridvan lamented the consequences of urbanization, worrying about green fields being transformed into building sites and about the unhealthy busy lifestyle, with tramways, dark offices and lack of daylight, without making any references to the West:

The modern family enjoys the radio, parties, cars and full wardrobes – but has nowhere to hang out their clothes to dry … Nervousness is a new and growing illness, an illness which didn’t exist in the village … As a consequence of urbanization we are being separated from our inner purification system (dahili ifraz guddeleri) … Why is no one questioning the rise in the use of aspirin? ³⁶

Yedigün expressed understanding and sympathy for those readers who longed for the past, but took pains to remind them that ‘it will not do to make plans for tomorrow while longing for the past …’. One columnist urges readers to stop the newly established habit of ending all sentences with a question mark: ‘… do we have youth? Do we have literature? Do we have a public opinion? … We must have belief in ourselves … Our question is not one of being or not being, but of how to be …’. ³⁷

‘Values’ was very closely followed by ‘Politics’ as the next most popular subject of the columns. Given the limitations on press freedom in Turkey, the only domestic political topics discussed were of a very general nature, such as social mobility, urban development and economics. All were framed in a context of social theory or individual responsibility. Thus the most frequent topic in the ‘Politics’ cluster was foreign news, and above all the political developments in Italy, Spain and Germany. A full 88.3 per cent of the columns within this topic contained references to the West, 56.6 per cent of which were to individual Western countries, 15, or 28.3 percent, to the West as a bloc, and eight, or 15.1 per cent, to the West as Western individuals. Out of all the references, 73.6 per cent were ‘Negative’. (See Table 4.)

Columns on ‘Travel’ were relatively prevalent, not least because Hüseyin Cahit Yalçın was Yedigün’s favourite columnist and the most sought after foreign news expert in Turkey during the 1930s. ³⁸ The travelogues covered both domestic and international travels, 44.4 per cent of which were without any reference to the West. Sixty-eight percent of the references were to individual Western countries, and 48 per cent of all the references were ‘Negative’. Participating in a ceremony at the Cemetery of Unknown Soldiers from the First World War, Yalçın reflected that: ‘Standing face to face with the martyrs of yesterday we could already taste the suffering of tomorrow’s victims (Dünün kurbanı huzurunda yarının kurbanlarının acısını da simdiden tadıyor gibiyiz)’. ³⁹

‘Relationships’ was also a frequent topic, with 13.6 per cent of the total. ‘Relationships’ is the topic with fewest references to the West, with only 10 units, or 27.8 per cent. Of these 10 units, seven emphasized Turkey’s common ground with the West, and only one referred to the West as positive. Given that this topic cluster includes all columns with references to gender, and that all of the columnists were arguing in favour of women’s liberation and gender equality, the result is unmistakeable: in matters of gender equality, the West was not a source of inspiration to Yedigün’s columnists. Instead they preferred to refer to pre-Abdülhamid practices:

In some districts of Turkey women are still veiled. But this must come to an end; why are women still dressed that way, eleven years after the revolution? Even in the Ottoman days, before Sultan Abdülhamid II, women would show more of their face than they do today. But Abdülhamid imposed his zeal on the whole population and made them cover up. If women were caught with uncovered hair, their hair would be cut off. But now we have a republic! Women should not stay in the shadow, or be veiled. Turkishness is a sun that penetrates even the darkest shadow! ⁴⁰

Alternatively, they would refer to Turkish republican politics and Mustafa Kemal, which is quite significant given that only two references to Kemal or Kemalist politics were found throughout the columns studied. Before the Kemalist revolution:

… a man was entitled to four wives and a woman was the man’s slave, separated from her children and exchanged like goods at a slave market. Today it is different, woman is the friend and companion of man … Both the female slave of poverty and the female slave of the bourgeoisie have been liberated by Turkish republican politics. Today we are all slaves of democracy. ⁴¹

The equally high prevalence of education/language references is symptomatic of the great emphasis placed on education as the means to establish Turkey firmly on civilized ground, as well as the language reform, which focused on purification of the language by replacing Persian, Arabic and French words with ‘pure’ Turkish. Two thirds of the columns in this cluster referred to the West, and none of these references were ‘Negative’.

Almost 7 per cent of columns dealt with the media, a relatively high number considering how limited this topic was compared to the large clusters of ‘Politics’ and ‘Values’. This reflects the interest in, and importance given to, the press, the radio and the discussion of censorship, propaganda and the responsibilities of journalists and publishers with respect to facts, readers and rulers. The majority of columns within this topic (68.4 per cent) referred to the West, and 46.3 per cent of these references were ‘Negative’. All the columns in this cluster were written by Hüseyin Cahit Yalçın, who was himself a victim of press censorship. ⁴² In 1936, Yalçın commented in one of his many Yedigün columns on the challenges of journalism:

To be able to realize the freedom of thought, the journalist works hard, surrounded by the smell of wet ink from the press, sometimes confronted with serious dangers, and with thousands of impressions and influences in the air, like a captive strapped in iron chains … You must be willing to make sacrifices: your social life, rest, promotion, money and even your life sometimes. ⁴³

Sedat Simavi was an independent publisher with an agenda to domesticate modernity. His magazine’s success depended on his ability to meet the needs of the population, both those who lacked the necessary knowledge and motivation to appropriate modernity, and those who were in the process of re-evaluating their prior commitment to the modernization project. Yedigün’s pedagogical approach worked for both groups. Through the feature stories and photographic material on ‘Pınars’, ‘Dilbers’ and ‘Kamils’, Yedigün allowed its readers to connect with modernity at a personal level, thus facilitating the appropriation of modernity. The content analysis of the columns has shown beyond doubt that the West neither was, nor could be, the standard reference to which everything Turkish was compared. Through the columns, Yedigün dissociated modernity not only from the West, but also from its Kemalist curriculum: modernity converted.

There was a time when Turkey was foreign even to its own population: Yedigün was Sedat Simavi’s effort to reconcile the divergent understandings of the past, the present and the future, establishing a modus operandi for the ‘old’ inhabitants of the new Turkish republic. As a source to broaden our understanding of 1930s Turkey, there are more discoveries to be made; I feel confident that the desire has been aroused.