explain anthropology with a related film (The study field is ANTHROPOLOGY)
Fidan Denizci
Ethnographybeyondborders.pptxNational Geographic: Rooting of People, Territorialization of National Identity. Liisa Malkki. “To be rooted is the most important and least recognized need of human soul” (Simone Weil, 1942). Complex categorizations of “homeland”, “culture” “territory”, “deterritorialization”. Social and political constructions. 19th century inventions, nation-states. Main determinants of identity and sense of belonging, conflictual and controversial.
National Geographic maps, different coloured countries, set boundaries. But what about minority groups? Refugees? Cultural diversity => Family of Nations. Not as neat as it seems. Emotional ties to the soil, botanical metaphor of a tree and its roots. If died in a foreign country, ashes brought to home country. Vandalism in cemeteries. Metaphysical links between land (place) and people.
1
Farming, settling down, sedentary life, adopt to natural environment and climate. Labeled as “indigenous people”, but who is more authentic? Romantic vision. Mixed ethnicities.
Moral and spiritual value of territory and its loss. Refugee as anomaly? A generalized category? Age, class, status, gender, migration experience not counted. “Objectified and undifferentiated mass”. Categorical purity through being a refugee in Hutu-Tutsi tribal war. Very debatable.
“True nation” => “moral community”.
“Identity is always mobile, processual, partly self-construction, partly categorization by others, partly a condition, a status, a label, a weapon, a shield, a fund of memories etc…”.
“Diasporas always leave a trail of memory about another time and place and create new maps of desire and attachment” In-betweenness.
Turkish Minorities’ Migration from Bulgaria to Turkey
Marking Time Along the Bulgarian-Turkish border. Ayşe Parla: Persecution in 1984-1989. Migration en masse in 1989. More than 300.000 people. Then in 1990s collapse of the socialist regime, economically induced temporary migration, exit in every 3 months, taking care of children, elderly and sick, particularly trained. Away from their own loved ones, children. Life stories, struggles, going back and forth.
First integration as a minority successful, education in Turkish in Turkish schools, efficient health system, publications in Turkish, cultural activities. Socialist consciousness => ethnic isolationism, integration => assimilation. Changing of names, closing down of Turkish schools, no Islamic symbols in public places, ban in speaking Turkish in public places. Special agreement with Prime Minister Turgut Özal, opening up the borders. “racial kin” (soydaş).
Turk in Bulgaria, Bulgarian in Turkey => always considered as a minority. Difficult living conditions. Leave in one night, everything they can carry in a car, wait and walk through the buffer zone in the border, 300 meter. Borders getting closed ocassionally. Mid 1990s, collapse of the regime: To improve their working conditions in Bulgaria, temporary work with Bulgarian passport. Melike’s story baby-sitting, away from her own baby. Missing her badly, emotional. Cigarettes to make the time pass quicker. But a couple, Gül and her husband servants in a nice private residents, like there so much, that they reluctantly go back to Bulgaria when their kids threaten them to leave school if they do not come back. “Wounded pride issue”.
“Borders in the dark, scary, hundreds of mouth crying” Semra abla. They will suck you back. Hamdi Dayı who went back to home, Bulgaria.
He got used to the Bulgarian system, different system in Turkey. He felt alienated. Different people, different notions of where is home.
