Women and Cultural Citizenship in Turkey

In 2005, a Turkish woman was shot dead by her son in an 'honour killing' for appearing on a popular women's talk show on television. The show invited ordinary women from lower socio-economic classes to speak of their experiences of family life: marriage, divorce, child custody rights and relations with in-laws. Here, Solen Sanli examines the diversification of mass media in Turkey following liberalization in the 1980s. Specifically looking at popular women's talk shows ("Woman's Voice" Television), she explores the way in which groups with political and cultural power control public discourse and the public sphere in Turkey, and how urban/rural and Islamist/secular oppositions play out. Sanli traces the development of mass media in Turkey, particularly television, and closely examining how narrations of violence against women are presented. "Women and Cultural Citizenship in Turkey" contains rigorous, topical and original insights relevant for a range of disciplines, such as Anthropology, Gender and Communication Studies, as well as those researching cultural and political participation in the Middle East.

Solen Sanli lectures at Santa Rosa Junior College in California. She holds a PhD in Sociology from the New School for Social Research, New York and an MSc in Political Sociology from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE).

Chapter 1: The Public Sphere and its Problems
Chapter 2: Women, Public Sphere and Media in Turkey
Chapter 3: The Institutional Framework: A Genealogy of Media Conglomeration
Chapter 4: Woman's Voice as Text: Stories and Structures Underneath
Chapter 5: The Audience: Watching Woman's Voice
Chapter 6: Behind the Camera: Production of Women's Voice
Chapter 7: Cultural Competencies: Republican Capital and Cultural Consumption in Turkey