Proceedings of the 19th International Academic Conference, Florence

THE JEWISH MINORITY IN TURKEY AT THE CULTURAL TURN OF CITIZENSHIP: AN ANALYSIS BASED ON THE EDITORIALS IN THE JEWISH NEWSPAPER ŞALOM

OYA MORVA

Abstract:

The usage of two oxymoronic words, citizenship and culture, together in political discourse is one of the most remarkable developments in recent socio-political thought. It indicates that the conventional understanding of citizenship – a nation state’s citizenship- which remains one dimensional and inadequate in explaining contemporary citizenship practices, has left its place to cultural citizenship. The new concept of citizenship embraces cultural flexibility, and the reproduction of cultural, linguistic and class knowledge that build the cultural capital of social classes; it demands rights which preclude social injustice and alienation among ethnic or marginal groups of society. Cultural citizenship takes into consideration the components of citizenship besides the rights and duties, such as identity, belonging, participation etc. It (cultural citizenship) questions the main promise of citizenship, the equality, and suggests dealing with it from the perspective of the subcultures. Departing from this theoretical framework, this paper aims to analyse how the Turkish Jewish population experiences cultural citizenship in Turkey. Accepting the idea that the perception of citizenship practices are reflected from/through discourse; the Jewish minority’s newspaper Şalom has been chosen as the source of material for analysis.

Keywords: subcultures, cultural citizenship, cultural flexibility, Turkish Jewish minority, Şalom Newspaper.

DOI: 10.20472/IAC.2015.019.091

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