Abstract: The following article examines the activities among the Turkish Cypriots for the establishment of a written history of the Turkish Cypriot Culture, through which their identity can be reflected. All the related material are evaluated for the first time with a critical approach, because there have been various misinterpretations among the so-called left-wing intellectuals on the subject of Cypriot identity in general and of Turkish Cypriot identity in particular.
While looking
for an answer to the question of “Who is a Turkish Cypriot or a Turk of
Cyprus?”, one has to read at first the works, which give us information about
our cultural history, telling us from where does our community come and to
where does it go? Unfortunately such works are not so much, they are just a
few.
Mrs. Ulviye
Mithat, writing in one of her articles in Ses newspaper, dated 24 August 1935,
underlined the cultural problems of the Turkish Cypriots in those years as
follows:
“As I heard, the
cultural part of the history of Cyprus belonging to the Greek Cypriot community
is completely protected. The Greek Cypriots recorded their cultural history in
various works and prepared them for the usage of the coming generations. On the
other hand, the Turkish Cypriots have not even thought of this subject! They
also neglected every period of the history of Cyprus. Where is a history of
literature? Where is a history of administration? Even their general history
was written in a simple text book.
The only article
written up to now about our cultural history is the short article about the
history of the Lycee which was published last year in the journal of the Lycee.
We need an article immediately about the development of our elementary schools
which are the cradle of our culture.”
The article
mentioned by Mrs. Ulviye Mithat is the one written by her husband, history
teacher of the Lycee, Mustafa Mithat Bey, titled “History of the Lycee”,
published in the “Journal of the Cyprus Boys’ Lycee, 1933-1934 Almanac”
(p.107-127). Mustafa Mithat Bey, who wrote “The Concise History of Cyprus”
(1926) had published in 1930 a 73-paged book “A Short Geography and A Short
History of Cyprus for the Schools” in Turkish together with the geography
teacher, İbrahim Hakkı Bey, published in Birlik Printing House in Nicosia. (1)
İsmet Konur, who
emigrated to Turkey from Cyprus and was a history teacher in Denizli Lycee,
published his work “Turks of Cyprus” in 1938 as a publication of the Remzi
Bookshop in Istanbul, but unfortunately this book was banned in Cyprus by the
British colonial regime. In the Söz newspaper, dated 18 October 1938, we read
the following news: “According to the Official Gazette, published on Friday, it
is strictly forbidden to import the book “Turks of Cyprus”, which was published
in Istanbul, into our land. Police Administration has made some researches, but
it could not find this book at some commercial institutions and houses. The
author of the book is İsmet Konur, who is a history teacher in Denizli,
Turkey.”
The book,
prepared by Hasan Behçet, a teacher, titled “A History of Turkish Education in
Cyprus” was published so late, in 1969.
Because some
Turkish Cypriots, as one of the communities living on the island, do not know
their own political and cultural history sufficiently or they have not read the
limited number of works written up to now, they either go out to search for an
identity or find themselves in the middle of a crisis. There is nı adequate
knowledge in the widely distributed history books, which are all written in
accordance with the official ideology or national ideology, when someone looks
at them in order to find the answer to the question “Who are we?”. Especially
after 1974, when the Turkish Cypriots concentrated themselves on the 37%
northern territory of the island as Turkey partitioned Cyprus by the use of
force, the Turkish Cypriots formed a new structure, which is economically,
militarily and politically dependent on the Republic of Turkey, who strictly
controls this region and the established order and balances of the Turkish
Cypriot community have changed in a great scale. The problem of protecting our
original Cypriot identity against the cultural assimilation, which gained importance
from our subject’s point of view, has forced the Turkish Cypriot intellectuals
to think of this situation constantly and to do various actions against it.
During the ongoing conflict between the mainland Turkish and Turkish Cypriot
identity, some crisis and searches for identity have emerged.
The Turkish
Cypriots, who have a traditional and small community structure, have of course
had an identity before 1974, but they did not have identity problems of such a
dimension as they have now. The British Administration, which started in 1878
after more than 300 years of Ottoman Administration in Cyprus, was the
protector of the Muslim minority, living on the island beside the Greek
Orthodox population. The role of the mainland Greek and Turkish nationalism as
an external factor, the formation and the consolidation of the Turkish Cypriot
leadership during the process starting from the beginning of the 1900’s as a
Muslim community and turning into a Turkish community in the 1950’s, are dealt
extensively in another study of mine.(2) In the serial, titled “Notes on the
development of Cypriot Consciousness”, I analyzed the subject from the point of
view of political identity. (3)
After 1974, the
Turkish Cypriots remained under the influence of the mainland Turkish culture
and they gave more importance to the struggle of repossessing and developing
their own cultural identity. Discussions in this direction started first under
the roof of some political parties. Later activities were made for the
collection and protection of the Turkish Cypriot cultural identity in the
framework of cultural associations and personal researches.
The first
comprehensive meeting for the definition of the standard of the Turkish Cypriot
culture took place in Nicosia from 1 to 4 February 1983 with the participation
of cultural and artistic organizations and personalities. This meeting was also
supported by Ahmet Atamsoy, who was then the responsible Minister for the
Cultural Affairs. More than 200 persons participated at this Advisory Meeting
on Culture and Art and 24 papers were submitted. The activities were carried on
in 10 separate commissions on Language and Literature, History, Music, Ancient
Monuments, Press and Publication, Plastic Arts, Library and Archive, Folklore
and Ethnography, Theater and Law. Unfortunately these contributions were not
published in a book form and as one can assume, They were left aside on dusty
shelves. Only a part of the discussions was reported in the Söz newspaper,
which was the only organ showing interest in those days.
During the
above-mentioned meeting, the Cypriot culture in general and the Turkish Cypriot
culture in particular were discussed intensively. The Söz newspaper published
my three studies during these meetings from 31 January to 12 February 1983:
They were
1. The Origins
of Cypriot culture from historical and ethnological point of view,
2. Changes in
the ethnic and cultural structure of Cyprus after 1571,
3. Cultural and
folkloric interactions between the two main ethnic-national communities living
in Cyprus.
Our cultural
identity was examined for the first time in the above-mentioned three articles
of mine in the historical perspective.
Right after the
advisory meeting, The Has-Der (The People’s Arts Association) organized in
Nicosia on 25 February 1983 the First Folklore Symposium. This was one of the
first scientific steps forward in the crystallization of the ethnic-national
consciousness of the Turkish Cypriots. For those, who are interested in the
subject, it was a gain to have the papers submitted to the Folkloric Symposia
from 1983 to 1986 published in a book by
the “TRNC Ministry of Culture and Tourism in 1986. It was a pity that the
materials of the “Search” Folkloric Exhibition, organized by Has-Der from 11 to
18 October 1982 in the Gamblers’ Inn, Nicosia and of the “Dress and Handwork
Exhibition, organized by the same Association, from 8 to 12 December 1987 at
the Ataturk Cultural centre were all dispersed later, because of the lack of a
Folkloric Museum. Among the other folkloric compilations, published in
book-form are the works of Mahmut İslamoğlu, Oğuz Yorgancıoğlu, Erdoğan
Saracoğlu, Hasan Siber, Mustafa Gökçeoğlu and others.
When we want to
examine the written products of our culture, the first to think of and the first researched are our newspapers.
The first study on this subject was published in Söz newspaper in August 1933
by its editor, Mehmet Remzi Bey, a serial with the title “History of newspaper
in Cyprus”. Mehmet Akif, the Printer, started to publish his study “Turkish
Printing Houses and Newspapers in Cyprus” in the first issue of his “Yeni
Fikirler” (New Opinions) journal (May 1946 and January 1947) and he later
continued the serial in his “Kıbrıs” newspaper (1949). The book “Cyprus Turkish
Press Resources” by Hasan Şefik Altay (1969), which has many mistakes and wrong
information, and “The Press Event in Cyprus 1878-1981” by Cemalettin Ünlü,
published in Ankara (1981) promoted new studies in this field.
The first
introductory articles about our old journals were published in Yeni Düzen
newspaper for 20 days, starting from 24 August 1982, under the title “Our
Culture and Art Journals among the dusty pages of history” by Sevgül Uludağ.
Later Harid Fedai published his study “Turkish Journals in Cyprus published in
the 1940’s” in Halkın Sesi newspaper from 27 March to 3 April 1984, adding new
information and enriching our knowledge in this subject. My study “Examples
from our thinking-life 40 years ago” was first published in Yeni Kıbrıs journal
(March-July 1988) and later in Ortam newspaper (25 July - 2 August 1990). In
the meantime, Haşmet M.Gürkan introduced some of our old journals and
newspapers in Söz newspaper. Sabahattin İsmail published in 1987 his
introducing articles, appeared in Yeni Kıbrıs on our newspapers under the title
“Those (newspapers) which left their imprints in the Turkish Cypriot Press” in
a book. Unfortunately there is no full collection of our Turkish Cypriot
newspapers or journals without failing numbers, neither in the Turkish Cypriot
National Archives, nor in the Turkish Cypriot National Library. I have to
remind the reader that the exhibition of the “First Turkish Cypriot Newspapers
in Cyprus” was opened for the first time on 25 December 1962 at the Mevlevi
Tekke in Nicosia and a lot of our old newspapers were exhibited there. It is
well-known that Ömer Sami Coşar, a Turkish journalist from Turkey, who was then
the Director of the Department of Social Works and Municipalities of the
Turkish Cypriot Communal Chamber, took all the exhibited material to Turkey
with the consent of the authorities, as if they were his private collection.
After his death in March 1984, noone knows the whereabouts of this historical
collection. It would be nice if the same Turkish Cypriot authorities would be
interested in bringing these newspapers back to our country!
The first
comprehensive bibliographical study about the books and booklets published in
Turkish language in Cyprus between 1878 and 1987 (650 books and 150 booklets,
800 titles) was published by me in the Yeni Kıbrıs journal (January-October
1987 and February 1988). Later those books published until 1992 were given in a
list every year in the same journal.(4) Yeni Kıbrıs journal used to be
published monthly starting from October 1984 by one of our researchers, Ahmet
C. Gazioğlu and beside political articles, mostly research articles on the old
Cyprus were published there. Authors like Harid Fedai, Haşmet M.Gürkan,
Sabahattin İsmail, Ali Nesim, Ahmet An published their studies on our cultural
heritage in Yeni Kıbrıs. Later this journal concentrated more on the official
Turkish Cypriot propaganda line and ended finally its publication at the end of
1993.
After referring
to the subject of compilation of the oral and written sources of the Turkish
Cypriot culture, we can come now to the discussions on the cultural identity.
As I could follow, apart from the discussions between individuals, the first
public debate, made in front of an audience, was a symposium, organized by the
Güzelyurt Arts Association (GÜSAD) from 4 to 9 August 1986 in Nicosia, Atatürk
Cultural Centre under the title “The importance of cultural and artistic
development in search of identity”. Although in February 1983 the Has-Der gave
the name “Search” to its “Folkloric Exhibition” and the Cypriot identity was
shown by the exhibited folkloric material, it was surprising to see the GÜSAD
after three years, searching again for a new identity in the cultural and
artistic development. Another mistake of the organizers of this meeting was
that out of the ten invited speakers, only one of them was a Cypriot. The rest
were all selected from Turkey. As the first meeting, the speakers needed to say
“We have not come here to give a prescription to the Turkish Cypriot art and
culture.” But in reality they tried to do so and at times they had to confront
heavy criticisms of the participants. Unfortunately the opinions raised in this
symposium during the discussions could not be published in a book, but some of
the contributions were published in Ortam newspaper in those days. The
Cumhuriyet newspaper of Istanbul reflected some news about the symposium to the
Turkish public opinion, even if they were short, but the newspaper used also
the same wrong title: “Cultural identity is being searched for in Cyprus” (4 August
1986). After two days the news was titled with the words of Professor Emre
Kongar: “The cultural identity of the Turkish Cypriots is different (from
ours).” On 9 August 1986 finally the real situation was reflected with the
words of a Turkish Cypriot speaker: “Cyprus is under the influence of the
interventionist culture.”
It is a fact
that the Greek Cypriots or the Turkish Cypriots are culturally ı-under the
influence of Greece and Turkey respectively. But the crystallization of the
Cypriot identity and the formation of our political togetherness can only be
possible by conscious resistance to the assimilating influences of these both
external cultures and by disseminating and developing our local cultural
characteristics of Cyprus. Without forgetting that the identity problem is in
the first and final analysis a problem of culture, we have to read, research
and digest well our own cultural history with its all aspects, secret and
protected, official and unofficial. Otherwise, it is inevitable to get into
crisis and search for identity, because of ignorance or lacking knowledge.
As the play
“Hope on Human Being” was staged by the Nicosia Turkish Cypriot Municipality
Theater in Istanbul, again a wrong title was used for an interview appeared in
Cumhuriyet newspaper: “The Turkish Cypriots are in search of cultural
identity”. Poet Fikret Demirağ, who was taking part in the interview, stated on
one hand that the most outstanding footprints are of Ottoman culture from the
point of view of the Turkish Cypriot community and on the other hand he could
say that the Turkish Cypriot poets did not have an important heritage from the
past”. (5) Whereas it was an unforgivable mistake of Demirağ, who was a teacher
of Turkish literature, not having heard of read Müftü Hasan Hilmi Efendi, who
was given at his time the title of “Master of the Poets” , the highest Ottoman
title for a poet, Kaytazzade Nazım, Kenzi and our other poets. Our contemporary
poets were also overlooked at once. Yaşar Ersoy, the director of the
Municipality Theater, who was also interviewed, preferred to choose cosmopolitism
in a search for world identity.
Mehmet Yaşın,
another poet of ours, who could not adapt the Cypriot identity, whatever
standard it has reached or could reach and who escaped from Cyprus to distant
places, told in another interview, made with him in London the following: “I am
searching for my soul in the Mediterranean culture”. (6)
Hakkı Yücel, who
together with a group of friends called themselves “Poets of 74 Generation” in
search of a title, preferred to stay away from the soil of Cyprus and named his
book of poems as “Bitter Exile” in 1986. The Varlık literary journal of
Istanbul published with the initiative of the same circle a special section in
its April and May 1987 issues under the title “A search for identity: Turkish
Cypriot Literature” and it tried to reflect the view of this circle to the
Turkish readers.
“The poets of
the 74 Generation” could not stop themselves and organized a panel discussion
on 21 June 1987 with the support of the Hackney Municipal Council in London
under the title “Turkish Cypriot Identity in Literature” and they later printed
the written contributions read at this panel under the same title in a book,
published by the Varlık Publishing House in Istanbul (1988). It was observed
that Mehmet Yaşın and the other participants were not aware of the activities
and discussions made on this subject in Cyprus and they declared themselves the
pioneers. Whereas Mehmet Yaşın confessed in his opening speech that the main
problem was the personal identity crisis of those, who initiated this panel
discussion: “Maybe it would be more appropriate if we have called the name of
this conference as “The identity crisis of the Turkish Cypriot man of
literature”. In fact the problem is in ourselves. It is not easy to destroy the
identity of a people. I am afraid, we, the writers, express our own personal
identity crisis.” (7) I have already published my critics of these
contributions, published in this book, in the Kıbrıs Postası newspaper of 19
June 1988 and I shall not go into detail here.
Another panel
discussion about the identity research was organized on 24 December 1990 by the
Kyrenia Anafartalar Lycee. Its title was “The importance of the identity of the
Turks, living in Cyprus, its necessity from the geographical, historical,
national-religious and political point of view”. Here, mostly the well-known
views of the official ideology were repeated and the students of the Lycee were
tried to be infected by the chauvinism. (8)
Another study,
made in parallelism with the official ideology, is the book, prepared by the
retired philosophy-sociology teacher, Ali Nesim and it was published at the end
of 1990 as the 17th book of the Publications of the “TRNC” Ministry of National
Education and Culture”. The book was named as “The Identity of the Turkish
Cypriots” and in 5 sections, which are “Turkish Cypriots with their social and
cultural aspects”, “Turkish Cypriot literature and the fact of identity”,
“Cultural changes in identity of the Turkish Cypriot people”, “What kind of
people are we? And “The identity of the Turkish Cypriots”, the subjective and
chauvinist views were conveyed in it. As an example we can give the following
judgments:
“We, in other
words, the Turkish Cypriots of today, are not, as the Greek Cypriots allege,
the remnants of the invaders, but the real owners of the island...The Turkish
Cypriots are the oldest people of the island with their history and culture and
as a national people, they are different from the Greek Cypriot people and have
all the rights that the Greek Cypriots have.” (p.13)
The last book we
are going to mention on our subject is the one, published by Dr.Nazım Beratlı,
its title is “The history of the Turkish Cypriots, First Book: The Turkish
Component of the Turkish Cypriot Identity.” He informs us that in the second
book “The Cypriot component of the Turkish Cypriot Identity” will be examined.
(10) I wrote a critic of this book, which was given the first prize in a
competition, organized for the first time in the name of Haşmet M.Gürkan, a valuable researcher of
history and writer, who was the founding president of the Union of the Turkish Cypriot Artists and Writers. The
jury of the competition was the members of the administrative council of this
union themselves! This critic was published in the “Alternatif Yazın” journal
No.6 (March-April 1993) under the title “A book which does not deserve its
prize”. Dr.Beratlı writes: “The Turkish Cypriots like horse and sword, in other
words, they still keep their Türkmenish characteristics, brought all along
through the centuries. “The writer alleges that “the Alevi-Bektashi values lie
at the foundations of the Turkish Cypriots” without referring to any convincing
document or source. (11)
My another
article was a critic again of the views by Refik Durbash on the subject of
identity in Istanbul, in the Görüş journal, dated September 1989, where he was
referring to the folkloric compilation book of Mustafa Gökçeoğlu. My article
against his was published in No.35, October 1989 with an undertitle “Those left
or right wing intellectuals, who come to Cyprus from Turkey and get fond of the
so-called democracy here, have to learn first of all the identity of the
Turkish Cypriots and the history of this country.”
Meanwhile, by
relying on this kind of ignorance or lacking knowledge, some wrong views could
be alleged on this subject even in Cyprus. For example, in an article written
by Derviş Okan in the No.8 (July-August 1994) of the Alternatif Yazın literary
journal, it is stated that “To support the Cypriot identity is in fact being
conservative and reactionary, although it has an appearance of being
progressive.” It is a pity that my article criticizing this wrong opinion was
not published by the journal, but it was published later in the Yeni Çağ weekly
newspaper of 29 August 1994. As I stated there, “The main problem is to possess
first our own Cypriot identity and to make this Cypriot identity universal in a
dynamic structure. As the class struggle intensifies, the class character of
this identity too will show itself.” Otherwise by saying “socialist identity”,
using a left-wing radical view and denying the national formation of the
culture, we cannot reach anywhere. As we reject nationalism and chauvinism, we
cannot reject being national. As we say “Yes to internationalism”, we should
not fall into national nihilism. What we have to develop against the chauvinist
bourgeois culture should be the culture of the working class, relying on the
friendship of the peoples. This new culture should depend on socialist
patriotism and its content should be socialist, its form national. Just because
of this reason, the struggle of the cultural identities of the Turkish Cypriots
and the Greek Cypriots against the assimilating influences of the mainland
Turkish and Greek identities gains importance. The Cypriot identity will be fed
from the struggle of independence which will be waged against the intervening
influences of Turkey and Greece and this will hasten its formation and
development.
Notes:
1. An, Ahmet,
Turkish history textbooks published in Cyprus and its last example: “Turks in
Cyprus”, Yeni Düzen, 23 May 1994 and Alternatif Yazın No.7, May-June 19942. Yeni Çağ, 8 March 1993 - 28 November 1994, a serial in 85 installments. Published as a book later in 1997 in Nicosia under the title “The formation of the Turkish Cypriot Leadership 1900-1942 - The process of becoming a national community out of a religious community”.
3. The first 4 articles were published in Söz newspaper from 23 October to 4 December 1987 and the others in the Demokrat weekly from 4 January to 22 November 1989
4. The Cyprus Bibliographical Association was kind enough to publish my list of the Turkish Cypriot books from 1878 to 1963 in its “Deldio Vivliografikis Eterias Kipru” Tomos C (1990), Nicosia 1991, Ekdosi ar. 10, pp.179-197
5. Cumhuriyet, 23 September 1986
6. Cumhuriyet, 18 May 1987
7. Turkish Cypriot Identity in Literature, Istanbul 1988, p.17
8. Summaries of the contributions were published in Halkın Sesi, 26 December 1990
9. Nesim, Ali, The Identity of the Turkish Cypriots, Istanbul 1990, p.13
10 Beratlı, Dr.Nazım, The History of the Turkish Cypriots, Book:1-The Turkish Component of the Turkish Cypriot Identity, Nicosia 1993, p.17
11. ibid, p.246 and p.207
(This study was first published in Turkish
in Yeni Düzen newspaper, 4-5 April 1988 and later it was translated into
English and was published in Hade, No.2, June 1999)
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