Voyvoda Street Lectures 2009-2010

A.POLITICAL ECONOMY LECTURES

First Wednesday of each month from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
The theme is environmental economics.

November 4, 2009 - Prof. Alper Güzel
Organic Agriculture and Genetically Modified Organisms

In recent years, two opposite techniques have emerged in the agricultural sector: organic farming and GMO farming. The pros and cons of both techniques and their socio-economic and environmental dimensions require investigation. At the same time, there is a growing interest in both topics throughout the world. In Turkey, on the other hand, there has been insufficient research and discussion on these issues; worse still, the general public receives incorrect information about both topics. The lecture, which aims to discuss advances in both techniques in Turkey and the world, will be in two parts. First Güzel examines developments in Turkey and the world from an economic perspective, then, he considers the social and environmental aspects of the topic.

December 2, 2009 - Assist. Prof. Begüm Özkaynak
Economic Solutions to Environmental Issues: Standard Economics vs Ecological Economics and the Impact of Standard Economics in Turkey

Economists have been aware for a long time that economic activities such as production have an environmental impact. Accordingly, the lecture will discuss how economics as a science theoreticizes the economy-environment relationship. Özkaynak will examine the theoretical and methodical differences existing between neoclassical economics and ecological economics, the two main approaches in this area. How are environmental destruction and sustainable development defined? What are the suggestions to slow down/stop/reverse destruction and promote sustainability?

Providing examples from Turkey, the lecture will also consider how, over the past 30 years, standard economics have shaped the ways in which this country views the environment and tackles environmental issues. Finally, Özkaynak will emphasize the need to approach environmental issues and policies in the public sphere from an essentially long term perspective, with participatory mechanisms and a multidimensional method, as well as the necessity for Turkey to change its environmental policies accordingly.

January 6, 2010 - Prof. Fikret Adaman
Turkey’s Environmental Policies : An Analytical Approach
The lecture presents a political economic analysis of Turkey’s environmental problematique – and by this concept we refer both to the pollution of the environment and the excessive depletion of natural resources – in a globalizing world context. Population growth, industrialization, urbanization, the use of pesticides and fertilizers in agriculture, and the rise in popularity of coastal areas have exerted a heavy environmental toll in Turkey over the past 50 years. There is plentiful data, some anecdotal and some from official sources, suggesting that the environmental cost of modernization in the short/middle/long term has not received the attention it deserves. In fact, the approach to the issue can be summarized as “let’s first reach our rapid growth and industrialization goals and then we’ll worry about environmental problems.” Despite this outlook, it is also a fact that the last 30 years have witnessed significant advances in terms of the legislative and administrative measures adopted in the sphere of environmental protection. Thus, we are faced with the following paradoxical situation: on the one hand, extensive environmental legislations and administrative regulations based on a deep-rooted and powerful state tradition, on the other, steadily increasing environmental deterioration… This in turn has fostered a general consensus that environmental policies are not properly executed and there is a lack of consistency in their implementation. It is thus very useful to apply a political economic analysis to understand this paradox.

February 3, 2010 - Prof. Harun Tanrıvermiş
From Classical Economics to Ecological Economics: Economic Approach Es to Environmental Issues  
From the 18h century on, the main goal in economics has been the struggle with scarcity. Awareness of the scarcity of fertile land and other natural resources along with the impact of Malthusian population theory induced economic units to adopt the goal of profit and benefit maximization without taking into account either the natural balance among natural resources as a production tool or the environmental effects of production and consumption. The fact that the supply of natural resources exceeded the demand for them and that they were considered free goods since they weren’t priced actually encouraged the destruction and excessive exploitation of the environment. Growth and welfare was related only to products and services whose production capacity and monetary value could be measured and living standards were based solely on per capita income. However, the pollution caused by the rapid growth and industrialization policy that acquired ascendancy first after the Industrial Revolution and later after World War II, soon began to have a negative effect on the existence of human beings and other living things and led to mass deaths. Developments in the UK and in the US in particular made it necessary to take a global approach to environmental issues. The first Conference on Human Environment and Progress was held in Stockholm in 1972 and around this time as well, the first report of the Club of Rome came out. But until that date, economists showed little interest in the topic of environmental issues. The oil crisis and increase in environmental problems between 1973 and 1974 especially, as well as the growing consumer demand for more environmentally friendly products triggered a greater interest for environmental economics in the scientific community. The “Our Common Future” Report published in the 1980s and the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro underscored the need for the integration of economics and environmental issues. Currently, many countries have integrated a number of concepts and approaches in their economic policies such as: quality of life vs. standard of living; sustainable development vs. economic growth; social cost and benefit vs. total cost; and the distribution of income and economic resources among regions, households, and generations vs. income distribution between regions and households. The “ecological economics” perspective that has emerged mainly over the past 20 years has gone beyond its goal of integrating the economic system with the environment to achieve a major transformation in economic theory. 

March 3, 2010 - Assist. Prof. Zeynep Kadirbeyoğlu
Environmental Ngos in Turkey
With the emergence of environmental problems such as global warming and drought, protection of the environment policies now figure significantly on political agendas at both global and national scales. One leading matter in environmental policies and sustainable development debates is the growing awareness that a highly centralized and non-participatory system of governance is unable to cope with the problems and difficulties that arise. On the subject of environment, just as in other public spheres, various groups are defending the principles of good governance and beginning to stress the need for a new social division of labor among the state, the private sector, and NGOs. It is obvious that the crucial role of NGOs in this multi-actor system calls for particular attention. At this time of growing need for NGOs in environmental issues, the lecture describes the formation and evolution of environmental organizations in Turkey and the role of civil society in the area of environmental protection. In addition, Kadirbeyoğlu examines the relations of environmental NGOs with their financial supporters, the state, and extra-national actors. 

B.ISTANBUL LECTURES

Second Wednesday of each month from 6:30-8:30 p.m.
Discussions on the pros and cons of Istanbul as an epicenter.

October 14, 2009 - Dr. Esra Güzel Erdoğan
Constantinople, the Monastic Center: Late Byzantine Monasteries and Their Founders (1261-1453) 

The end of the Latin occupation of Constantinople, in 1261, engendered a period of intensive construction. Monasteries, which had lost their possessions and fallen into ruins, now acquired a new meaning; they became institutions catering to the wealthy classes’ desire to lead a privileged life. Departing from monastic tradition and religious beliefs, later period monasteries developed into closed institutions aiming to benefit the life of a particular privileged class. While they served to protect the upper classes from the period’s political, economic and social turmoil, monasteries also immortalized the names of their founders.
  
November 11, 2009 - Dr. Sara Nur Yıldız
The Imperial Capital: Tense Relations between Constantinople/Istanbul, Center of Decadence and Oppression, and Konya

This lecture offers a rather different perspective on the relations between the political regime in Constantinople/Istanbul and Anatolia. Yıldız first discusses the imperial reception accorded to Kılıç Arslan, during the visit the ruler of Konya made in 1162 to Constantinople, at a time when he was attempting to promote good relations with Emperor Manuel II. The source here is Byzantine historian Kinnamos’s lively description of the event and of the tensions generated as the emperor aspiring to flaunt his splendor and power received the ‘barbarian’ Turk in the most lavish manner he knew. An earthquake coinciding with the visit was interpreted as a bad omen by the Byzantine people. Yıldız next considers how, a few centuries later, when Istanbul had become the Ottoman imperial capital, the inhabitants of Konya and Karaman perceived it as a center of corruption and evil. Accordingly, she refers to Shikari’s History of the Karamanids, said to have been written in the 16th century, in which he idealizes the resistance of the vanished dynasty of the Karamanids to oppressive Ottoman rule following the conquest of Constantinople.

December 9, 2009 - Assoc. Prof. Aygül Ağır
An Example of Istanbul as a Commercial Center: Venetians in the Historic Peninsula (11th Cent. – 15th Cent.)  

Throughout history, Istanbul’s location at the intersection of major land and sea routes from east to west and north to south, and the existence of the Golden Horn as a natural sea port with protection against the wind, made the city a major nexus of trade. The region started to attract the attention of the Latins in the 10th century. In the Middle Ages, leading Italian merchants such as the Venetians and the Genoese, especially, as well as Italian city-states with access to the sea felt the need for safe stopover points on their trade routes. Especially after the 11th century, Byzantine Istanbul, where merchants arriving from different countries and various directions met and dispersed, became the most important “stopover” for Italian mercantile colonies. The first place the Latins settled in was the southern shore of the Golden Horn. Drawing on primary sources, the lecture first takes up the Venetians, as the main protagonists of trade and commerce in the Middle Ages and discusses their activities in the districts of Tahtakale and Eminönü – which have remained focal points up to the present. Next, Ağır looks at the region after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople.

January 13, 2010 - Prof. Feridun Emecen
A Forgotten Aspect of Istanbul: The Cursed Capital
In Ottoman history and tradition, Istanbul is not only celebrated for its unmatched splendor as the “mother of all cities,” one stone of which is worth all the treasures of Persia but, perhaps due to the catastrophes that have befallen it, some Ottoman literature from both before and after the conquest of Constantinople also mentions it in a entirely contradictory manner as a “city cursed by God and thus always plagued by calamities.” This appears to be a legacy handed down from the Muslim Arabs who viewed both the city and Byzantium as a religious symbol to be reconquered. Even though never fully articulated, these beliefs – especially the ones of religious origin – seem to have acquired a striking prevalence among the population. This darker side of the city, nurtured by inherited myths and catastrophe scenarios based on actual events, succeeded in establishing the image of an ill-starred, ill-fated city in the minds of the general public.

February 10, 2010 - Prof. Tülây Artan
Istanbul, the Center of Learning: Libraries as a New Area of Competition at the Start of the 18th Century
The late 17th century marks the emergence of a new type of library – in addition to those found in Istanbul’s madrasahs, mosques, mausoleums, and dervish lodges – which, although usually still part of a mosque complex, was now located in an independent building. Backed by the Köprülü family, these libraries are also noteworthy for their new forms of organization and areas of activity. When the Ottoman court left Edirne to return to Istanbul in the beginning of the 18th century, on the one hand, it strived to reinstate to its former glory a capital that had seen neglect, fires, and destruction over the past 60 years; on the other, it rapidly and zealously began to amass collections of manuscripts, translations, and other works in the foundation libraries created by sultans and state dignitaries.

However there is not much information either about the kinds of books that were donated to libraries during this period or about their readers. The estates of Grand Vizier Damat Ibrahim Paşa, the Grand Vizier’s assistant Mehmed Efendi, and Chief Admiral Kaymak Mustafa Paşa, who were brutally killed in the uprising of 1730, uncover books they had gathered in their homes and planned to donate but hadn’t had occasion to move to a separate location. Comparing these collections with others from the same period, the lecture examines various aspects of the competition that was taking place in Istanbul to make the Ottoman capital a center of learning once again. At the same time, Artan ponders whether this febrile activity should be interpreted as an indicator of innovations such as the expansion of the public sphere, the growth of secularism, and the development of rational scientific thought or knowledge. 

March10, 2010 - Prof. Edhem Eldem
Istanbul in the 18th and 19th Centuries: Change and Progress
The 18th and 19th centuries were a period of great change fort the Ottoman capital. The lecture addresses the main dynamics and phases of the process, and examines as well such topics as the influence of interior and exterior factors, the changing perceptions of the city, and the tension between modernization and peripheralization.

C.CITY AND LITERATURE TALKS

Third Wednesday of each month from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
Talks on cities and the writers they create.

October 21, 2009 - Roni Margulies
One Life, One Poem, Two Cities

The day I turned thirty four,
I realized I had shared my years
equally between London and Paris.

And now in my forties, one day, this year
as I wandered around the streets of London,
I realized that every corner, bus stop, statue,
every curve of the river, everything
had an old story to tell me.
I realized I was talking to every stone in the city,
(as if, cruising down the main street of a town,
I was greeting each person I met).
It was as if a mischievous child with a small pocketknife
had carved the initials RM all over the city.

Excerpt from Roni Margulies’s poem “İki Kentin Öyküsü” [The Story of Two Cities]

November 18, 2009 - Herkül Millas
Stories of the Minorities in Istanbul Novels: 1872-2003

Until the 1980s essentially, most Turkish novels take place in Istanbul and today’s so-called minorities figure in almost all of them. Writers from different periods and with different world views have perceived and written about ethnic minorities (the Greeks, for example) in various ways. The stories about these minorities shed light on the personalities of their writers as well. Looking at novels this way helps us understand the dominant ethnic conceptions in society at the time. The major differences among writers and the great diversity of characters also expose existing city dynamics.

December 16, 2009 - Ayfer Tunç
We All Love Our Native City Best

Why are the lovers of a city attached to that city? For instance the residents of Ankara or Izmir… Does the secret arrogance that Istanbul displays towards every other city bind admirers to those cities even more? For me Ankara is a masculine city, whereas Istanbul is female. Ankara is “us,” but Istanbul is “me.” If they were novels, Ankara would be Crime and Punishment and Istanbul Anna Karenina. Ankara is the father committed to his home and Istanbul the lover you chase after in every street. But why should it be this way for me?

January 20, 2010 - Mıgırdiç Margosyan
I Set off form the Infidels’ Quarter
“Cehü” was what Kurds called Jews. We Christians called Jews “Moshe.” Although all Christians were considered “Gâvurs” (infidels), they were subdivided into Armenians, Suryanis, Keldanis, and Pırots.

Armenians called Suryanis “Asori.” Muslims called all Christians “Gâvur” while Christians called all Muslims “Dacik.”

But aside from this, actually the crazies were in one group and all of us, the Daciks, Gâvurs, Haços, Kızılbaş, Yezidis, Armenians, Turks, Kurds, Keldanis, Suryanis, Asoris, Pırots, Fılles, Moshes, Cehüs, and Dürzis were in the other.

There were also the Greeks who belonged to neither category and were almost impossible to find in Dıyarbakır. If you went searching for them thinking there might be one or two left somewhere, you were sure to be disappointed.
Mıgırdiç Margosyan, Short Story, Söyle Margos Nerelisen? [Tell Me Margos, Where Are You from?], Aras Yayıncılık, April 1995, Istanbul.  Excerpt from the book cover.

February 17, 2010 - Deniz Kavukçuoğlu
Growing up in the Streets
“… The waiter coming to take away the empty tea glasses on the table had looked me over and said ‘Abi, you don’t belong here.’ I hadn’t answered… The coffee shop was a hangout for brothel clients, unemployed men killing time, street peddlers operating around Alageyik, small-time gamblers, pickpockets, purse snatchers, and drug dealers. The waiter knew nothing about the ‘mysterious’ appeal it held for me… Whenever I went there, my mind would be rested and purified and from that cleanliness I could reach back into my past more easily. My memory came alive, and the old images I thought I had erased from my mind would pass before my eyes again…    
… Could it be that the coffee shop’s ‘mystery,’ which I always felt but could not explain, resided in the district itself, in Galata, once a refuge for exiles?”
Deniz Kavukçuoğlu, Alageyik Sokağı Bir Liman mıydı? [Was Alageyik Street a Refuge?], 2nd Edition Istanbul: Can Yayınları, p. 303-304.

March 17, 2010 - Ender Özkahraman
Slum Neighborhoods, Patchy Dreams

Scene 46
Market place. Inside Coffee house / Exterior – Daytime:

EFRAYİM – You’re going to die!
Abdurrahman comes very close and looks at him as if ready to take out his anger on him.  
ABDURRAHMAN – What did you say? I dare you to say it again, what did you say?
EFRAYİM – You’re going to die!
Abdurrahman slaps Efrayim across the face hard enough to knock him to the ground… Then he walks away with his friend. Jumping up from his chair, Harun rushes over to Efrayim’s side. Blood is trickling down in a steady trail from Efrayim’s nose to his mouth. Taking a tissue hanky from his pocket, Harun holds it to Efrayim’s nose and grabs his arm to help him up. Once on his feet, Efrayim supported by Harun walks towards the coffee house and sits down on a bench. Every time he tries to lean his head forward Harun stops him by pushing up his chin.   
HARUN –You’re still bleeding Efrayim, hold your head up… That’s it.
Efrayim just sits there for a moment staring up at the sky. Meanwhile, Harun continues applying pressure to his nose with one hand to stop the bleeding. He takes his hand away when he hears Efrayim making some unintelligible sounds.
...
HARUN – Ha! What did you say? What are you saying now?
EFRAYİM – You’re going to die!
 
Ender Özkahraman, Excerpt from the Screenplay of the Film Hayatın Tuzu [The Spice of Life]

D.BYZANTINE HISTORY AND ARCHAEOLOGY TALKS

Fourth Wednesday of each month from 6:30-8:30 p.m., talks on Byzantine works.

November 25, 2009 - Prof. Turgut Saner
Emperor Zeno’s Village Büyükkarapinar and the Church of St. Socrates

The village of Büyükkarapınar, located within the boundaries of the province of Başyayla (Karaman), was once Zenonopolis, the birthplace of Roman Emperor Zeno. The church built on the village yayla (plateau) figures among the most important remains from this Late Antiquity settlement. Based on an inscription found on the ancient site at the beginning of the 20th century and taken to Branieowo (formerly, the German town of Braunsberg) in Poland, the monument can be attributed to St. Socrates. From 2008 to 2009, a team from the Faculty of Architecture at Istanbul Technical University conducted a survey of the site, its vicinity and the church.

December 23, 2009 - Assist. Prof. Haluk Çetinkaya
Traces of Byzantine-Italian Art in the Arab Mosque, Turkey’s First Gothic Church

The Arab Mosque was allegedly built as a Byzantine church and, in time, converted for other uses, while the numerous Byzantine materials used in its construction also suggest there may have been another Byzantine church in the same area. The building is known as the Arab Mosque in honor of Mesleme bin Abdülmelik, who is believed to have built it as or converted into a mosque. The edifice that stands today was probably constructed in the first part of the 13th century as the Church of Saint Paul. In the second half of the 13th century, it was used by Dominican Friars.

The building is famous for its fresques, whose existence, though known already in the 1920s, were revealed only when plaster fell after the earthquake of 1999. What gives these murals their unique significance is that their depiction of Byzantine iconography also includes representations of Catholic saints and that they are the only fresques of their kind in Turkey.

In the period following the conquest of Constantinople in 1453, the building was most likely still used as a church. The tombstones found inside the edifice, the last of which dates back to 1475, and the fact that in June 1976, the Dominican Friars using the building moved to the nearby Saint Peter’s Monastery would indicate that it was probably converted into a mosque between 1475 and 1476. The most logical explanation for the origin of the Arab Mosque’s current name is that it was located in one of the districts into which settled the Andalusian Arabs forced to leave Spain in 1492.

January 27, 2010 - Assist. Prof. Koray Durak
The Byzantine Empire and Foreign Trade in Theyear 1000
With its rapidly expanding military capabilities, its treasury full to the brim with gold, and boasting the best examples of artistic production, Constantinople was one of the points of greatest attraction in the Mediterranean Basin and Eurasia during the 10th century. Among the factors that led to its military expansion and laid the groundwork for its artistic production, the economic growth of Byzantium probably comes first. The increase in production and consumption that accompanied urbanization and population growth was not confined to the domestic market and fostered the development of close trade relations between Byzantium and its neighbors.

Addressing the foreign trade that rose in the year 1000 among Byzantium and the Russians in the north, the Italians in the west, and the Muslims in the south, the lecture offers information into the nature of the goods traded and Byzantium’s export-import policies.  

February 24, 2010 - Assoc. Prof. Gülgün Köroğlu
Byzantine Women and Their Jewelry
Most of the information we have about Byzantine women regards the members of noble and upper class families. Aside from images of the Virgin Mary, Eve, and the saints, visual sources essentially portray empresses and noble ladies. Plebian women only turn up by necessity among the crowds in religious compositions such as those depicting Christ’s entry into Jerusalem and the multiplication of loaves and fish. The miniatures featured in non-religious books also show ordinary women going about their daily activities such as spinning wool, weaving cloth, working in gardens and fields, milking animals, and carrying water. At the time, women usually engaged in textile industries, agricultural activities and the sale of produce in the market, and housewifery or other health-related professions. Some of them lived as nuns in convents while others were professional mourners, actresses or dancers. Tax records show that there were widows who owned agricultural lands and ran large farms. Noble women and upper class women in particular led an busy social life; they became writers, calligraphers, patrons of art and literature, founders of monasteries, and were often active in politics. The lecture looks at the world of both aristocratic and ordinary Byzantine women, their home life, professions, marriage customs, dress and finery, and their jewelry.

March 24, 2010 - Dr. Ayça Tiryaki
The Monastery at Kisleçukuru: An Unknown Byzantine Monastery in Antalya
In Beydağları, the mountainous region to the west of the Gulf of Antalya, stands the Kisleçukuru Monastery, one of the best preserved Byzantine monastic complexes of Anatolia. In accordance with the general layout of Byzantine monasteries, the structures constituting the complex are arranged around a courtyard, in the middle of which stands the church, and the entire complex is surrounded with a wall. All the auxiliary buildings such as the refectory, monks’ cells, cistern, latrines, and larder are located within the encircling wall around the courtyard. In keeping with the usual plan of a Byzantine monastery, the remains of a funerary chapel and an aqueduct can be found beyond these walls. Based on regional history and the architectural characteristics of the complex, it is possible to date the Kisleçukuru Monastery to the 12th century during the Middle Byzantine period, while surface finds of glass and ceramic indicate that it may have been used again in the Seljuk period.