"Identity Conflict and Restructuring of the Public Sphere in Turkey" with Ramazan Yelken
AVACGIS Visiting Scholar Presentation
Wednesday, April 30, 2014 3:00 PM to 4:00 PM EDT
Johnson Center, Meeting Room F, 3rd Floor
Join us for a presentation by Ramazan Yelken, Associate Professor of Sociology at Selcuk University in Turkey, who has been a visiting research scholar at the Ali Vural Ak Center for Global Islamic Studies for the past two years.
Like many other countries in the Middle East and across the Muslim world, Turkey has been going through a profound transformation in recent years. The million-dollar question these days, however, is "What is going on in Turkey, and where is the country headed?". Dr. Yelken will answer this question with historical and sociological analysis using the the concept of "the public sphere", where identity conflicts are shaping Turkish society's transformation.
Dr. Yelken received his B.A. in Sociology from Ankara University, his M.A. in Sociology from Middle East Technical University, and earned his Ph.D. in Sociology from Sakarya University in Turkey. He began his academic career as a Research Assistant at Afyon Kocatepe University and is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at Selcuk University. He has also taught several courses as a guest lecturer at Pamukkale University, Erciyes University and Mardin Artuklu University, and he is an active member of the British Sociological Association. Among Dr. Yelken’s academic and intellectual interests are civil society and the public sphere, sociology of the community, human rights, contemporary sociological theories, and the history of sociology in the Islamic world. His research has appeared in several academic journals and book chapters, and he is also the author of two books in Turkish, titled Cemaatin Dönüşümü, Geç modern dönemde cemaat sosyolojisi (Transformation of the Community: the Community in the Late-Modern Era of Sociology) and Tarih Sosyolojisi (The Sociology of History). Dr. Yelken’s current research project is “Civil Society in the Islamic World”.
