TÜRBAN TÜRBAN DEDİKLERİ- A TURBAN BY ANY OTHER NAME...

TÜRKÇE (For English please scroll own.)

Ülkemizde senelerdir bir “türban” lâfı dolaşır durur.  “Türbanla” üniversiteye girilmeli mi, devlet memurları “türban” giyebilir mi,  mecliste “türbanlı” milletvekilleri olsun mu vb. vb. Kendini “lâik cumhuriyetin” bekçisi sayan Türk Silahlı Kuvvetleri “türban” yasağını titizlikle uygularken AKP’nin yükselişiyle “türbanlı” başbakan ve cumhurbaşkanı hanımlarıyla burunburuna geldi.  

Bu polemiği şimdilik bir kenara bırakıp  şu “türban” kelimesini  inceleyelim. Bütün dünya oldum olası Türk’ü “türbanlı” olarak tanır; hem de sadece kadıları değil, ekekleri de. Evet, “Muhteşem Süleyman” denince gözlerinin önüne “türbanlı” bir hükümdar gelir. Ama şu farkla ki, bütün dünyanın turban diye tanıdığı ve Türklerle özdeşleştirdiği nesne Türklerin “türban” dediklerinden başkadır. “Turban”, bizim “sarık” ya da “kavuk” dediği şeydir. 

Türk kültürünü tanıtan bir kitaptan turban'ı açıklayan sayfalar. Turkish Delights, Philippa Scott, Thames & Hudson, London, 2001

Genç Türk Kadını, Anne-Louis Girodet de Roussy- Trioson.

Odalık, Natalia Sciavoni.

 Lady Mary Montagu, Jean-Baptiste van Mour

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu 18. yüzyıl başlarında İngiltere'nin İstanbul'daki büyükelçisinin eşiydi ve yazdığı mektuplarla Lale Devri İstanbul'u hakkında çok değerli gözlemler bırakmıştır.

  Prenses Victoria Türk kıyafetiyle, Sir W.C. Ross 
Resimdeki Prenses Victoria, ünlü Kraliçe Victoria'nın kızıdır. Sonradan Kaiser III Friedrich'in eşi olarak Alman imparatoriçesi olacaktır. 1850'den kalma bu portre, o zamanki Türk kadını imajının nasıl olduğunu gayet iyi anlatıyor.

 Paris'te yaşadığımız yıllarda (1998 öncesi) eşimin böyle 'alla Turca" ilhamlı bir resmini yapmıştım, başına da bir "turban" koymuştum. Şekli o gün anladığım şekilde tam bir sarık, bugünkü "türbanlılara" mahsus saç gösterme fobisi de yok.

Saygın ve ayrıca benim de çok güvendiğim Funk & Wagnalls sözlüğü “turban” kelimesini şöyle tanımlıyor:

tur.ban (tûr’ban) n. 1.An oriental head covering consisting of a sash or shawl, twisted about the head or about a cap. 2. Any similar headdress. 3. A round-crowned brimless hat for women or children. [< F turban, turbant < Ital. turbante < Turkish tülbend < dial. alter. af dülbend < Persian dulband <  dul turn + band band]

Mana murad olundukta: 1. Baş etrafına ya da bir kep etrafında bir kumaş ya da şalı bükerek sarmak (“twist”) toluyla yapılan doğuya özgü baş örtüsü. 2. Buna benzer herhangi bir başlık. 3. Kadın ve çocuklar için yuvarlak alınlı, kenarsız şapka.

Kökeni farsça “dulband”’a dayandırmış, “dul” döndürmek, “band” bizde “bant” kelimesine dönüşen dar  uzun kumaş. Kelime bizim  “tülbent” kelimesinin de kökeni.

Aynı kelime batı dillerinde “Lale” karşılığı olan “tulip”, “tulipe”, “tulpe”, “tulpa”’nın da kökeni; çiçeğin kavuğu andıran şeklini bilisiniz.

(Funk & Wagnalls Standard College Dictionary, Harper & Row, New York, 1977)

Bugün ülkemizde yaygın olduğu şekliyle “türban” söylemi dilimize ne zaman, nasıl girdi bilmiyorum, ama merak ediyorum. Bildiğim şu ki çok eskiye dayanmıyor.  1995’ten önce Abant’ta Turban Otel’den fiyat sormuştuk (ve pahalı bulup gitmemiştik), o zaman Türkiye’deki bir turistik tesisin bu isimle tanınması – sarıklı sultan imajından dolayı- bana son derece normal gelmişti. Hatta gözümün önüne Hint hava yolları’nın sarıklı mihrace maskotu gelmişti. 

Hint Havayolları (Aır India) kendini böyle bir maskotla tanıtırdı. Adını 1995'ten önce duyduğum Turban Otel'in adı bana böyle bir imaj çağrıştırıyordu.

Yani ya ben çok cahildim, ya da bugün yaygınlaştığı hâliyle “türban” kelimesi henüz tedavüle girmemişti.

 Bugünkü söyleme göre "türban" giyen hanımlarımız.

Polemik çıktığı zaman, kelimenin yanlış kullanımı dışında, “türban” dedikleri başörtüsüne başkaları kadar kızmıyordum. İnsanların istediği gibi giyinme özgürlüğü bakımından kafaya öyle ya da böyle bez sarma isteğine karşı çıkmanın yanlış olduğunu düşünüyordum. 1999’da “türbanlı milletvekili” Merve Kavakçı olayında yazılı bir kural bulamadıkları için ABD vatandaşlığı almış olması, o da tutmayınca (çünkü biz çifte vatandaşlığı kabul ediyoruz) ABD vatandaşlığına geçerken bunu Türk makamlarına haber vermemiş olması gerekçe gösterilerek milletvekilliği düşürülmüştü. Bu gerçekten de “laik” cumhiriyette vicdan hürriyetine yapılan bir baskı olarak görülesi bir şeydi.

AKP yükselişe geçince askerle sürtüşmesi ilk “türban” cephesinde başladı. Orduevlerine “türbanlı” kadınlar giremezken önce başbakanın ve bazı bakanların, sonra da artı olarak cumhurbaşkanının eşleri “türbanlı” olunca işler gerildi. 30 Ağustos resepsyonlarına “türbanlı” eşler davet edilmedi. Kılık kıyafet üzerine yürütülen bu sürtüşme dünyanın gözünde Türk askerinin “baskıcı” imajını arttırmıştır elbette; o “baskıcı” imajın yaygınlaşmasında eski solcu (çoğu şimdi “Atatürkçü” ve “türban” düşmanı) aydınlarımızın ne kadar büyük payı olduğunu gözardı etmemek lâzım.

O zamanki abuk durumu ve uygulanan baskıyı (baskıydı çünkü) “laik” ve “Atatürkçü” cephe şöyle mazur gösteriyordu: “Başörtüsünü bizim anneannelerimiz de bağlıyordu, bunların yaptığı tarikat usulüdür ve siyasi semboldür!”  Kişisel özgürlükler bakımından bu biraz zayıf bir savunu gibi gözüküyordu bana!

Ama haksız görünen o baskılara rağmen Fethullah isimli bir tarikat lideri Amerika’dan beri Türkiye’yi ve sistemini tepetaklak edip kendi aklına uyan bir parti, bir başbakan, bir cumhurbaşkanı, bir hukuk sistemi, bir polis ve bir basın yaratarak eşi görülmemiş bir intikam hırsıyla bir taraftan aydınları, bir taraftan askerleri, bir taraftan öğrencileri sudan sebeplerle tutuklatıp senelerce içeride tuttu, tutmaya da devam ediyor. Yeni idare  ”pedagojik reform” kisvesiyle eğitim sistemini dini temellere oturtuyor, milli bayramlarımızın kutlanmasını yasaklarken cumhuriyetimizin tarihi yeniden yazılıyor, kahramanları karalanıyor, hainleri yüceltiliyor. “Özgürlük”,”demokrasi” diyerek çocukların zihinlerine saldırıyorlar. İnsanların korku ve acılarını istismar ederek halkı din ve taassupla hüküm altına alıyorlar. Ve getirdikleri yeni karanlık çağın bayraklarından en gözükeni, adını bile doğru kullanmadıkları şu “türban”.  

AKP, destekçileri, fikir babaları, yandaşları gücü ele geçirince öyle berbat davranmaya başladılar ki, zamanında onlara ve temsil ettikleri değerlere baskı koymuş olanlar (ve şimdi bu yüzden Silivri ve Hasdal’da tutuklu bulunanlar) haklı çıkıyorlar.  Demek ki toplumumuz hakikaten özgürlükleri sindiremiyor! Demek ki 28 Şubat gerçekten bir tehlikeyi bertaraf etmek için yapılmış. O tehlike bertaraf edilemeyince ne olduğunu şimdi görüyoruz. Yarın daha da net göreceğiz.

Özgürlük diyerek taassup getirmek niye? Bu “türban” saçmalığı gerçekten  de Türk kadınını tekrar çarşafa sokmak için bir adım mı? Buna kim, neden özendiriyor? Özenen nasıl özeniyor?  

Türkiye hududu, arkada Avrupa sosyetesinin şık kompartmanlarda seyahat ettiği ünlü Orient Express, önde Türk kadınları. Bu günleri geride bıraktık sanıyorduk!

Türk kadını, herşey sende başladığı gibi, herşey sende bitiyor. Buna neden izin veriyorsun?

ENGLISH
The footnote links do not work; you will have to scroll down to to the footnotes for expanded information. Opening the blogsite on two seperate windows and keeping one on the footnotes will make it easier to go back and forth. Sorry for the inconvenience, I'm no expert!. 

For years now there has been talk of türban in this country. Türban, as in the English “turban” (and in French, and in German, and in God knows how many more languages).

Now this may seem most natural, since the “turban” is, barring tge fez, the headdress most strongly associated with the historic image of the Turk.

You will probably find it strange that the türban controversy has been powerfully pulling and tugging at the fabric of Turkish for years, and that this bone of contention has occupied center stage in the showdown between the secular an Islamist forces that has culminated in the vengeful victory of the Islamists.

Stanger still, the türban in question bears no similarity to what everyone else calls a “turban”. In other words, only in Turkey is the türban not a “turban”! 

What everybody but the Turk calls a "turban".

From Turkish Delights, Philippa Scott, Thames & Hudson, London, 2001.

Young Turkish Woman, Anne-Louis Girodet de Roussy- Trioson.

Odalisque, Natalia Sciavoni.

Lady Mary Montagu, Jean-Baptiste van Mour.

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu .was the wife of the British ambassador in the early years of the 18th century. Her letters have left a vivid record of Istanbul of her time.

Princess Victoria in Turkish dress, Sir W.C. Ross.

The young lady in the painting is a daughter of the famous Queen Victoria of Britain. She later married Friedrich III and, for the shor duration of her husband's reign, became Empress of Germany. This painting from 1850 illustrates the European image of Turkish womanhood at the time.

We were living in Paris between 1996 and 1998, and that's where I made this fanciful, alla Turca drawing of my wife, wearing what I know as a "turban". Back then it never occured to me to conceal the hair, and flaunt işt as much as the painters represented above have done!

What is more, the word türban has entered common usage rather recently in the Turkish language!

 

Let’s backtrack: what is a “turban”? According to my Funk & Wagnalls Standard College Dictionary, (Harper & Row, New York, 1977):

tur.ban (tûr’ban) n. 1.An oriental head covering consisting of a sash or shawl, twisted about the head or about a cap. 2. Any similar headdress. 3. A round-crowned brimless hat for women or children. [< F turban, turbant < Ital. turbante < Turkish tülbend < dial. alter. af dülbend < Persian dulband <  dul turn + band band]

An etymologically related the word is “tulip”, (French: “tulipe”, German: “tulpe”, Latin: “tulpa”), a flower with a form that recalls the turban.

What is commonly known in the world as a”turban” is, for the Turks, a sarık or a kavuk. The only word in our language today that comes from the same roots is tülbent (a word which figures among the etymological roots following the definition above) and it means gauze or cheesecloth.

When one speaks of a türban today, one refers to a head-scarf worn by a woman in such a way as to conceal the hair completely, and denote nuances of religious persuasion according to how it is worn around the head. There is some conviction there that revealing any of the hair to strangers’ eyes is a kind of sin, something familiar to us from orthodox Judaism. 

How far back does the the use of the word “türban” go in the Turkish language? Not very!

I remember trying to reserve a room in a certain “Turban Hotel” (and giving up, because it was too costly). I remember finding the name perfectly normal for a tourist establishment in Turkey, the image of a pampered Sultan or Pasha in oriental comfort . I even remember imagining the turbaned Maharadja mascot of Air India! 

When I tried to make a reservation at the Turban hotel sometime before 1995, this is the image that floated before my mind's eye: the mascot of Air India!

I tried to make the reservation from Ankara, which we left in 1995, so as far as I am concerned that word had not yet entered common currency in the Turkish language at the time. I also suspect the introduction of the word coincides with the introduction of the head-scarf with religious significance into Turkish society.

A head-scarf always was and still is very common among Turkish women, used more and more with advancing age, so the change would not be immediately obvious to the outsider, for whom a head-scarf is a head-scarf. (Joke I heard in Germany: “How can you tell a Turkish horse?” Answer: “From the head-scarf!”) A Turkish woman you saw with an head-scarf one day could wear a hat the next, or walk around with no headdress at all if the mood took her. The head-scarf was simply a cover for the head like any other, interchangeable and with no religious significance at all. The common head-scarf has its own word in Turkish: başörtü (literally “head-covering”).  The türban however is considered sacrosanct as the holy Scripture, a radical political statement, a declaration of a desire for the Sharia, Islamic Religious Law: the antithesis of womens’ rights, paradoxically defended by women. 

 Turkish women wearing head-scarfs that are not türban.

(Image from the media.) 

Turkish women wearing what they call türban.

(Image from the media.)

The reaction of the secular Republic and its intelligentsia was to condemn the “türban”, to ban it, to illegalize it! It was suspected that the “türban” was a step towards a return to the veil, the black chador, a degeneration that would turn the secular Republic into another Iran! As for myself, having witnessed the personal freedom enjoyed by citizens of western countries, I saw these fears as far fetched and found the bans and restrictions unjust and un-democratic.

In 1999 Merve Kavakçı, an elected parlamentarian of the female gender attempted to force the issue by attending the parliamentary session with her türban wrapped around her head and all hell broke loose. There was no rule expressly forbidding a türban, so her opponents tried to get her through other means. They hit upon the fact that she had become a US citizen, but had trouble making it stick because Turkey accepts double citizenship (though the US doesn’t) and there was nothing in the books for or against elected parliamentarians who fall into this group. Then they used the pretext that, when taking up US citizenship, she had failed to notify Turkish authorities, and her status as Member of Parliament was duly anulled.

Though there is something hard to digest about an MP being a citizen of another country, the treatment of Merve Kavakçı did look unfair and lent justification to those who saw the “secular” principles of the Republic as repressive towards  the pious and called into question the “freedom of faith” promised by the Republic.

As the fundamentalist- oriented AKP rose, winning the elections of Nov. 3rd 2002, the secular Armed Forces looked on with suspicion. The new Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan had a türban-wearing wife- a first for the secular Turkish Republic.[1] The staunchly secular Armed Forces, guardians of the Republic, were at a loss as to how to react. Turkish officers’ wives may not wear a türban, fundamentalists were routinely filtered out of the armed forces. The Turkish Armed Forces have always been wary of anything that smacks of reviving fundamentalist activity or “irtidja”.[2]

Now the awkward situation arose wherein the Prime Minister himself, higher in protocol than the Armed Forces, was flaunting the secular measures so jealously guarded by the Armed Forces. Then this was compounded when the Prime Minister and the AKP exploited their majority to bring like-minded Abdullah Gül to the presidency- with türban wearing wife as First Lady![3] This was seen as an unheard-of violation of the office once held by Atatürk himself, the founder of the secular Turkish Republic!

Protests were launched to stop it, large demonstrations were organized, a monster rally in Istanbul, which has gone down in recent Turkish history as the Çağlayan rally, brought together literally hundreds of thousands on April 29th, 2007.[4] 

The government had its way, Gül became President and to many, the last bastion of the Republic had fallen!

The Armed Forces reacted clumsily, and entered an era- stretching to today- when it could do nothing right. The 30th of August celebrations were regularly hosted by the Armed Forces, which had pointedly issued single personal invitations to MP’s whose wives wore the türban. ("Don't bring your wife!") Now a fundamentalist-oriented President was officially the supreme head of the Armed Forces. Some high ranking officers would refuse to stand up to or shake hands with AKP parliamentarians, like Lieut. Gen. Engin Alan, who did not stand up in the presence of Prime Minister Erdoğan,[5] and  Lieut. Gen. Aslan Güner, who reportedly slipped out of the protocol lineup to avoid having to salute the türban-wearing First Lady.[6] 

A general steps out of line to avoid saluting a türban-wearing First Lady,

October 19th, 2007.

(Image from the media.)

  

Chief of Staff Full-Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt held out, and was massively criticized for it, until August 30th celebrations of 2007, at which time he submitted to the precepts of duty and gave President Gül, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, the military salute.[7]

Chief of Staff Büyükanıt finally saluting President Gül, August 30th, 2007.

(Image from the media.)

I remember feeling relieved when I saw the salute televised; this was a chance for normalization. The Islamists were victorious, had won the elections and asserted their rights. All they had to do now was to show us that our fears were unfounded, that they were in fact as dedicated to the secular state as we were and they asked nothing more than the normal democratic right of exercising their faith in the way they interpreted it without imposing it upon others. It was a perfect chance for reconciliation.

But they blew it famously! It became an age of vengeance and counter-revolution, of fundamentalist reaction, of the terrible irtidja that the Armed Forces had been so wary of.

Since then Turkey’s history has been a string of conspiracy allegations, police raids, arrests, planted and fabricated evidence, blackmail, extended trials, improbably long sentences, the buying out of the media, attacks on nationalist sentiments and the pumping up of religious ones, the discrediting and purging of the Armed Forces, the dismantling of the secular Republic and its institutions, the selling out of national resources and plundering of natural ones, a mushrooming of highrises and shopping centers accompanied by skyrocketing credit debts and ruined families, the corruption of the system of education in favour of a fundamentalist Islamist slant, a full scale attack on the impressionable minds of ever younger children, and a slow but deliberate transformation of modern Turkey into a theocracy in the most medieval sense. And the banner of this retrograde revolution has been the türban.

The more the AKP, and the spiritual leader Fethullah Gülen in his Philadelphia home, run on their vengeful rampage, the more the hundreds in captivity- journalists, intellectuals, academicians and officers- are vindicated in their suspicions that had once seemed so exaggerated and unfair. Apparently our society really can’t handle freedom: when granted liberty, it abuses it to get itself enslaved again! Even the controversial military muscle-flexing with tanks rolling through Sincan and the much aligned National Security Council Resolutions of February 28th are thus vindicated.[8] The Islamists have shown themselves to be as horrid, unjust, and fanatical as their opponents made them out to be!  

Where is the point of shouting “freedom” and bringing repression? Is this nonsensical türban controversy really the first step in bringing back the veil, and then the black chadoor, as its opponents nave claimed? Who is pushing for this, and why? How is it that our women, our young girls, actually end up wanting to do this?

The luxury Orient Express at the Turkish border. Inside, the elegant gentlemen and ladies in their compartments, outside... this! 

To think we had left all of this behind!

The Turkish woman, everything starts with her, everything ends with her! How can she allow this to happen?

---

[1] Emine Erdoğan.

[2] İrtica- pronounced “irtidja”- means reactionary activity aiming to re-establish religious law- the “Sharia”- upon all aspects of life.

[3] Hayrünnisa Gül.

[4] Çağlayan Mitingi, from Çağlayan Square in Istanbul, where it was held.

[5] At commemoration ceremonies at the Dardanelles, March 18th, 2004.

[6] During the arrival of President Gül and his wife at Esenboğa Airport, Ankara, October 19th 2007.

[7] Gen. Büyükanıt had pointedly avoided doing so the day before, on August 29th 2007, at the graduation ceremony of the military hospital, GATA.

[8] In 1997 there was a coalition government of the Right-of-Centre DYP (Doğru Yol Partisi-the “True Path Party” and the strongly Islamist and undisguisedly anti-secular RP (Refah Partisi- the “Welfare Party”). It was viewed with suspicion by the secular-Kemalist elite, and especially the military. Political opponents of the DYP and RP did not hesitate to use the sensitivity of the Armed Forces to topple their rivals, and rang the alarm bells. The conduct of the RP did not help to allay fears; on January 30th, 1997 the RP mayor of Sincan, (“Sindjan”) a suburb of Ankara, put on a play called Cihad (“Djihad”, meaniing “Holy War”), with the ambassador of Iran as guest of honor. Ambassador Mohammed Reza Bagheri’s speech was strong enough to get him called to the Ministry of Exterior afterwards. The press took up the theme, and tanks rolled through the streets of Sincan on February 4th, 1997 in a show of military muscle. On February 28th the National Security council (MGK-Milli Güvenlik Kurulu- a body that has military men and civilians as members, including the Prime Ministers and President ) passed resolutions to curb fundamentalist inroads into state organs, the educational system, and the fabric of society.

This did not save the government in the long run, on June 19th coalition collapsed.

Today the AKP persistently qualifies the Resolutions of the 28th of February 1997 as a “coup” and is intent on avenging it, as it is intent on avenging everything Ataturk’s secular Republic has done to create a nation state out of the derelict theocratic Ottoman Empire.