The Republic of Love: Cultural Intimacy in Turkish Popular Music

by Martin Stokes

At the heart of The Republic of Love are the voices of three musicians—queer nightclub star Zeki Müren, arabesk originator Orhan Gencebay, and pop diva Sezen Aksu—who collectively have dominated mass media in Turkey since the early 1950s. Their fame and ubiquity have made them national icons—but, Martin Stokes here contends, they do not represent the official version of Turkish identity propagated by anthems or flags; instead they evoke a much more intimate and ambivalent conception of Turkishness.

Using these three singers as a lens, Stokes examines Turkey’s repressive politics and civil violence as well as its uncommonly vibrant public life in which music, art, literature, sports, and journalism have flourished. However, Stokes’s primary concern is how Müren, Gencebay, and Aksu’s music and careers can be understood in light of theories of cultural intimacy. In particular, he considers their contributions to the development of a Turkish concept of love, analyzing the ways these singers explore the private matters of intimacy, affection, and sentiment on the public stage.

Genres: Nonfiction

240 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2010

Reviews

[Enes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stokes doktorası sırasında Türkiye'ye gelmiş, Sezen Aksularla, Gencebaylarla filan yüz yüze konuşmalar gerçekleştirmiş, müzik bilgisine sahip, ilginç bir akademisyen. Kültürel mahrem terimini biraz havada buldum. Kastı, bir kavramın taşıması gereken açıklığı taşımıyor bence.

Türkiye'de Arabesk Olayı'nı okumadım ama, bu kitabı, arabeskin kültürel ve müzikal zeminine dair çok yetkin açıklamalar yapıyor, yaptığıyla kalmıyor piyasaya giriyor. Müzik şirketleri, sanatçılar, onların karşılanma biçimleri gibi hayatın içinden bilgilerle arabeskin toplumsal beğenide aldığı yeri de gösteriyor.
Kültürel Çalış'acaksan böyle çalışacaksın. Anything goes mantığıyla disiplin olmaz yoksa.

Böyle kitaplar sevilir. İki kere okumazsın ama herkese anlatacağın kadar etkiler seni. Öyle okunası. Arabesk kitabı okuyunca, yazdığın görüş de böyle oluyor ancak.

Kitapçınızdan isteyin.

[Selim Kuru · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brilliant entry into popular culture in Turkey. It reflects the shortcomings of ambitious first steps into creative approavhes but makes up fpr those with sparks of originality and an extensive reseaech and bibliographive. Chicago UP should have done a better work with editing of this groubdbreaking study.

[Michael Jay · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good start. Learning the contextualization of the songs I have already heard and enjoy will be helpful for me in understanding the larger pulls of culture. For example, one of my fellow educators was telling me the difference between the handshakes of religious folk, normal interactors, and nationalists, and the differences are so minute. Discernment and nuance can be so subtle. American signs and sounds are easy for me to distinguish, but as a yabancı listener, I appreciate a studious look at this music which has so much appeal.

[K · Rating 3 out of 5]

For a book on Turkey, it is amazing that there are so many spelling mistakes in Turkish words and names quoted. I am not talking about one or two mistakes that might have eluded the proofreader and the editor, it is almost in every word and on every page, it was so distracting. And this is a book by University of Chicago Press, mind you, a publishing house that was expected to be strong in Ottoman and Turkish Studies.