Center for Women’s Studies of Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Rijeka invites you on lecture with dr. sc. Damle Isik on Friday 25th of May. Lecture will start at 10 o’clock, room number 801/802 at Department of Cultural studies.
This lecture will look at the rise of populist nationalism in Turkey and its concurrent effects on women’s rights from a historical perspective. Historically, in Turkey, authoritarian governance has been constructed and validated through women and women’s bodies although the trajectories and meanings of such construction have been diverse. The attempted control of women’s bodies, public presence, and their social, economic and intellectual activities have also become an integral part of such authoritarian politics. In Turkish populist nationalism, women are seen primarily as mothers and caretakers of the family and this growing familialism becomes central to the validation and mythification of a populist state.
Damla Isik is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Regis University. She holds a PhD in Anthropology from The University of Arizona with a Graduate Certificate in Women’s Studies. She also has an undergraduate degree in English Language and Literature. Her research has evolved from women’s labor and work in Turkey to charitable associations, poverty and aid delivery within the context of Turkey and the Middle East. During the summer/fall of 2017 she has started new research on the relevance of gendered food production on different understandings of urbanization, local governance, and tourism development in Turkey. She is currently working as a Fulbright Scholar in the Department of Sociology at University of Zadar