Regional studies in Turkey have long focused on Europe and the Middle East, with which Turkey has traditionally been associated. East Asian studies seem to remain out of the spotlight. This study claims firstly that different phases of Asian studies scholarship in Turkey have all been geared towards confirmation and validation of the process of Turkish national identity formation. Secondly, this process also reflects the Western-centrism of Turkish academic knowledge production.
This paper presents a periodization of Asian Studies in Turkey in three phases to contextualize and demonstrate these claims. During the first phase of the early republican years, the first Sinology departments were expected to actively contribute to writing Turkish national history. Throughout the second phase of the Cold War years, Turkey found itself in both political and intellectual isolation. In the final phase of post-Cold War globalization, the scope of regional studies scholarship expanded to include East Asia. Despite this development, academic scholarship in Turkey still suffers from Western-centrism and it is not able to directly communicate with East Asia. Knowledge production on East Asia in Turkey is still filtered through the theoretical framework of the Western Anglophone academic world.
AltunS (2014) Toplumsal hareketlere asyadan bakmak: Bir okuma önerisi. Birikim297: 61–69.
3.
AndersenHL (2002) The situation of the foreign language studies. In HansenHL (ed) Changing Philologies: Contributions to the Redefinition of Foreign Language Studies in the Age of Globalisation. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 41–50.
4.
ArapSK (2010) Türkiye yeni universitelerine kavuşurken: Türkiye’de yeni universiteler ve kuruluş gerekçeleri. Ankara Üniversitesi SBF Dergisi65(1): 1–29.
5.
AydınlıEMathewsJ (2008) ‘Türkiye Uluslararası İlişkiler Disiplininde Özgün Kuram Potansiyeli: Anadolu Ekolü Oluşturmak Mümkün mü?’. Uluslararası İlişkiler5(17): 161–187.
6.
AykutA (2006) Türkiye’de rus dili ve edebiyatı calışmaları rus edebiyatından ceviriler (1884–1940) ve Rusça Öğrenimi (1883-2006). Ankara Üniversitesi Dil ve Tarih-Coğrafya Fakültesi Dergisi46(2): 1–27.
7.
BarméG (2005) New sinology. Chinese Studies Association of Australia Newsletter31: 5–9.
8.
BayatA (2013) Areas and ideas. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East33(3): 260–263.
BurawoyM (2005) Provincializing the social sciences. In SteinmetzG (ed.) The Politics of Method in the Human Sciences: Positivism and its Epistemological Others. Durham: Duke University Press, 508–525.
11.
ChakrabartyD (2007) Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
12.
CohenPC (1984) Discovering History in China: American Historical Writing on the Recent Chinese Past. New York: Columbia University Press.
13.
CumingsB (1997) Boundary displacement: Area studies and international studies during and after the cold war. Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars29(1): 6–26.
14.
ÇandarlıoğluG (1967) Sarı Uygurlar ve Kansu Bölgesi Kabileleri (9-11. asırlar). Unpublished doctoral thesis. İstanbul University, School of Literature, Department of History.
15.
ÇelebiN (2003) Dil ve tarih-coğrafya fakültesi’ndeki mülteci profesörler. Ankara Üniversitesi Dil ve Tarih-Coğrafya Fakültesi Dergisi43(1): 259–272.
16.
DeGuignesJ (1923) Hunların, Türklerin, Moğolların ve sair Tatarların tarih-i umumiyesi, transl. by YalçınHüseyin Cahid, 6 v. İstanbul: Tanin Matbaası.
17.
DeGuignesJ (1976) Büyük Türk Tarihi, transl. by AltaySelahattin, et al. Istanbul: Türk Kültür Yayinlari.
18.
DirlikA (2005) Asia Pacific studies in an age of global modernity. Inter-Asia Cultural Studies6(2): 158–170.
19.
DuaraP (2010) Asia Redux: Conceptualizing a Region for Our Times. The Journal of Asian Studies69(4): 963–983.
20.
ErgençC (2014a) Asyacılıktan asyalılığa: Küresel tahakküm ilişkilerine meydan okuyan bir bölgesellik mümkün mü?, Birikim297: 51–60.
21.
ErgençC (2014b) Looking at china from turkey: A journey to understand ourselves?. Turkish Review4(4): 470–471.
22.
EsenbelS (2006) Reflections on japanese and turkish modernization and global history. New Perspectives on Turkey35: 5–19.
EsenbelSToganIAtlıA, eds (2013) Türkiye’de Çin’i Düşünmek: Ekonomik, Siyasi ve Kültürel İlişkilere Yeni Yaklaşımlar. Istanbul: Boğaziçi universitesi yayınları.
25.
EsmeirS (2013) A world compared, destroyed and connected. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East33(3): 276–278.
26.
FletcherJ (1985) Integrative history: Parallels and interconnections in the early modern period. 1500–1800. Journal of Turkish Studies9(1): 37–57.
27.
FryeJ (1996) The Heritage of Central Asia from Antiquity to the Turkish Expansion. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
28.
GülerC (2010) Türkiye’de kazak kültür ve tarihi hakkındaki calışmalara bir bakış. Ankara Üniversitesi Dil ve Tarih-Coğrafya Fakültesi Tarih Bölümü Tarih Araştırmaları Dergisi29(47): 177–196.
29.
HansenHL (2002) A change in paradigm in language studies. In HansenHL (ed.) Changing Philologies: Contributions to the Redefinition of Foreign Language Studies in the Age of Globalisation. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 63–76.
KaravitK (2013) Çinin yetiştirdiği türkçe uzmanlarında uç kuşak karşılaştırması. In EsenbelSToganIAtlıA (eds) Türkiye’de Çin’i Düşünmek. Istanbul: Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Yayınları, 201–227.
KonukK (2007) Eternal guests Mimics and Dönme: The place of german and turkish jews in modern turkey. New Perspectives on Turkey37: 5–30.
34.
Kuşçu BonnenfantI (2013) The origins of uyghur long distance nationalism: the first generation uyghur diaspora in turkey. Orta Asya ve Kafkasya Araştırmaları Dergisi8(16): 73–94.
35.
KuşçuIGüneş-AyataAKahveciH (2004) Eurasian studies in turkey. Central Eurasian Studies Review3(2): 112–127.
MignoloWD (2013) The point of nonreturn: The reemergence of the disavowed. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East33(3): 268–271.
PletschCE (1981) The three worlds or the division of social scientific labor, circa 1950-1975. Comparative Studies in Society and History23(4): 565–590.
40.
PomeranzK (2000) The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
41.
RosenthalJLWongRB (2011) Before and Beyond Divergence. The Politics of Economic Change in China and Europe. Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press.
42.
SarıtaşE (2009) 1935 Yılından itibaren türkiye’de yapılan cin araştırmalarına genel bir bakış. Şarkiyat Mecmuası15: 97–111.
43.
SezenS (2011) Bir türk inologun gözünden devrim oncesinin cini: Eski Çin’den notlar. Ankara Üniversitesi Dil ve Tarih-Coğafya Fakültesi Dergisi51(2): 155–167.
44.
SezenS (2022) Asya açılımı bağlamında bölgeye yönelik akademik ve diplomatik orgütlenme. Asya-Pasifik Çalıştayı: Yeniden Asya Açılımı Çerçevesinde Fırsatlar ve Zorluklar Bildiriler Kitabı (ed. Dündar), 3–39.
45.
SinhaM (2013) Is region still good to think?. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East33(3): 264–267.
46.
TekeliI (2003) Dünyada ve türkiye’de universite uzerinde konuşmanın değişik yolları. Toplum ve Bilim97(1): 123–143.
47.
ToganI (2006) Türk tarihini araştırma prensipleri içinde dışta ticaret içte ulüşün rolü. Journal of Turkic Civilization Studies, 2: 211–222.
48.
ÜngörÇ (2012) China reaches turkey? Radio peking’s turkish language broadcasts during the cold war. All-Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace1(2): 19–33.
49.
ÜngörÇ (2013) Türkiye solunda cin etkisi: Proleter devrimci aydınlık hareketi uzerine bir değerlendirme (1969–1977). In EsenbelSToganIAtlıA (eds) Türkiye’de Çin’i Düşünmek. Istanbul: Boğaziçi universitesi yayınları, 170–200.
50.
VukovichDF (2012) China and Orientalism: Western Knowledge Production and the P.R.C. New York: Routledge.
51.
YıldırımR (1997) Atatürk ten günümüze eskiçağ tarihi ve arkeoloji calışmaları. Çağdaş Türkiye Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi2(6): 33–48.
52.
WagnerCLeydesdorffLBornmannL (2015) Recent developments in China-US Cooperation in science. Minerva: A Review of Science, Learning and Policy53(3): 199–214.
53.
WangH (2010) The idea of Asia and its ambiguities. The Journal of Asian Studies69(4): 985–989.
