基本説明
A study of the production of a state-revering political culture in the public life of 1990s Turkey.
Full Description
Faces of the State is a penetrating study of the production of a state-revering political culture in the public life of 1990s Turkey. In this new contribution to the anthropology of the state, Yael Navaro-Yashin brings recent poststructuralist and psychoanalytic theory to bear on the study of the political. Delving deeper than studies of nationalist discourse that would focus on consciously articulated narratives of political identity, the author explores sites of "fantasy" in the public-political domain of Istanbul. The book focuses on the conflict over secularism in the aftermath of an Islamist victory in the city's municipalities. In contrast with studies that would problematize and objectify religious movements, the author examines the agency of secularists under a state widely known for its "secularist" policies. The complexity and dynamism of the context studied moves well beyond scholarly distinctions between "secularity" and "religion," as well as "state" and "society." Here, secularism and Islamism emerge as different guises for a culture of statism where people from "society" compete to claim "Turkish culture" for themselves and their life practices.
With this work that stretches the boundaries of regionalism, the author situates her anthropological study of Turkey not only in scholarship on the Middle East, but also in the broader problem of thinking "Europe" anew.
Contents
List of Illustrations ix Acknowledgments xi Introduction Semiconscious States: The Political and the Psychic in Urban Public Life 1 Entering the City 1 Secularism in Public Life 6 The Turkish Astronomer and the Little Prince 8 The Construction of "Turkish Culture" 10 "The Anthropology of Turkey" 12 The Not-Too-Native Anthropologist 13 Researching the Political 15 PART I: CULTURAL POLITICS 17 1. Prophecies of Culture: Rumor, Humor, and Secularist Projections about "Islamic Public Life" 19 "The Native" 19 Tales of Nightmare 22 Rumor or Reality? 29 The Issues at Stake 36 The Prophecy 40 Public Life and the Construction of "Local Culture" 42 2. The Place of Turkey: Contested Regionalism in an Ambiguous Area 44 "Turkey" as Sign 44 The History of "Region" 46 Beheadings in Saudi Arabia 51 Joining the Customs Union 55 The Place of Turkey 58 The Contest over "Region" 65 "The Middle Eastern Woman" 67 Undoing Area Studies 73 3. The Market for Identities: Buying and Selling Secularity and Islam 78 Consuming "Culture" 78 The Veil as a Commodity 82 Secularist Commodities 85 Istanbul's New Marketplaces 90 The Islamist Department Store 94 The Trademark of Islam 98 The Force of Symbols 107 The Market for Identities 111 PART II: STATE FANTASIES 115 4. Rituals for the State: Public Statism and the Production of "Civil Society" 117 The Soldier's Farewell 117 The Wrestler as Leviathan 122 The Flag Campaign 127 Does "Civil Society" Exist? 130 "The Transparent Reflection of Society" 137 "A Holiday of the People" 144 The Agency of "Society" 152 5. Fantasies for the State: Hype, Cynicism, and the Everyday Life of Statecraft 155 Does the "State" Exist? 155 Mundane Cynicism 166 The Truck That Crashed into the "State" 171 The Magnetism of State Crime 180 The Afterlife of the "State" 183 6. The Cult of Ataturk: The Apparition of a Secularist Leader in Uncanny Forms 188 Like a Cross That Stops the Devil ... 190 "Visits to a Saint's Tomb" 191 Mystical Apparitions 193 Calling Spirits 194 Numerology 195 Statues and Idols 196 Heads of State 199 Secularist Excesses 201 Notes 205 Bibliography 231 Index 241
