Papers by Pınar Kemerli
Political Theology, 2022
Fethiye Çetin's grandmother, Seher or Heranuş, was an Ottoman Armenian who survived the 1915 deat... more Fethiye Çetin's grandmother, Seher or Heranuş, was an Ottoman Armenian who survived the 1915 death march when a Turkish officer snatcher her from her mother's arms and raised her as a Muslim. In a memoir for her, Çetin recalls how she felt when her grandmother shared her story: What she told me did not fit with anything I knew. It turned the known world on its head, smashing my values into a thousand pieces. I no longer knew how I felt; and as inchoate thoughts chattered and throbbed and swirled through my mind, I gave in to a deep dread that threatened to engulf everything and everyone. 1
New Political Science, 2022
Rojava has recently received significant global attention thanks to
the victories achieved there ... more Rojava has recently received significant global attention thanks to
the victories achieved there by the revolutionary Kurdish militia
controlling the region and its Women’s Protection Units against
ISIS. An international community that has long been silent
about Kurdish oppression was suddenly fascinated by the Rojava
revolution and its potential for women’s liberation. But this current interest elides vital political and conceptual contributions of
activists in Rojava and elsewhere in Kurdistan, and reinscribes the
orientalist and imperial scripts invoked in the representation of
the emancipatory politics of the region’s peoples. Pushing against
these frameworks, this paper examines the new method of
Kurdish decolonization, “democratic confederalism,” as a distinct
and perhaps novel contribution to the global repertoire of anticolonial thought and practice, especially with its re-envisioning of
the revolutionary role violence and nonviolence can play in liberation. Tracing the intellectual and political process that turned
decolonizing Kurds from the pursuit of a territorial nation-state
towards the revolutionary and feminist transformation of colonized sites and lives, it distinguishes this decolonial politics and its
central means of community self-defense from both its reactionary opposites and revolutionary siblings. Foregrounding its foundationally anti-nationalist character, the paper proposes to
approach this revolutionary, egalitarian, and community based
self-defense as a rival ethics of nonviolence.
Theory & Event, 2021
Scholars of early modern toleration are divided about Hobbes's role in the development of modern ... more Scholars of early modern toleration are divided about Hobbes's role in the development of modern secularism. Much of this debate focuses on whether we should see Hobbes as a modest defender or enemy of toleration, while often neglecting an engagement with critical secularism studies inaugurated by Talal Asad's work. Bringing the insights provided by these new perspectives on secular power to bear upon the analysis of Hobbes's position, this article argues that Hobbes's work in fact includes a poignant early theorization of secular power that anticipates the operations and tensions of political secularism more accurately than more normatively-inclined early modern theories of toleration. Hobbes's arguments on this topic are developed in the course of the evolution of his thinking on military duties from Leviathan to Behemoth, culminating in a distinct model of religious reconstruction. Situating this model at the center of Hobbes's contributions to the development of political secularism, the article thus makes a case for the value of cultivating more robust disciplinary interactions between histories of political thought and critical analysis of secular power.
Turkey's Necropolitical Laboratory: Democracy, Violence and Resistance (ed. Banu Bargu), 2019
Radical Philosophy , 2019
Saba Mahmood made immensely important contributions to the critical understanding of secular powe... more Saba Mahmood made immensely important contributions to the critical understanding of secular power and its operations, without which the field would be significantly impoverished. Tragically cut short by her un-
This article focuses on Islamist conscientious objectors (COs) in Turkey who have resisted both
m... more This article focuses on Islamist conscientious objectors (COs) in Turkey who have resisted both
mandatory conscription and the Turkish state’s use of Islamic discourses of jihad and martyrdom
to legitimize it. Examining military conscript training and the post-1980 coup national school
curriculum, the article first outlines the Turkish state’s production of a particular interpretation of
Islam and its dissemination of it through nationalist and militarist discourses and practices. The
article then pursues an ethnographic analysis of Islamist COs’ resistance to conscription through
nonviolent civil disobedience based on antiauthoritarian and antinationalist interpretations of
Islam. Weaving together their own interpretations of jihad and martyrdom with transnational
theories and ideologies, Islamist COs present a powerful critique of Turkish militarism and its
religious claims. A focus on Islamist COs potently highlights the diversity of Islamic groups and
sensibilities in contemporary Turkey, and the difficulties faced by nationalist projects to discipline
religious imaginaries and put them to the service of the modern state.
Treating modern terrorism discourse as an important political problem in the history of Western l... more Treating modern terrorism discourse as an important political problem in the history of Western legal theorizing and national security policy, this chapter examines the impact of the end of the Cold War and September 11 on political debates on terrorism at the United Nations. Surveying the framing of Palestinian terrorism at the General Assembly and Security Council between the 1960s and late 2000s, it argues that the disavowal of the legitimacy of non-sovereign political violence at the end of the Cold War, and the association of political Islam with terrorism following September 11 have facilitated the discursive construction of a universal enemy in the image of the “Islamist terrorist.” The chapter shows that this discursive formation is laden with, and thus perpetuates, politically significant normative presumptions that are related to anxieties concerning sacrificial violence with which political Islam is widely associated.
The relationship between Islam and violence has become a major topic of academic and popular disc... more The relationship between Islam and violence has become a major topic of academic and popular discussion since the terror attacks against the United States in 2001. Indeed it has become a legitimate feature of contemporary discourse on terrorism to conflate Islamist extremism with terror itself. Thus when the news of the July 22 nd Oslo attacks reached the major news networks in the U.S., the immediate response was to frame the incident as an Islamist terror attack. The New York Times originally reported, based on the claims of a terrorism analyst, that a Jihadist group claimed responsibility for the attack, only later to revise the story: Initial reports focused on the possibility of Islamic militants, in particular Ansar al-Jihad al-Alami, or Helpers of the Global Jihad, cited by some analysts as claiming responsibility for the attacks. American officials said the group was previously unknown and might not even exist. 1
Book Reviews by Pınar Kemerli
Umut Uzer's An Intellectual History of Turkish Nationalism offers a textual analysis of the ideat... more Umut Uzer's An Intellectual History of Turkish Nationalism offers a textual analysis of the ideational grounds and developments of Turkish nationalism from the late Ottoman Empire to the present. The book's overarching argument is that in the course of its " ideological odyssey, " Turkish nationalism has evolved from a modern, secular, progressive, and even revolutionary idea—which the author loosely associates with early Kemalist thinking—to a " conservative " and patriarchal ideational formation that embrace traditional, exclusionary, and Islamic values. Uzer mainly credits the transition to multiparty democracy in the 1950s for this transformation but also emphasizes other factors, including the republic's gradual welcoming of Islamic ideals and groups into political life, the Cold War dynamics and anxieties about communism, and urbanization. In mapping this transformation, the book covers an impressive range of primary literature including not only the nationalist thinkers such as Ziya Gökalp who commonly feature in studies of Turkish nationalism, but also, more usefully, neglected figures such as Nihal Atsız, the influential proponent of Turkish racism. Indeed, the book's strongest contribution is its comprehensive analysis of racist thought and ethnic nationalism in modern Turkey. Thus, in addition to Uzer's analysis of the racial components of Turkish nationalism, the expansive primary sources contained within the book make it an important and useful resource for students and scholars interested in the region and era, but who cannot read Ottoman and Turkish. There are, however, three criticisms that could be raised against this otherwise important book. The first concerns style. Despite bringing together close readings of an impressive body of literature, some of which appears for the first time in English, the texts covered are not situated within a broader theoretical structure. Nor does the book offer a theoretically rich account of them. Instead, the presentation takes the form of descriptions and summaries of different texts, leaving the reader craving a more robust analysis of their theoretical depth and structure. The second point concerns the book's main argument about the evolution of Turkish nationalist thought from a relatively progressive and revolutionary ideational form to a more right wing and Islamist ideology. While not novel in the scholarship, this argument endorses a somewhat romanticized
Books by Pınar Kemerli
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Papers by Pınar Kemerli
the victories achieved there by the revolutionary Kurdish militia
controlling the region and its Women’s Protection Units against
ISIS. An international community that has long been silent
about Kurdish oppression was suddenly fascinated by the Rojava
revolution and its potential for women’s liberation. But this current interest elides vital political and conceptual contributions of
activists in Rojava and elsewhere in Kurdistan, and reinscribes the
orientalist and imperial scripts invoked in the representation of
the emancipatory politics of the region’s peoples. Pushing against
these frameworks, this paper examines the new method of
Kurdish decolonization, “democratic confederalism,” as a distinct
and perhaps novel contribution to the global repertoire of anticolonial thought and practice, especially with its re-envisioning of
the revolutionary role violence and nonviolence can play in liberation. Tracing the intellectual and political process that turned
decolonizing Kurds from the pursuit of a territorial nation-state
towards the revolutionary and feminist transformation of colonized sites and lives, it distinguishes this decolonial politics and its
central means of community self-defense from both its reactionary opposites and revolutionary siblings. Foregrounding its foundationally anti-nationalist character, the paper proposes to
approach this revolutionary, egalitarian, and community based
self-defense as a rival ethics of nonviolence.
mandatory conscription and the Turkish state’s use of Islamic discourses of jihad and martyrdom
to legitimize it. Examining military conscript training and the post-1980 coup national school
curriculum, the article first outlines the Turkish state’s production of a particular interpretation of
Islam and its dissemination of it through nationalist and militarist discourses and practices. The
article then pursues an ethnographic analysis of Islamist COs’ resistance to conscription through
nonviolent civil disobedience based on antiauthoritarian and antinationalist interpretations of
Islam. Weaving together their own interpretations of jihad and martyrdom with transnational
theories and ideologies, Islamist COs present a powerful critique of Turkish militarism and its
religious claims. A focus on Islamist COs potently highlights the diversity of Islamic groups and
sensibilities in contemporary Turkey, and the difficulties faced by nationalist projects to discipline
religious imaginaries and put them to the service of the modern state.
Book Reviews by Pınar Kemerli
Books by Pınar Kemerli
the victories achieved there by the revolutionary Kurdish militia
controlling the region and its Women’s Protection Units against
ISIS. An international community that has long been silent
about Kurdish oppression was suddenly fascinated by the Rojava
revolution and its potential for women’s liberation. But this current interest elides vital political and conceptual contributions of
activists in Rojava and elsewhere in Kurdistan, and reinscribes the
orientalist and imperial scripts invoked in the representation of
the emancipatory politics of the region’s peoples. Pushing against
these frameworks, this paper examines the new method of
Kurdish decolonization, “democratic confederalism,” as a distinct
and perhaps novel contribution to the global repertoire of anticolonial thought and practice, especially with its re-envisioning of
the revolutionary role violence and nonviolence can play in liberation. Tracing the intellectual and political process that turned
decolonizing Kurds from the pursuit of a territorial nation-state
towards the revolutionary and feminist transformation of colonized sites and lives, it distinguishes this decolonial politics and its
central means of community self-defense from both its reactionary opposites and revolutionary siblings. Foregrounding its foundationally anti-nationalist character, the paper proposes to
approach this revolutionary, egalitarian, and community based
self-defense as a rival ethics of nonviolence.
mandatory conscription and the Turkish state’s use of Islamic discourses of jihad and martyrdom
to legitimize it. Examining military conscript training and the post-1980 coup national school
curriculum, the article first outlines the Turkish state’s production of a particular interpretation of
Islam and its dissemination of it through nationalist and militarist discourses and practices. The
article then pursues an ethnographic analysis of Islamist COs’ resistance to conscription through
nonviolent civil disobedience based on antiauthoritarian and antinationalist interpretations of
Islam. Weaving together their own interpretations of jihad and martyrdom with transnational
theories and ideologies, Islamist COs present a powerful critique of Turkish militarism and its
religious claims. A focus on Islamist COs potently highlights the diversity of Islamic groups and
sensibilities in contemporary Turkey, and the difficulties faced by nationalist projects to discipline
religious imaginaries and put them to the service of the modern state.