Examining Sources for Writing the History of the Labour Movement in the Late Ottoman Empire and the Turkish Republic, Istanbul, November 16-17, 2013
This conference is organized through a collaboration of the Social History Research Foundation of Turkey (TUSTAV), the Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions of Turkey (DİSK) and the History Foundation (Tarih Vakfi). It will be held in Istanbul, Turkey on November 16-17, 2013.
The conference has three main goals. The first objective is to raise awareness about some of the challenges of using sources and archives of the labour movement in the late Ottoman Empire and Turkish Republic.
Second, it seeks to critically evaluate existing scholarship on these sources and make research more accessible to a broader public audience.
Finally, it aims to bring together academics and independent researchers who work on the history of the labour movement in Turkey as well as the surrounding region.
The conference will address the following questions:
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1. What are the major sources of the history of the labour movement in the Late Ottoman Empire and Turkish Republic?
2. What condition are these sources in and how accessible are they in Turkish and international archives?
3. In the future how might scholars methodologically broaden their approaches to studying the labour movement? Are there methods, archives, or sources that have so far gone unutilized that might be used in the future? If so, how and to what end might they be used?
4. In what ways can such alternative sources be utilized to investigate the role of leftist currents for the emergence and development of labour movements as political actors? Moreover, in what ways can these sources contribute to the existing literature on the history of the labour movement?
The planned sessions will focus on five periods:
1. The Late Ottoman Empire (1838-1918)
2. The Establishment of the Turkish Republic (1918-1926)
3. The Early Turkish Republic (1926-1960)
4. Turkey between 1960 and 1980
5. Turkey after the Military Intervention of 1980
There will be concluding last session which will be a general evaluation of the possibilities and limitations of the historiography of the Ottoman / Turkish labour movement using international comparisons.
Proposed papers should either focus on a specific category or genre of sources or should investigate existing sources for a specific time period or topic of the history of the labour movement.
The working language of the conference is Turkish.
Abstracts should be between 250 and 500 words and must be submitted along with a brief CV to emekkonferans2013@gmail.com by May 20, 2013.
Accepted papers will be announced in June 2013. Participants are expected to submit their complete papers to the conference organizers by October 29, 2013.
There are limited funds to assist with travel and accommodation expenses. Potential participants should notify organizers if they require financial assistance when they submit their abstracts.
We hope you will be able to join us for this conference.
[Cross-posted, with thanks, from H-Labor]