Being an Academic/Writer in Turkey and Its Possible Consequences Today

One of the best excuses for procrastination when it comes to creative or academic writing is overwork. You convince yourself and others that you are too busy to write anything meaningful or smart. In fact, you know darn well that there are other reasons for not being able to write but to cover it with your ever-growing projects is a commonly embraced and accepted strategy. I work a lot, and there have been some side-projects that came out from nowhere but I love them. However, psychological outcomes of the political atmosphere and the numbing effect of the several suicide bombers' massacres in Turkey have also been among the major reasons for my writer's block. The incident that remains the closest to my mind and life is the one which came to be known as the "Petition for Peace". In short, it was composed in response to the violence in the conflict between state security forces and PKK in mostly Kurdish populated southeastern region. The petition, headlined "We Will Not Be a Party to This Crime", demands an end to curfews, deportations, and violence. It simply calls for a resumption of peace talks. The text is allegedly criminal under Article 301 of the constitution, which prohibits "insulting the State of the Republic of Turkey" and Article 7 of the Law to Combat Terrorism which prohibits terrorist propaganda aimed at inciting hatred and enmity among the public. For more details, feel free to check out another colleague’s blog:

http://ebruerdemakcay.com/2016/01/16/solidarity-with-academics-for-peace/

Yesterday, I read the background stories of the three academics who are now behind the bars in a state prison to their own shock. The piece was prepared by an old friend who has been conducting wonderful interviews and well-researched commentaries on the current events and figures in Turkey in Cumhuriyet Newspaper: Zeynep Miraç. You may have already heard of the peace-petition scandal and the shrunken room (as if we are placed in a Poe or Kafka story) of the freedom of expression in Turkey. I am aware that it is nothing new, but the randomness and the absurdity of the investigations and detentions have never been so explicit.

I chose to translate the first section of Zeynep Miraç's essay entitled "Three Lives Full of Labor" which narrates some selected highlights from Esra Mungan's life story. It goes without saying that my sympathies and support extend to Muzaffer Kaya and Kıvanç Ersoy as well. I hope that they would not accuse me of favoritism since I chose the female academic at the university where I am both alumni and occasionally an adjunct instructor. I also hope that Zeynep will be tolerant of my careful shortening of some sections while translating:

Assistant Prof. Esra Mungan was born in 1968. Her father İhsan Mungan was a professor of architecture. The family is originally from Mardin. She finished German High School in Istanbul and graduated from Psychology Department at Bogazici University where she was teaching until she got arrested. She completed her MA and PhD in Washington DC. She is known as a cheerful and energetic instructor and is favored by many students.  One of her main interests is cinema. She loves the world cinema and Bertolucci’s 1900 has a special place in her memory. She would watch any movie directed by Sokurov and Zvyagintsev. The culture of Russian cinema influenced her deeply. Her office is full of movie posters. She is known by cycling to everywhere and wearing t-shirts even when the weather is cold, a habit from her years spent in the US, where the indoors are heated way too much for her standards.  Her other 'weird' habit from the US was cycling. She was well-known for commuting by her bicycle in the crazy Istanbul traffic for 10 years until she got a spinal disc problem.

Esra Mungan wants her students to share her enthusiasm toward the courses she offers. She is in favour of getting rid of hierarchies regarding the student-instructor relationship. She addresses her students in the formal 'you' in Turkish (siz) and never uses her right to grant grades as a trump card to pressure students. She claims that it is the Bogazici University culture which makes this form of setting possible. When she described Bogazici University with the words "freedom" and "confidence" in an interview for Time Out magazine in 2010, she had no idea that she would be arrested for signing a petition for demanding peace but backed up strongly by the university administration in the times of witch-hunting in Turkey.

(My note: In fact, the University President Gülay Barbarosoglu requested a meeting with the İstanbul Chief Prosecution (March 16) and it was reported that her request of trial without arrest for Mungan has been received favourably. See: https://bianet.org/english/freedom-of-expression/173098-arrested-academic-esra-mungan-we-stand-by-our-word)

Ms Mungan confesses that she doesn't like to grade papers and that reading articles gets boring occasionally because she feels that the student papers reflect the lack of expressing oneself properly due to the education system which has been favoring multiple choice exams. The worst thing however was to force oneself to become a "detective" against plagiarism.

In another interview for Hurriyet newspaper in 2009, Mungan criticized the education system in Turkey: "It does not provide the very basic values of universal ethics such as honesty and fairness for all." Was she wrong?

After being arrested, she sent a message in which universality is once again underlined:

"We, who long for peace despite all intimidations and oppressions, continue standing by our words".

Upon a request from its author Ece Temelkuran, I am re-visiting the novel Devir (which is in the process of being translated into English as Time of the Mute Swans), set in Ankara, and it takes place during some turbulent times between 1971 and 1980 when two coups d’états took place in Turkey. When combined with what we have been going through nowadays in Turkey, the novel's effect is indeed gloomy and moving because the reader realizes that the past three generations of Turkey have been wallowing in the similar muddy waters of politics and suffering from the mismanagement of clumsy politicians. The ethnicity issues and the strong prejudices between the secular and the 'religious' (very problematic way to define a group, I know) people of Turkey have only been worse. The people who are in defense of minority and women's rights have been systematically oppressed and the punishment appears in different forms ranging from physical torture in prisons to defamation in the workplace or the neighborhood.

Overwork may work for some of us. It helps us to forget or temporally blind ourselves but it doesn't solve any of the current or the past problems that we are forced to live in. How can we absolve ourselves in this dark picture? What if we have indeed tried hard to change the system and failed more than once? How do we define 'hard' ? What is the straw that breaks the camel's back for you?

These are some of the questions which we as citizens of this country have to work through on an everyday basis. There are more. I personally appreciate the international support of my friends and colleagues, and do not shy away from reaching out. We have a Turkish expression that I dislike a lot: "Kol kırılır, yen içinde kalır" = "A broken arm should remain inside the sleeve" which equals to saying: Don't air dirty laundry in public. So tell me then, what should I do if the private space I was given has become so small that I cannot no longer air or do any laundry in that tiny room?

A Distinguished Man, A Talented Woman, and the Myths of CERN:

Impressions and Associations of a Bogazici University Lecture

                                                                                                 dedicated to Emine Gürpınar who magically welcomed me at CERN

Prof. Rolf Heuer, the former director of CERN (2009-2015), who is also known as the man who introduced the world to Higgs Boson, gave a lecture on 03 February 2016 at Bogazici University. I had marked the date on my calendar a while ago. The full title of the lecture was "The Role of Science for the Sustainable Development of Society – in particular the Role of Large Scientific Infrastructures". Don't bother googling that title, you won't be able to find it since he changed the name last minute from "Science and Sustainability – The Role of Unique International Facilities".

It was during his position that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) -huge particle accelerator- located at CERN in Geneva was in full function. Both in Turkish and in English, in every talk, it is also referred to as "atom smasher" and the Higgs boson as the "god particle". Both terms are provocative and curious ways of twisting vocabulary. There are personal and sociological reasons as to why I am drawn into the topic and the way Prof. Rolf Heuer presented it to a university audience, made up of graduate and undergraduate students, retired physics professors, faculty, and some administrators.

The talk was deliberately designed to be jargon-free and was decorated with several small jokes spread into the German-accented calm and self-confident manner that Prof. Heuer delivered his speech. I will begin with two points that Heuer proudly underlined:

1. CERN is free from political issues so that scientists from all around the world can work in a smooth and efficient manner. Shedding this national layer of one’s self is extremely important, Heuer said, considering the huge egos of the academics. It indeed sounds impossible and I cannot help wondering how much is covered in this statement. He sometimes wished that if only politicians could work in this manner! Later, however, during the Q&A session, when two questions regarding politics were asked his face became more serious and he underlined that the success of CERN is absolutely due to its exclusion of politicians. He said politicians are welcome to visit, and one has to show a face in political gatherings such as Davos, but keeping the politics off from the mecca of science is crucial. 

2. The letter E of CERN, which used to stand for Europe now stands for Everywhere and the statistics were shown to underline the multi-nationality of the people working for the institute. Diversity, Heuer has observed, influences the ways of thinking and exploring among other things. Having collaboration and competition simultaneously sounds like the ideal combination for success for him, although one of the questions posed by a female social scientist was whether it was possible to eliminate the competition element and keep the collaboration only. Prof. Heuer replied that he doesn't believe in the progress without competition. I remain skeptical on this statement.

The third point he made combines itself to no.2 since it is about sharing wider. Prof. Heuer made great effort toward the  educational and outreach activities of CERN. "We need to train more scientists and make science more attractive to the students at a young age" he said, and provided some examples. Turkey's membership to CERN was signed in May 2015, and he named Bogazici faculty in the team.

My Personal Fascination:

CERN as an Intangible Way to Enlighten Humankind

&

A Criticism by a Former Turkish Physicist

All of us need to be reminded regularly (set a reminder on your cell phone!) of the dark energy and "dark matter" which account for the other 96% of the universe. How little we know yet how big our egos are or the importance we attribute to our lives in our small worlds. How much we exaggerate our problems and how badly we destroy the planet, the bio-systems and how we consume products made in Asia with the sweat of under-age laborers…  The list is huge and so is the dark matter.  

What Heuer referred to as "disruptive innovation" (the type of discovery whose consequences cannot be predicted and go off balance) is also fascinating for me. Engaging in it is pure adrenaline! Scholars who are dedicated to the questions such as "what happened right after the Big Bang?" or "how is it possible that the matter and anti-matter does not destroy each other?" are extremely attractive for me (men or women). I am not necessarily referring to a sexual attraction, it is more than that, it is the combination of brainpower, creativity and discipline, exactly this combo, which I find incredibly captivating. I hope to make more friends coming from that realm, not only study their lives but become part of it.

As Heuer concluded his talk and chose not to share his opinions on the two gatherings of physicists, philosophers, and theologians at CERN, I think of the statue of Nataraja which came across my way at a quiet corner of CERN back in August 2013. For me, this is what matters the most: Intersections of Physics and Theology (why separate Theology from Philosophy, I do not know). I cannot agree more with Andrew Pinsent, the research director of the Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion at Oxford University when he is concerned with science's taking risks of turning society into a machine if it did not engage with religion and philosophy. October 2012 marked the first time that CERN invited theologians and philosophers to debate with scientists. I could have listened to the results of this meeting for many hours non-stop if I had the opportunity. As for the deity, all I can gather from the official website is that on 18 June 2004, CERN unveiled an unusual new landmark, a 2 meter tall statue of the Indian deity Shiva. It was a gift from India, celebrating CERN's long association with the country which started in the 1960s. There is the following information on the plaque which is informative enough but still does not explain the reason why it is there. 

The dancing Shiva symbolizes the life force in the Hindu Trinity. He is the Creator, Sustainer, and the Destroyer. Creation is sparked by the vibration of drum in his right hand, sustenance by the open palm of the front right arm, the fire in the left arm dissolves the universe. 

There I was, standing by the statue, and asking myself why Shiva and why here at CERN? Now here is a curious 'coincidence': In Islam, Allah is also Al-Khaliq (Creator), Ar-Razzaq (Sustainer), and Al-Mumit (Causing/Bringing Death) but for 'some reason', I could not imagine having Asma al-Husna (names of God) engraved in a decorative manner in the garden of CERN. A gift from Pakistan maybe? 

I think Prof. Heuer marketed CERN successfully for the Bogazici audience. Maybe he was genuine, maybe he wanted to or required to act that way. Just for the record, the new director is Fabiola Gianotti, the first woman director in CERN's history. There is even a book about being a female physicist Mary K. Gaillard, A Singularly Unfeminine Profession: One Woman's Journey in Physics, who also worked at CERN and wrote that she had to harness 'survival mechanism' while in the circle. 

And speaking of women in particle physics, one of my favorite authors in contemporary Turkish literature Aslı Erdogan, an outspoken rebel, criticized the conditions of CERN where she received her MA degree on Higgs Boson (1993) after completing a summer course. In an interview on CNN-Turk, in response to the speculations on the Higgs Boson and whether it can be the space after the search of God, she said: 

"I don't look for God in a physics lab, I look in the acts of humanity instead. I think the last place to find God is a physics lab. I didn't feel I belonged to CERN and the life we led there. Even the 'lazy' ones like myself averaged a 15-hour work per day, and you don't have the luxury of making any mistakes because it is a team work, there is a chain-reaction structure. It was at CERN that I decided to quit physics, the competition was relentless."

 

In fact, Aslı Erdogan's first novel, Kabuk Adam (Shell Man), has a group of international physicists in the background who are gathered on a Caribbean island. It is a story of an irrepressible desire between a Caribbean assassin and a white woman. It introduced a new theme where a woman's desire was in the forefront, which is very unusual especially for Turkish literature. The Caribbean man, toughened from being tortured and an assassin, becomes the woman’s object of desire. It is worth reading even for checking out the tension in the protagonist’s life versus the lives of the physicists. It is very tempting to compare what Prof. Heuer said about the link between competition and progress (a linear approach to life and science) and how Aslı Erdogan commented about her stories. She said: "There is no linear narrative, they are all cyclical yet each recurring theme or sentence comes back in a transformed form".

No wonder she felt alienated at CERN and questioned the narrative that was constructed under definitions of success, career or team-work. I wondered if I was the only one in the audience who was thinking of Aslı Erdogan (also Bogazici alumni) while simultaneously admiring Prof. Heuer who concluded his talk with some lines from Guardian (4 March 2015):

 

"The point is that Europe is working together in a thrilling intellectual exploration that can have no conceivable commercial or political payoff but could, in some still intangible way, enlighten all humankind. In these otherwise murderous and mean-spirited times, that is something to salute". 

Oops, did I just hear the word Europe there? I thought it was replaced with the word "everywhere" !

I can only hope that it is less than 96% of my small universe (my heart and brain) which consists of the dark matter. I should confess though that I have always welcomed dark humor of all cultures and times into my gray cells, or the gray matter as they say… 

I cannot narrate light because I don't know it