Rethinking the History of the Women's Movement on the Centenary of the Republic Conference Organized on October 21

The conference “Rethinking the History of the Women's Movement on the Centenary of the Republic” took place at the Reşat Aytaç Auditorium on Saturday, October 21, 2023. Organized by Dr. Senem Timuroğlu, Dr. Özlem Dilber ve Dr. Murat Narcı from the Humanities and Social Sciences Department at the Faculty of Social Sciences at Özyeğin University in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Republic, the conference garnered substantial attention throughout the day.

Özyeğin University faculty members Dr. Senem Timuroğlu and Dr. Özlem Dilber explained their reasons for organizing the conference as follows: “From the final years of the Ottoman Empire to the present day, the struggle for women's rights and social activism have been accentuated during specific historical periods. Studies on the history of the women's movement also generally focus on these periods. However, the struggle for women's rights, their organization, and their political agendas show both variations and continuities across different periods. We wanted to organize a conference where we can underscore these variations and continuities, and revisit lesser-known periods and aspects in the history of the women's movement. This way, we believe that the “wave” narrative of the women's movement will be enriched with the contributions of the perpetual “deep surge” of feminism’s intellectual bedrock. Moreover, we posit that an examination of the interplay between intellectual accumulation and organization will unveil fresh perspectives in documenting the history of the women's movement.”

In her opening speech, İnci Özkan Kerestecioğlu discussed the stance of the feminist movement in Türkiye against patriarchal ideologies and how it has challenged these ideologies from a historical perspective. The first session, titled “Women’s Movement in the Early Years of the Cold War” and moderated by Dr. Murat Narcı, focused on a period that remains to be lesser known, albeit witnessing a notable surge in the formation of women's associations, namely the first fifteen years of the Cold War. The second session, titled “Women’s Movement in the Era of Coups” (1960-1980) and moderated by Dr. Özlem Dilber, put the spotlight on the period between 1960 and 1980, characterized by the impact of military coups and a significant presence of the leftist movement. The final session, titled “Neoliberalism and Women’s Movement, and moderated by Dr. Sinem Timuroğlu, featured conference proceedings on the ideological basis, organizational strategies, agendas, and discourses of the women's movement influenced by post-1980 neoliberal economic policies.