GOVERNMENTAL NARRATIVES OF HEALTH, GENDER, AND 
PLACE IN THE EARLY TURKISH REPUBLIC 
By David Lee Baylis 
A DISSERTATION 
Submitted to 
Michigan State University 
in partial fulfillment of the requirements  
for the degree of 
GeographyÑDoctor of Philosophy 
2015 ABSTRACT 
GOVERNMENTAL NARRATIVES OF HEALTH, GENDER, AND 
PLACE IN THE EARLY TURKISH REPUBLIC 
By David Lee Baylis 
 The narrative production of healthful and diseased environments and populations was a 
central feature of the nascent Turkish republicÕs efforts to distance itself from its Ottoman legacy.  
In this dissertation, I explore the production of these narratives while paying particular attention 
to gendered tropes of health and place.  This work builds on prior studies in geography that 
recognize certain spatial sensitivities in FoucaultÕs approaches to history, knowledge, and power.   
The archaeological and genealogical methods, applied by Foucault to the spatial dispersions of 
power/knowledge implicated in the production of subject forming discourses ranging from 
ÔdisciplineÕ and ÔmadnessÕ to ÔsexualityÕ and ÔbiopoliticsÕ reached their zenith for geographers in 
the so-called Ògovernmentality lecturesÓ. This dissertation builds on insights from Foucault and 
his geographic legacy to assess the production of governmental discourses pertaining to health, 
gender, and place in the early Turkish republic.  Specifically, I address the production of 
Òsanitary citizenshipÓ and Òscientific motherhoodÓ as they emerged from various discursive 
formations dispersed throughout Anatolia: the Ministry of Health and Social WelfareÕs ÒMedical 
and Social GeographiesÓ, the novels of Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu, the writings of Dr. Besim 
–mer (Akalõn), and the journal published by the
Turkish Red Crescent Society.  This historical 
study adds insight to contemporary debates about body politics and public health in Turkey.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  I would like to briefly acknowledge a few people, without whom this dissertation would 
not have been possible.  Kyle and Emine Evered provided many hours of support and advice and 
their guidance, kindness, and good humor was greatly appreciated throughout the course of my 
graduate school career.  Neslihan, my kind, intelligent, and inspiring sister in Ankara provided 
hours of patient support as both roommate, translation assistant, and good friend during the 
course of my Fulbright Hays funded research.  My good friends Kirby, Christina, Kyle, Jordan, 
Bobby, Donnie, Dan, ‡a
!lar, Hamit, Cengiz, and Nick have been there throughout the years, 
keeping me properly sane (or insane) as needed. My family has provided a lifetime of endless 
support and love. Thank you always Mom, Dad, Christina, Luke, and Monica.  Finally, my 
thanks and warmest affections to Michael.
 "iiiTABLE OF CONTENTS
 LIST OF TABLES ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ vi 
 LIST OF FIGURES ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. vii
   !Chapter 1 Methodological Introduction: archaeology, genealogy, geography ÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 1
   1.1 Foucault as method in geography ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 9 
   1.1a Archaeology and genealogy ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 10 
   1.1b Governmentality ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 14 
   1.1c Authoritarian governmentality ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 16 
   1.1d Foucault and geography ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 17 
   1.1e Geography and Foucault ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 20 
      
 Chapter 2 Producing governmental objects in early republican Turkey:  gender, health,  
 & population in the 
Medical and Social Geographies 
ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 26  2.1 Survey, map, national body, sanitary citizen ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 26 
 2.2 Narrating governmental discourses of population, health, & gender in the 
   
 Medical and Social Geographies 
ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 30   2.2a Narratives of health and environment in the 
Medical and Social   
  Geographies 
ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 31   2.2b Gendered governmental discourses in the 
Medical and Social   
  Geographies
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 42
  2.3 Governing healthful domestic spaces as healthful national spaces ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 53 
 APPENDIX ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 60
    Chapter 3 A shriek in the wasteland:  governmental narratives of gender, nation, health,
 and place in the novels of Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 73 
 3.1 Geography, literature, and governmentality ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 73 
  3.1a Geographic perspectives on critical deployments of literature ÉÉÉÉÉÉ 75 
  3.1b Uses of literature in humanist and regional geography ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 77 
  3.1c Ecocriticism and geocriticism ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 84 
  3.1d Geography, literature, and governmentality ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 88 
 3.2 Fictional natures:  Anatolia, Kadro, and Karaosmano
!lu ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ... 92 
 3.3 Diagnosing the village body:  gender, sanitation, and national space in selected   
 works of Karaosmano
!lu ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 96 
 3.4 Utopian ends and dystopian conclusions ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.   112 
 APPENDIX.ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.  116  
 "ivChapter 4 ÒTurkish children should live!Ó:  gendered governmental narratives in the 
 later works of TurkeyÕs Ôfather of obstetricsÕ, Dr. Besim –mer (Akalin) ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 119 
 4.1 Historicizing narratives of disease, hygiene, population, and gender ÉÉÉÉÉÉ 119 
  4.1a Narratives of pronatalism and population politics ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 122 
   4.1b Maternalist politics and narratives of scientific motherhood in the    
  Middle East ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 124 
  4.1c Dr. Besim –mer and population politics in the late 19
th and early 20
th    
  centuries ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 134 
 4.2 Governmental narratives of gender, hygiene, and space in the later works of   
 Dr. Besim –mer (Akalin) ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 139 
  4.2a From population politics to the sustenance of children, 1923-1938 ÉÉÉ. 141 
 APPENDIX ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 165 
 Chapter 5 ÒHow shall we overcome ignorance?Ó:  the Red Crescent Magazine & the 
 conscription of sanitary citizens ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 188 
 5.1 Anatomo-politics, biopolitics, and the state ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 188 
 5.2 The Red Crescent Society in the context of public health in the early Turkish   
 Republic ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 193
  5.3 Reading the Red Crescent:  from population exchange to chemical warfare   
 preparedness and all the mundane spaces in between ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 198 
  5.3a The population problem & scientific motherhood and the Red Crescent   
  Society ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 204 
  5.3b Sanitary citizenship and the Red Crescent Society ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 213 
 APPENDIX ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 220 
 Chapter 6 Concluding remarks ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 226
 BIBLIOGRAPHY ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 231
 "vLIST OF TABLES
 Table 1:  
PorteousÕ Narrative Schema  
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 78
 Table 2: 
Population Density in Selected European Countries
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 146
 Table 3: 
Population Growth Over a 40 Year Span in Selected European    
 Empires  
ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 148 Table 4: 
Annual Change in Population in Selected Years, 1899-1910  
ÉÉÉÉÉ.. 149 Table 5: 
Countries with the Highest Rates of Child Mortality in 1905    
 (in Percentages or Deaths/100) 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ..
 157 Table 6: 
Countries with the Lowest Rates of Child Mortality in 1905    
 (in percentages or deaths/100) 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ... 158
 Table 7: 
High Rate of Infant Mortality in Infants Nourished on CowÕs    
 Milk From Birth 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 162
 Table 8: 
List of Commonly Occurring Topics  
ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 200 Table 9: 
Articles Pertaining to the Population Problem and Scientific    
 Motherhood 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 204
 Table 10: 
Infant Mortality Rate by Country  
ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 210
 Table 11: 
Articles Pertaining to the Production of Sanitary Citizens  
ÉÉÉÉÉÉ 213 "viLIST OF FIGURES
 Figure 1: 
Graph of Birth and Death Rates in Ankara Province, 1923 
ÉÉÉÉÉÉ 61 Figure 2: 
Map of Malarial Areas Around the Borough of Keskin 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 62 
  Figure 3: 
Map of Malarial Areas Around the Borough of Aya
!
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 63
 Figure 4: 
Map of Malarial Areas Around the Central Borough of Ankara
  ÉÉÉ. 64
 Figure 5: 
Biopolitical Chart 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 65
 Figure 6: 
Tuberculosis and Children 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 66
 Figure 7: 
Child with Contaminated Hands
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ... 67
 Figure 8: 
Child in the Dirt 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 67
 Figure 9: 
Spreading Tuberculosis from the Elderly to the Young
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 68
 Figure 10: 
Contaminating the Home
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 69
 Figure 11: 
Danger in the Domestic Space 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 70
 Figure 12: 
Fighting a National Scourge  
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 71
 Figure 13: 
Tuberculosis is the Enemy of Man  
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 72
 Figure 14: 
Diseases in Ankara Province in 1923 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 117
 Figure 15: 
Map of Zir Borough in Ankara Province
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 118
 Figure 16: 
The Population of Large Countries in Western Europe (in millions) 
 ...É 166
 Figure 17: 
Relative Annual Population Growth Ratio per 10,000
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 167
 Figure 18: 
Crude Birth Rates of the Principle European Countries (per 1000    
 population) 
ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ... 168
 Figure 19: 
The Primary Causes of Death in Infants 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 169
 "vii
Figure 20: 
The Primary Causes of Death in Infants (Reprint) 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 169
 Figure 21: 
Infant Mortality and Type of Nursing
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 170
 Figure 22: 
Infant Mortality Rates of Nursing Age Children
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 171
 Figure 23: 
Thermometer of Child Mortality 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 172
 Figure 24: 
Be Certain, My Beloved Homeland!
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 173
 Figure 25: 
MotherÕs Love and Care 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 174
 Figure 26: 
Child and Crescent
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 175
 Figure 27: 
If We Save and Protect 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ... 176
 Figure 28: 
Healthy, Robust Children
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.. 177
 Figure 29: 
Baby Feces Barometer 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 178
 Figure 30: 
The Proper Way to Remove a Newborn Child from the Bath
  ÉÉÉÉÉ 179
 Figure 31: 
Special Space Allocated to Children Not Yet Able to Walk
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉ 180
 Figure 32: 
Why Am I Crying? 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 181
 Figure 33: 
Children Require Ample Fresh Air and Sunlight 
 ..ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 182
 Figure 34: 
Clean and Sterile MilkingÉspecialized milking spaces, bottles being     
 filled with milk on the lower level 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ... 183
 Figure 35: 
Ideal Dairy Industry 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ... 184
 Figure 36: 
A Nursing Room Plan
  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 185
 Figure 37: 
Edirnekapi Health Center 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 186
 Figure 38: 
Infant Demands 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 187
 Figure 39: 
Types of mosquitos perched on the wall:  Picture 1 and 2 - Anopheles,     
 Picture 3 - Culex 
 ÉÉÉ..ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ... 221
 "viii
Figure 40: 
Vital Statistics 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 222
 Figure 41: 
Proper Body Posture and Position 
 ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ 223
 Figure 42: 
The Death of a Drunk  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 
224 Figure 43: 
The WorldÕs Fattest Woman  ÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ. 
225 "ixChapter 1 
Methodological introduction: archaeology, genealogy, geography
  Efforts to calculate and classify, intervene upon, and reform populations were consistent 
phenomenon attributable to the rise of the modern state over the course of the last several 
centuries.  As Eugene Weber demonstrated in 
Peasants into Frenchmen,
 these efforts typically 
required both a systematic material and discursive replacement of simultaneously existing 
ÔunofficialÕ cultural forms with a standardized ÔofficialÕ articulation (1976). In his French case 
study, this process of modernization stemmed from a desire to translate and diffuse the culture of 
the urban metropole, i.e. Paris, throughout the rural and undeveloped parts of the territorial state.  
At the same time, Weber noted the stateÕs efforts to simplistically classify elements of non-
Parisian France were often reflected in similarly distilled historical accounts.   
 Evoking another scholar of 20th century France in his introduction (Gordon Wright) 
regarding the fundamentally flawed and outright ÒfalseÓ nature of studies that depict 
heterogenous populations like that of rural France via the critical lens of ÒgeneralizationÓ or 
totalization, Weber self consciously recognized the limited scope of his own massive and 
detailed study of this process of state-oriented cultural assimilation (1976, p. x-xi). Subsequent 
social and cultural theorists and historians of French society have grappled with these geo-
historiographical problems, what Foucault called Òtotal history,Ó by emphasizing spatial scales 
and moments of disjuncture, incongruity, confusion, complexity, and hybridity in the production 
of the modern French body, polity, and society (Ross, 1996; Rabinow, 1995).  
!1 Such an accounting of any element of social and cultural transformation in Turkey is 
equally if not more complex.  As scholars of late Ottoman and early Republican Era Turkey have 
repeatedly demonstrated, this process of state sponsored generalization with respect to depictions 
of rural life in the transformative early years of the Republic were further complicated by an 
almost schizophrenic depiction of the past in relation to the present condition.  While Paris was 
the focal point for the cultural diffusion of modernity in modern France, in Turkey the seemingly 
obvious successor candidate of Istanbul as cultural hub for the young Republic was ruled out for 
several reasons.  Initially under foreign occupation following WWI, an alternative and 
authentically ÔTurkishÕ physical and symbolic seat of power was deemed essential.   
 Moreover, the agglomerating powers of bureaucratic secularism that would be 
crystallized under the aegis of the charismatic war hero Mustafa Kemal (Ataturk), and would see 
political life as the system of authoritarian control known as Kemalism, sought to distance the 
new Republic from what was perceived as a decadent, dysfunctional, and in effect 
diseased
 past.  
However, this process of self-orientalization via ÔOttomanÕ or ÔTurkishÕ Orientalism (Lafi, 2014; 
Karateke, 2013; Eldem, 2010; Deringil, 2003; Makdisi, 2002) can be considered schizophrenic 
inasmuch as the rejection of the Ottoman past in both its material and discursive forms (e.g. 
IstanbulÕs value, the rejection or mischaracterization of modernization efforts during the late 
Ottoman era) was at the same time constructed with a foundation embedded in thoroughly 
Ottoman ideas, landscapes, objects, and individuals (Zher, 2014; Meeker, 2002).  Ottoman 
practices not only lingered on but were re-conceptualized and woven into the tapestries of 
governmental structure, regulations, architecture, and infrastructure, even in places like the 
newly erected capital of Ankara that were seemingly divorced from, yet were in fact founded 
!2upon, the legacies of an Ottoman past (Evered, 2008; Bozdo
"an, 2001).  One needs look no 
further than President Erdo
"anÕs call for the reestablishment of compulsory Ottoman  language 
education to see how these ideas persist.
  Therefore, excavating beneath the surface of any large portion of the Turkish experience 
with rural modernization is a daunting task.  As such, following WeberÕs advice, I attempt to 
narrow the scope and breadth of the issue in several substantive ways by focusing on fragments 
of interest that still function as companion pieces to studies of modernization in the late Ottoman 
and Early Republican eras.  Moreover, I deploy multi-focal approach that considers the Òspaces 
of dispersionÓ (see below) of governmental discourses of power.  In terms of scalar 
considerations, I attend to the broader issue of state efforts at describing and critiquing perceived 
and real defects in rural Anatolian health and sanitation alongside a narrower focalization vis-a-
vis gendered and medicalized discourses regarding the health and well-being of the population.  
The discursive deployment of housewives, midwives, and mothers (both good and bad) is central 
to this effort.  
 As such, my primary question and focus of study in this dissertation is quite simple, 
albeit broadly conceived: 
How were discourses of health (disease and sanitary citizenship), 
place (Anatolia, the infertile wasteland), and gender (ignorant vs. scientific motherhood) 
central components of authoritarian governmentality in the transitional period of the early 
Turkish republic (from roughly the early 1920s until the late 1930s)?
  More to the point, using FoucaultÕs methodological comments regarding archaeological 
and genealogical considerations of history and geography, I ask:  
What sorts of surfaces of 
!3emergence, authorities of delimitation, and grids of specification were bound up in the 
production of gendered governmental objects and subjects, namely Òsanitary citizenshipÓ 
and Òscientific motherhoodÓ?
  This study is informed by and draws heavily upon geographic approaches to FoucaultÕs 
genealogy of governmentality, or the Òart(s) of governmentÓ (Foucault, 1991, pp. 87-104) and its 
various modalities (governmentalities).  Drawing upon an emerging set of anatomo- and 
biopolitical interests within the modern state, including but-not-limited-to an increasing interest 
in collecting data about the body and statistically analyzing the so-called politics of life itself, 
population and the spaces it occupies are salient points of intervention for the modern state in 
which Òpower has operated for the last two hundred or so years in part by creating, manipulating, 
managing, promoting, and investing in a Ôzone of indistinctionÕ between nature and culture which 
we all too problematically call Ôthe bodyÕÒ (Cohen, 2009, p. 15). The creation of Ôbodies of 
knowledgeÕ, both literally and figuratively, was essential to the logics and modalities of various 
governmentalities, with certain bodies receiving disproportionate state scrutiny.  This elision of 
space and body from the perspective of the modern state is apparent when one considers the 
numerous public health examples of state/body, disease/warfare metaphors that are deployed in 
propaganda and public service announcements. 
 In the 
History of Sexuality,
 Volume 1,
 FoucaultÕs genealogy of sexuality questions the 
widely held belief that sex-talk had been suppressed in the Victorian Era and had only recently 
been liberated by contemporary sensibilities; rather, he posits that the discourse of sexuality 
proliferated during this era, due to the stateÕs increased interest in sex as a vital component of 
!4subject formation.  Part of this genealogy considered sexualityÕs production of four primary 
objects of knowledge,
  i.e. sites of intervention for discerning ÔirregularÕ and ÔunproductiveÕ types 
of sex and promoting ÔusefulÕ and ÔproductiveÕ sex: the hysterical woman, the masturbating child, 
the perverse adult, and the Malthusian couple (Foucault, 1990, p. 105).  While Foucault has often 
been critiqued for his gendered blind spots (Mills, 2008; Taylor & Vintges, 2004), particularly in 
the earlier Ôspatially-explicitÕ works like 
Discipline and Punish, 
governmental interrogations of 
public health and medicine are in fact fraught with gendered implications that extend many of 
FoucaultÕs observations in 
The History of Sexuality.
   Therefore, I further narrow the scope of this study by considering anatomo- and 
biopolitically oriented, gender-specific discourses pertinent not only to narratives of disease, 
ignorance, and backwardness in the urban hinterlands, but also with respect to one of the larger 
public health concerns of the early Turkish Republic, i.e. the health and well-being of children.  
The works of one particular medico-bureaucrat, Dr. Besim –mer (Akalõn), a key figure 
associated with the Turkish Red Crescent Society and Ôfounding fatherÕ of modern obstetrics 
during the late Ottoman and early Republican eras, are also addressed. Some of the most 
persistent themes in his writings center on the ideal disposition of the family, health in the home 
and the gendered roles that support it, the value of professionalized nursing to the state, and the 
national threat of infectious diseases like tuberculosis which could most effectively be combated 
in the domestic space of the home.  While utilizing only selected writings from one key figure as 
a representative of the techniques of governmentality may seem limiting, following Matthew G. 
HannahÕs approach in 
Governmentality and the Mastery of Territory, 
the effect generated by an 
intensive as opposed to extensive reading of texts and deployment of theory is preferential here 
!5as it allows for elaborative extensions into other parallel understandings of the relationship 
between state, power, and population (Hannah, 2000, p. 4).   
 In HannahÕs case study of  Òthe cycle of American social controlÓ three key moments are 
identified:  observation, normalizing judgement, regulation/punishment (Hannah, 2000, p. 10).  
This typology provides a useful starting point for an investigation of the techniques of 
governmentality from an early republican era Turkish perspective.  While the boundaries 
between these moments are less than stable, such a typology creates a general framework from 
which to assess the engendering and transformation of governmental objects and subjects in 
modern Turkey.  For example, the boundary between observation and normalizing judgement in 
the discourses of reports commissioned by the Turkish state in order to evaluate the health and 
welfare of rural areas, towns, and villages in Anatolia was often
 blurred.  
 Moreover, the observation (more fully fleshed out in later chapters) that modern Turkish 
intellectuals and bureaucrats frequently denounced or skimmed over similar if not identical 
efforts at modernization and development in the late Ottoman Era should be kept in mind here.  I 
must also emphasize the generally unidirectional and masculine nature of the medical gaze as 
typically deployed in early Republican Turkey (Evered and Evered, 2011).  This study is an 
examination of state and 
state-related
 discourse on health, hygiene, sanitation, and society and as 
such it was largely authored by men whereby their subjective depiction of women and children is 
especially salient.  
 In order to facilitate the critical reading of governmental texts regarding health, place, 
and gender in early republican Turkey, geographical aspects of FoucaultÕs methodology 
(archaeology and genealogy) and later theoretical concerns (anatomo-politics, biopolitics, and 
!6governmentality) are discussed in the remainder of this chapter.   For the purpose of addressing 
the techniques of governmentality in sources outside of the social sciences where they have 
received the most attention, and for considering other types of governmental texts, the link 
between literature/fiction and governmentality is also discussed in later chapters where they are 
specifically relevant. 
 Additionally, this research complements current thematic and methodologically concerns 
within the broader subfield of historical geography.  As outlined in 
Modern Historical 
Geographies 
(Nash & Graham, 2000) and 
Key Concepts in Historical Geography 
(Morrissey, et. 
al., 2014)
, contemporary historical geographers with an interest in the modern era have placed a 
primacy on understanding patterns and processes associated with identity formation and 
regulation (especially as it pertains to the construction and maintenance of racial, ethnic, and 
national identities as well as more recent interest in gendered and sexualized identities), imperial 
spatialities that exist during and linger on after empire has run its course, and the production, use, 
and representation of environments and landscapes; the analysis that follows attends to elements 
of each of these broad interest areas in historical geography.  More specifically, a focus on the 
various intersectionalities between state, medicine, health, gender, and environment is an 
increasingly prevalent topic within the field.  While much of this literature has traditionally 
focused on health and sanitary regimes and regulations in former imperial metropoles and the 
West (Carter, 2014; Biehler, 2013;  Brown, 2013; Biehler, 2010), other regions, including Latin 
America (Carter, 2010), India (Arnold, 2013), and Turkey (Evered, KT, 2014) have recently 
received more critical appraisal.  
!7 This methods section directly facilitates the transition into chapters two and three in 
which I situate the 
Medical and Historical Geographies, 
a series of governmental reports 
commissioned by the Ministry for Health and Social Welfare, and the literary works of 
Karaosmano
"lu in the space between FoucaultÕs archaeology of discourse and genealogy of 
power.  
These two sets of texts (and practices) will be considered with respect to the production 
of governmental objects which emerged from similar though distinct Ôenunciative modalitiesÕ, to 
use the Foucauldian term; i.e. the techniques and practices of those medico-bureacrats in the 
early republic who were able to speak truth to power regarding health, sanitation, and 
governance. 
!81.1  Foucault as method in geography 
 An overall analysis of FoucaultÕs many theoretical concerns is an unwieldy task, 
problematic on many levels, and largely beyond the scope of this dissertation.  That being said, 
my own use of ÔFoucaultÕ as he has been articulated and deployed within geography during the 
last three decades as a methodological consideration requires elaboration primarily on three 
different fronts.  As such, in the sub-section that follows I will attend to the question of Foucault 
in geography by briefly outlining: FoucaultÕs historical methods (archaeology and genealogy); 
the emergence of governmentality as an object of analysis in FoucaultÕs work; and geographersÕ 
engagement with ÔFoucaultÕ since roughly the early 1980s.  The cursory depiction provided here 
serves primarily to situate my own study of governmentality in the early Turkish republic as an 
idiographic or 
general
 as opposed to a nomothetic or 
total
 historical-geographic engagement 
1within the larger genealogy of governmentalities. 
 Using FoucaultÕs own vernacular, as outlined in the section that follows.
1!91.1a  Archaeology and genealogy  
 It is generally fashionable (and convenient) when considering the wide corpus of 
FoucaultÕs work and its scope of considerations, to roughly periodize his writings and lectures 
and divide his methods.  Examples of such generalizations may include an emphasis on the shift 
in his approach to historical analysis from the archaeological mode to the genealogical mode as 
his thematic concerns shifted from the linguistic to the governmental.  That being said, without 
falling into the trap of describing a neat and linear progression in his writings and musings that 
would run counter to FoucaultÕs own conceptualization of history, it is possible to draw 
connections between the ruptures and discontinuities that populate his work, spanning the major 
texts like 
Madness and Civilization, Discipline and Punish, The Birth of the Clinic, The Order of 
Things, The Archaeology of Knowledge, 
and
 The History of Sexuality 
to the ÒGovernmentalityÓ 
and related lectures delivered at the College of France, 1970-1984 (Burchell, et al., 1991; 
Foucault, 1980).  
 Foucault gradually transitioned from an historical method he called archaeology 
(described in detail in 
The Archaeology of Knowledge
) to one called genealogy (incompletely 
articulated in the english translations of 
The History of Sexuality 
and the various lectures at the 
College of France, 1970-1984).  While an entire methodological dissertation could be written 
that articulates the detailed applications of these methods, their similarities, and differences, my 
main objective in the section that follows is to briefly outline how they function and how 
genealogy utilizes and extends archaeology.  I also aim to show, following other geographers 
!10who have adopted a Foucauldian framework, how his spatial metaphors are well-suited to if not 
in fact directly dependent upon the same concerns that occupy historical geography. 
 There is no doubt that the central theme of FoucaultÕs work is the power/knowledge 
nexus. The archaeological approach highlights a linguistic sensitivity to the study of discourse 
whereas the genealogical approach begins to consider more deeply the shifting mechanisms of 
power that acts upon and inscribes bodies. In order to make my point more clearly, a little back-
tracking is required.  In 
The Archaeology of Knowledge
 Foucault articulated how an 
archaeological approach to history functions.  Writing against what he described as ÒtotalÓ 
histories, or historical approaches that conceptualized historical development as linear and 
progressive, he saw history as full of discontinuities, ruptures, and breaks.  As such, historical 
analysis that was concerned with the reading of texts should not be too preoccupied with 
establishing the archival document as the proclamation of a fixed and Cartesian self-knowing 
subject.  Historical analysis should instead acknowledge these constantly shifting subject 
positions and subsequently evaluate each archival document on its own merits as opposed to 
seeing it as a representation of any overarching zeitgeist.   
 While it is quite possible to find fault with this vision and it is not my intention to defend 
it in its entirety, the archaeological approach that emerged from this historical understanding is 
important for geographers.  Along this line of reasoning, Foucault outlined an approach for the 
study of historical objects that was uninterested in telling their origin stories as fixed on 
particular points, but rather those that considered the objectÕs 
surfaces of emergence,  authorities 
of delimitation, 
and
 grids of specification
.  Foucault reasoned that objects (for example, of study, 
such as the concept of madness) were not simply out there, waiting to be found.  Such objects are 
!11produced by statements, which are themselves governed by implicit rules, rituals, and practices 
of speech.  Discursive formations fuse together these objects and collections of statements about 
objects and essentially ÔdisciplineÕ them; i.e. they legitimate and delegitimate certain bodies of 
knowledge about certain objects.  Hence the use of the term ÔdisciplineÕ to refer to an academic 
field of studyÕs relationship with its object, e.g. psychiatry-madness (Foucault, 1972). 
 To reiterate, these objects are not fully formed or primordial; they are shaped and 
reshaped within discursive formations.  Archaeology is the method that seeks to excavate the 
field of relations in which they are drawn up or embedded within (their surfaces of emergence), 
the collection of experts that give voice to and are given voice or legitimated by the object (their 
authorities of delimitation), and the dimensions of the object that are deemed worth knowing 
(their grids of specification).  While not as clearly delineated as archaeology, genealogy seems to 
owe much to its predecessor if we base that assessment on works that incorporate it, e.g. 
The 
History of Sexuality.   
 The genealogical studies are explicitly concerned with the inscription of power/
knowledge on and through bodies. For example, an increasing preoccupation with sex as a site of 
knowledge production also constitutes the body as a site of governmental intervention.  
Conversely, while power is enacted upon the body through the discursive disciplining of proper 
and productive sexual behavior, Foucault also recognized that such discourses created subject 
positions that had previously been silent and could now seek political recognition (e.g. the so-
called ÔperverseÕ) (Foucault, 1990). The main take-away point here is a recognition of powerÕs 
more diffuse and complex flows and forces than had previously been recognized or allowed by 
total approaches to history (Foucault, In 
Crampton & Elden
, 2008, pp. 142Ð171).  Before 
!12moving on, I also reiterate that FoucaultÕs metaphors are of central interest to geographers and 
will be returned to below, following a brief outline of governmentality. 
 !131.1b  Governmentality 
 FoucaultÕs shift in focus toward the tactics, strategies, and practice the constitute the Òart 
of governmentÓ have been thoroughly related elsewhere (Dean, 2010; Foucault, 1991). As such, 
my interest here is to briefly outline my understanding and interest in governmentality, especially  
alongside its study as outlined and deployed by Hannah in 
Governmentality and the Mastery of 
Territory 
(2000).  Towards the end of the chapter I will present some recent geographical 
engagements with governmentality studies, alongside other considerations of Foucault within 
human geography over the course of the last few decades. 
 FoucaultÕs articulation of governmentality draws upon many of his prior interests and 
insights: power/knowledge, discipline, the interwoven formation of objects and subjects, an 
emerging interest in strategy, etc.  His prior analyses of the inscription of power on bodies 
alongside the production and deployment of knowledge that took place in the confines of the 
prison, mental institution, and clinic, fuels line of questioning that emerges in 
The History of 
Sexuality 
(1990) and the so-called governmentality lectures.
  Alongside his thesis regarding the 
2spurious nature of the Òrepressive hypothesisÓ concerning sex-talk in the Victorian era, Foucault 
outlines his vision of power as all-encompassing and ubiquitous as opposed to merely top-down 
and repressive.  This vision of power in part depended on a shift in the focus of questions that are 
asked about power, where it originates from, how it is transmitted, and how it acts upon bodies 
and spaces.   
 The 2009 and 2003 volumes, 
Security, Territory, Population, 
and 
ÒSociety Must Be Defended!Ó 
were reviewed for 
2this study.
!14 With respect to the state, in 
Discipline and Punish
 Foucault had previously outlined a 
shift from the deployment of bodily punishment and the administering of death, to incarceration 
and reform via the disciplinary gaze (1995).  This historical analysis posited a huge difference in 
the mechanisms of sovereign governance versus neoliberal governance.  With population 
replacing territory as the primary object of government came a shift in the tactics, practices, and 
logics regarding the role of government; this shift reconstituted Òthe art of governmentÓ over 
Òbiopower,Ó broadly incorporating a constellation of ways to calculate, manage, classify, 
regulate, and normalize consumption, reproduction, and a host of other demographic and 
sociological matters (Foucault, 2009, p. 1; Foucault, 1990, p. 140).   
 In 
The History of Sexuality,
 Foucault described this as a shift from the power to punish 
crimes through the enforcement of death sentences, to the power to regulate and promote (a 
certain vision of) life through surveillance and discipline: an Òanatamo-politicsÓ of the body and 
a Òbio-politicsÓ of population were united (Foucault, 1990, pp. 135-140).  The discursive 
practices undergirding the Òproblem of populationÓ, as shaped and reshaped within a loose 
collection of discursive formations that included but were not limited to the social and medical 
sciences, were at the core of FoucaultÕs genealogical analysis:  i.e., what were its Ôsurfaces of 
emergenceÕ, Ôauthorities of delimitationÕ, and Ôgrids of specificationÕ?  
!151.1c  Authoritarian governmentality 
 It is also important to consider the type of governmentality being assessed.  While much 
of the literature in governmentality studies has emphasized liberal logics and practices, attention 
has also been directed at both the Òilliberality of liberal governmentÓ as well as governmental 
practices of authoritarian governments (Dean, 2010, pp. 155-174; Dean, 2002).  In geography, 
this has included considerations of the scalar dimensions of illiberality and governance by 
considering authoritarian elements of urban/environmental management and health and 
sanitation policy (Gandy, 2006).  
  However, much of this attention has focused on developing or modernizing histories and 
geographies, including: governmentality and the impact of resource scarcities and political 
ecologies (Watts, 2004), the hybridity of authoritarian government and varying degrees of 
economic liberalism (Ismail, 2011; Sigley, 2006), and the intersection of governmentality and 
development policy (Li, 2007) which invariably incorporates elements of global or Òinternational 
governmentalityÓ (Dean, 2010, pp. 228-249) as well.  The principles of Kemalism, incorporating 
degrees of ÔprogressiveÕ or modernist thinking alongside authoritarian governance, situates a 
study of governmentality in the early Turkish republic squarely in the study of governmentÕs 
illiberal logics and modalities. 
!161.1d  Foucault and geography 
 GeographyÕs engagement with Foucault has revolved around loosely conceptualized 
deployments of the English translations of the governmentality lectures (especially 
ÒSociety 
Must Be Defended!Ó
 and 
Security, Territory, Population
), although an interest in the so-called 
spatial preoccupations of full-length texts such as 
Discipline and Punish
 and more recently 
The 
Birth of the Clinic
 are also of note.  While those works that are more commonly seen as part of 
the corpus of genealogical studies have been central to geographical engagements, some 
geographers have noted the value of the earlier archaeological studies for conceptualizing the 
spaces of geographic knowledge and philosophy (Livingstone, 2010).   
 Matthew Hannah makes a compelling argument along these lines in 
Space, Knowledge, 
and Power
 (2008).  He argues that the archaeological approach, despite its seemingly stagnant 
rendering of space (when contrasted with the more dynamic presentation of temporal variables), 
in fact reveals a relatively acute sense of the vitality and instability of space which Foucault 
himself remarked upon in the frequently discussed 
Questions on Geography, 
originally appearing 
in the French journal 
H”rodote.  
From FoucaultÕs comments in 
Questions, 
we should take care to 
note that space itself wasnÕt necessarily the primary focus of his analytics, but rather 
governmentÕs Òtactics and strategiesÓ (Foucault, 2008, p. 182).  Regardless of semantics, 
HannahÕs argument is useful and worthy of brief explanation here for two reasons: it 
contextualizes archaeology and situates it in practical terms in the history of geography; and it 
touches on the linkages between archaeology and genealogy as coherent method of interest for 
historical geographers. 
!17 In 
Formations of ÔFoucaultÕ in Anglo-American Geography:  An Archaeological Sketch
, Hannah uses FoucaultÕs archaeological approach in order to attend to both discursive 
constructions of ÔFoucaultÕ within geography and to ÒsketchÓ out archaeology as method 
(Hannah, 2008, p. 83).  As such, he relies upon an analysis of the various methods that facilitate 
the production of objects (e.g. ÔFoucaultÕ as a category or approach) within a particular 
discursive formation (e.g. geography); as described above, those systematics include a 
consideration of authorities of delimitation, surface of emergence, and grids of specification.  
Hannah argues that the Ôauthorities of delimitationÕ of Foucault within (Anglo-American) 
geography include individuals like Felix Driver and Chris Philo.  While temporal dynamics were 
important in the emergence of Foucault as discourse amongst these individuals (i.e., the impact 
of the cultural turn on geography), shifting and unstable spatial scales were also of importance; 
e.g. their position as upper-level scholars in major research institutions (Hannah, 2008, pp. 
90-92).  In terms of the surfaces of emergence of ÔFoucaultÕ as discourse within geography, 
Hannah once again relies upon both spatialities and temporalities; he noted that while the 
academic freedom of the seminar in the British university system facilitated the introduction and 
negotiation of ÔFoucaultÕ within geography and allowed its diffusion based off of professional 
connections, readings and subsequent deployments of ÔFoucaultÕ varied dependent upon oneÕs 
initial point of interaction with the spectrum of works.  In some instances, oneÕs knowledge of 
French impacted this, due to the gradual pace of translating the original French into English.    
 As such, an engagement that was christened by 
Discipline and Punish, 
with full and prior 
knowledge of the influence of panopticism and the disciplinary gaze, inculcated oneÕs spatial 
!18expectations and influenced forward and backward readings of FoucaultÕs other writings that 
would be fundamentally different than, say, a traditional linear/chronological reading of the body 
of work (Hannah, 2008, pp. 92-97). Alongside these concerns, when considering the grids of 
specification of Foucault, Hannah also reflects on how these works were read into and situated 
alongside other academic trends within geography.  Specifically, he notes that many of the 
scholars engaging with Foucault in this period have a hard time reading him outside of the 
confines of  structure and agency (Hannah, 2008, pp. 97-99).  Keeping these arguments in mind, 
I conclude this chapter by briefly presenting some of the most influential as well as recent 
encounters with Foucault in geography, and by situating my own study as an example of general 
historical-geography. 
!191.1e  Geography and Foucault 
 Geographers began to engage in a critical way with FoucaultÕs writings beginning in the 
mid-1980Õs.  Much of this early work traces its origins to cultural and historical geography 
seminars at major universities in the UK; at the forefront of this movement were well established 
academics like Felix Driver and Chris Philo (Hannah, 2008).  Corroborating Matthew HannahÕs 
argument regarding 
Discipline and PunishÕ
s serving as a common point of entry for geographers,
 Felix DriverÕs 
Power, space, and the body: a critical assessment of FoucaultÕs Discipline and 
Punish
 (1985) provides an excellent early example of what Hannah also describes as a deep or 
Òclose readingÓ approach to FoucaultÕs texts; such an approach emphasizes, following Foucault 
himself, the subjectivity of the text itself (Hannah, 2000).   
 DriverÕs close reading of FoucaultÕs 
Discipline and Punish
 emphasizes the work as an 
Òanalysis of power, not a general theory of powerÓ (p. 444), and considers a host of geographic 
considerations in the work, including but not limited to the scalar relationship between 
micropowers (of the disciplinary institution) and the Òcondition of existence for more centralised 
or ÔglobalÕ powersÓ (p. 425), the transformation of Òpolitical technolog[ies] of the bodyÓ across 
space and time (p. 420), the value of archaeological and genealogical considerations for 
geographers interested in the discursive production of space at all scales (from the body to the 
global) (pp. 431-432), and larger questions about FoucaultÕs approach to the geography of power 
as Òa challengeÓ to Marxist Òeconomies of power,Ó so popular at the time in the era of the ÔNew 
Cultural GeographyÕ (Driver, 1985, p. 436).   
!20 In 
FoucaultÕs Geography 
(1992), Chris Philo is similarly interested in broadly 
demonstrating the usefulness of FoucaultÕs approach to geographic questions.  Philo carefully 
points out that Foucault should not be conceptualized as (nor did he try to be) another Ògrand 
theorist of spaceÓ (p. 137). Instead, his works should be seen as providing some methodological 
guidelines for anyone interested in writing an historical account that takes space seriously and 
critically and that Òshades into being a geographyÓ (p. 140); however, geographers should be 
careful not to perpetuate a singular and orthodox ÒÔstoryÕ to be told about Foucault and 
geography [that] has been agreed upon all too quickly and simplisticallyÓ (p. 138), i.e. placing 
Foucault hastily into a family tree of postmodern and poststructuralist spatial thinkers.    
 PhiloÕs primary goal with this article (1992) was to address the value of FoucaultÕs attack 
on total history which he describes as an ÒunorthodoxÓ reading of FoucaultÕs archaeological 
method that: 
 calls forth a geographical way of looking at the world in which one sees only Ôspaces of  
dispersionÕ: spaces where things proliferate in a jumbled-up manner on the same ÔlevelÕ as one 
anotherÑon the one level where advanced capitalism and the toy rabbit beating a drum no 
longer exist in any hierarchical relation of the one being considered more important or 
fundamental than the otherÑand one which it can never be decided if Ôthe essentialÕ has been 
sighted (because there simply is no ÔessentialÕ to be sighted or because, even if there is one, we 
can never know whether it has revealed itself) (p. 139). 
!21 General histories are thus pregnant with spatiality, or more specifically ÒspacesÓ and 
Òsystems of dispersionÓ (Philo, 1992, p. 148), albeit of a non-Euclidean topology and geometry 
that eschews traditional concerns of proximity, hierarchy, and juxtaposition merely for their own 
sake. Assumed connectivities and relations amidst those objects and subjects deemed worthy of 
consideration should not be taken for granted and the existence of all artifacts in the spatial 
arena, Òtangible and intangibleÓ, should be taken account of. Hence the value of approaches that 
take stock of Ôgeneral historyÕ, where Òthe initial move in this conceptual ÔlimbolandÕ is not to 
homogenise the components of relevance nor to chase them into one central compound, but to 
preserve and even to accent their details and the differences between themÓ (Philo, 1992, p. 149).  
While Ôgeneral historyÕ can still be utilized as a means for attending to discursive themes amidst 
spatial practices, it isnÕt necessary nor even possible to tie up all the diverse components and 
practices into a neat, perfectly coherent bundle.
  As Philo (1992) goes on to argue:  
 The envisaging of a space of dispersion is not tantamount to saying that all there is in the 
world is chaos that the researcher can do no more than celebrate, because Foucault clearly 
supposes that there is some order in the dispersion waiting to be discovered, but that this order 
resides resolutely in the things themselves and not in any order theoretically imposed from 
without (p. 149).  
 Much of the work in geography that utilizes Foucauldian topics or approaches proceeds 
along the lines outlined by Philo and Driver, albeit to varying degrees of ÔorthodoxyÕ and/or 
attention to the full corpus of FoucaultÕs writings.  While other examples of FoucaultÕs Ômid-
!22periodÕ works have gradually received more sustained consideration by scholars like Philo, 
especially with respect to population geography and 
The History of Sexuality 
(Legg, 2005; Philo, 
2005) and medical geography and 
The Birth of the Clinic 
(Philo, 2000), the impact of 
Discipline 
and Punish
 remains a heady influence on geographies of spatial control, policing, and regulation 
(Herbert, 1996).   
 However, there is no doubt that FoucaultÕs 
Governmentality Lectures
 have had the most 
profound recent impact on geographic scholarship.  While several geographers have considered 
the value of governmentality to questions of scalar production, the geopolitics of development, 
and population management (Huxely, 2008; Elden, 2007; Jessop, 2007; Li, 2007; Brown & 
Knopp, 2006; Rose-Redwood, 2006, Hannah, 2000) the intersection between health and medical 
geographies and governmentality has been especially prominent over the course of the last 
decade (Brown & Watson, 2010; Brown & Duncan, 2002).  The relationship between governance 
and public health is highlighted in a diverse array of studies in different geographic locations, 
from prostitution to malaria eradication, and from sex-ed to infant mortality (Legg, 2014; Moore, 
2013; Evered & Evered, 2012, 2011; Brown & Knopp, 2010; Crowley and Kitchin, 2008; Prince, 
Kearns, & Craig, 2006).   
 Hannah notes that genealogically sensitive studies such as these make the logics and 
practices of various governmentalities less opaque by asking questions about certain ÒmomentsÓ 
that transpire within them; namely acts of observation, normative judgement, and regulatory 
enactment which serve to operationalize the discourses of governmentality (Hannah, 2000).  Put 
succinctly, these moments encapsulate the overall actions and logics of those privileged to speak 
truth to power on a given subject; they gather information about the object in question via 
!23observation, evaluate those observations based on cultural, political, and social beliefs, and draw 
up governing schemes based on those ethically situated judgements.  In line with these 
considerations, my contribution to general history and the governmental logics and practices of 
the transitional early Turkish republic is guided by Hannah, but is especially attuned to the 
contributions of Moore, Legg and Evered & Evered, by attending to the sparsely theorized 
intersectional spaces of gender and health from a genealogical perspective.
  With this methodological consideration of the intersections between geography and 
studies of governmentality now in place, in the second chapter I proceed by evaluating the 
Turkish RepublicÕs developing biopolitical agenda through an intensive, focused and close 
reading of the Ministry of Health and Social WelfareÕs 
Medical and Social Geography of Ankara
.  This chapter also exemplifies the emergence of preventative medicine as a field of governmental 
intervention, a concept that is echoed throughout this dissertation in subsequent chapters.  The 
third chapter demonstrates the prevalence of discourses surrounding health, sanitation, space, and 
gender within the upper echelons of expert bureaucratic knowledge production that went beyond 
official government sanctioned reports and highlights the existence of other types of 
governmental literatures through a critical reading of the novel 
Yaban (
and to a lesser extent 
Ankara
) written by the Kemalist and Kadro scholar and politician Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
"lu
.   Chapter four narrows the focus by considering the fusion of anatomo- and biopolitical 
concerns through the discursive rendering of 
scientific motherhood
 as a vital state interest via the 
works of Dr. Besim –mer (Akalõn).  The fifth chapter complements this approach by considering 
a second anatomo-/biopolitical discursive fusing via the promotion of 
sanitary citizenship
 in the 
Turkish Red Crescent SocietyÕs official journal. While each chapter serves as a self-contained 
!24discussion that contextualizes and situates the material by adding additional relevant literature 
and explanatory justifications for the selections of texts alongside summaries of the 
governmental logics at play with respect to discourses of health, place, and gender, a short yet 
concise conclusory analysis is provided
 at the end of this dissertation that reiterates the themes 
that are in dialogue with each other amongst the various chapters. 
!25 Chapter 2 
Producing governmental objects in early republican Turkey:   
gender, health, & population in the 
Medical and Social Geographies 
2.1  Survey, map, national body, sanitary citizen 
 Scholars of the late Ottoman Empire and early republican Turkey have opened up 
invigorated inquiries into continuities of thought and practice with respect to shifting forms of 
governance in the late 19th and early 20th centuries (Deringil, 1998). Many of these inquires 
have centered on shared concerns regarding population, health, and sanitation; in sum, a general 
interest in mechanisms of control with respect to biopower.  From direct efforts to eradicate 
malaria via land reclamation and wetland draining, to campaigns against syphilis and in support 
of pronatalist policies and activities, both the Ottomans and later Turkish bureaucrats were 
intimately involved in the production and regulation of healthy bodies and spaces throughout 
Anatolia.
  As Evered and Evered demonstrated in 
State, peasant, mosquito 
(2012a)
, the Ottomans 
and their successors in the Turkish Republic shared a common preoccupation of the late 19th and 
early 20th century; i.e. malaria as a 'problem of governance.'  From a spatial perspective, Malaria 
was seen as a 
kıyltalõ
!õ 
or village disease
 in pamphlets, reports, and propaganda pieces 
produced by official state organizations, charitable foundations, and other regulatory bodies (p. 
313).  Thus, various governmental officials (experts, doctors, bureaucrats, etc) spilled copious 
amounts of ink on detailed depictions of the state of the population vis-‹-vis health and 
!26 environmental conditions of central and western Anatolia (Evered, K.T. & Evered, E.–., 2012a).  
One particularly salient example comes from the Ministry of Health and Social Assistance 
(Sõhhat ve 
"“timai Muavenet Vekaleti
) (MHSA) which was established in 1920.  Initially under 
the directorship of Dr. Adnan (Adivar) (1882-1955), spouse of the well-known feminist, 
nationalist, and novelist Halide Edib (Adivar) (1884 - 1964), numerous other powerful medico-
politicians held sway at the MHSA, most notably the subsequent director and future Prime 
Minister Dr. Refik (Saydam) (1881-1942).  Moreover, this medico-political legacy is etched into 
the very fabric of Ankara as numerous avenues, streets, and public buildings bear the name of 
physicians central to the stateÕs history of modernization.   
 The  production and diffusion of discourses regarding the health and sanitary conditions 
of the population as an indicator of the well-being of the state were common during this era, not 
only from the MHSA, but also from organizations that transcended the dissolution of the 
Ottoman empire, e.g. the 
Hilal-i Ahmer Cemiyeti 
or Turkish Red Crescent Society 
(RCS).  
However, one undertaking of the MHSA was especially revealing from the perspective
 of governmentality.  Between the early 1920s and the early 1930s, the MHSA deployed medico-
bureaucrats to various provinces throughout Anatolia for the purposes of gathering data and 
writing up reports on the status of local populations.   
 These 
Medical and Social Geographies 
(Tkiye'nin Sõhhi-i 
"ctim⁄fl Co
!rafyasõ
) (MSG) 
such as Dr. Muslihiddin (Safvet)Õs volume centered on the Province of Ankara (1925) (AMSG), 
began with brief introductions of the regionÕs history and geography, which are elaborated upon 
only in circumstances in which it is deemed necessary by the author to highlight landscapes 
classifiable as beneficial from the standpoint of political economy (e.g., highland streams, 
!27 springs, etc) or diseased and/or misused (various wetland environments, i.e. 
bataklik, sazlik,) 
(78).  The juxtaposition between fact-finding and critical, normative commentary are indicative 
of the type of knowledge being produced in these works.  They also highlight the permeable 
boundary between the governmental moments of observation and normative judgement.  For 
example, in between detailed depictions of the water quality of various rural water supplies 
(accounting for appearance, taste, color, and quantities of various nutrients and bacteria) (84) Dr. 
Muslihiddin also included numerous criticisms of village water-use practices, often pausing in 
the midst of a matter-of-fact description of a streamÕs chemical, mineral, and organic 
characteristics in order to include a diatribe against domestic water use, e.g. washing of laundry, 
bathing of children, etc.  Notably, these are activities typical attributed to females and the 
domestic spaces they manage.           
 In the chapter that follows, I highlight the production of population discourses and 
subjectivities in early republican Turkey via a particularly prolific "surface of emergence," i.e. 
the Medical and Social Geographies that were generated by the MHSA.  I will focus on one 
volume of this collection in order to draw attention to the emphasis that was placed on gendered 
roles and spaces, threats to the well-being of the population, and the protection of children as a 
vital resource of the state.  I critically evaluate the AMSG as an example of an object of 
governmentality or perhaps even a form of governmental literature within the historical 
geographic context of early republican Turkey.  Discursive formations pertaining to population 
are highlighted, especially where observations and statements regarding health, sanitation, and 
gender are interrelated.  Following HannahÕs reading of Walker, I argue that a set of spatial logics 
are prevalent in both the stateÕs gendered diagnosis of the conditions of population, health, 
!28 sanitation, and hygiene in rural Turkey (of which Dr. Muslihiddin 
serves merely serves as a point 
of illustration or a Ònexus of relationsÓ), and in its prognosis as to how these deficiencies can be 
alleviated so as to protect the well-being of the state. 
!29 2.2  Narrating governmental discourses of population, health, & gender in the    
Medical and Social Geographies
  As noted previously, while each volume of the MSG tends to adhere to a pre-established 
set of criteria as dictated by the MHSA, individual medico-bureaucrats were able to elaborate 
upon, and in most instances engage in the co-construction of, a highly subjective and normative 
critique of particular circumstances based off of their own interests or passions (Evered, K.T. & 
Evered, E.–, 2012a; 12b; Evered, E.– & Evered, K.T., 2013).  This is indicative of what Hannah 
described as the imprecise and multi-faceted nature of national-scale normalizing judgement 
(Hannah, 2000) while lending credibility to John MarxÕs assertion of the Òimaginative 
reformulationsÓ that the art of government entails (p. 66, 2011).  While extensive time and 
attention is paid by Dr. Muslihiddin (Safvet) to the physical environment of Ankara and its 
surrounding hinterland (including but not limited to Beypazarõ, Haymana, Kir
"
ehir, Kastamonu, 
Yabanabad, etc.), particularly in the opening sections which follow guidelines mandated for all 
ethnographic accounts of the cities and villages of Anatolia by the MHSA with sections 
dedicated to an explication of the physical environment, climate, resources, ethnicities and 
customs of the regions, infrastructure, existent health and sanitary concerns, and demographic 
dynamics of the region, he also spends a great deal of time and ink relating the interaction 
between these physical environments and the human populations that inhabit them, as is typical 
of much modern human-environmental geography and especially health geography.  
 !30 2.2a  Narratives of health and environment in the 
Medical and Social Geographies
   In the second section of the ethnography, which emphasizes climate and resource 
characteristics, an entire sub-section (
miyah-õ madeniyye)
 is dedicated to mineral waters and 
springs (
kaplõca)
 scattered across what is otherwise generally depicted as the semi-arid 
bozkõr, 
or prairie, of central Anatolia.  Recent studies have attended to the complex situation of water in 
Anatolia, both historically and in the present, addressing the seemingly paradoxical 
characterization of the region as both water scarce and water abundant, in which water 
abundance or the presence of unmanaged water sources tended to be seen as a detriment to 
public health at the turn of the 20th century.
   As such, Dr. Muslihiddin SafvetÕs attention to the 
1positive health effects of particular water sources is of note here; however, his evaluation of the 
way in which these vital water sources are put to use is certainly less than a glowing review of 
local hygiene.  
   Safvet draws attention to several local springs in relation to how the local population 
classifies them based on their anecdotally noted rejuvenative and restorative capacities, i.e. their 
havass-i 
#
ifaÕiye
 or Òpowers of healingÓ roughly speaking.  For example, one spring near 
Haymana,
 a former village and now southern district of the Ankara metropolitan area, was noted 
for its capacity to alleviate the discomfort of rheumatism, ostensibly due to its high sulfur content 
(Safvet, 1925, p. 28).  These are rare points of relatively judgement-free observation whereby a 
local and traditional practice is deemed sanitary and beneficial under modern medical scrutiny.  
It is interesting to note that mineral waters retain a vaunted position in the public imaginary of 
 see EveredÕs recent work on wetland drainage schemes as linked to malaria eradication efforts: Evered, K.T., 2014.
1!31 Turks today.  Coffeehouses, restaurants, grocers and convenience stores typically stock several 
varieties of small, green glass bottles of Ônatural mineral waterÕ (
do!al maden suyu).  
Moreover 
many of these bottles, which declare the widely held mantra that healthy individuals consume at 
least two bottles a day, are branded based on their Anatolian source points, e.g. 
Beypazarõ
 is a 
commonly found variety. Two major mineral springs are listed by Dr. Muslihiddin as being well 
known amongst the peoples of 
Beypazarõ
, i.e. 
Dutlu
 and 
Kapullu
.    Before World War I, the sick from Ankara and even Eski
#
ehir used to come here.  The 
curative powers of the mineral springs circulated amongst the population and it was widely 
believed that internal illnesses could be cured by drinking these waters and external maladies by 
bathing in them.  Therefore, the sick came here to drink and bathe.  They continually came to the 
springs in July and August and stayed for 15-20 days.  Due to the laxative effects of internal 
consuming the water, around the springs myriad lavatories had been constructed  (p. 
26).    However, the tone of his writing is more frequently characterized by a departure from or 
complete abandonment of objective observation in favor of the second activity in the 
governmental triptych: normative judgement.  At the very least, observation and normative 
judgement exist side-by-side, with occasional appeals toward regulation occurring more 
frequently in the later half of the document.  The typical model the author adheres to is as such: 
First, the characteristics of a physical environment were described in detail and then related to a 
local population and its activities in that area.  Second, that populationÕs culpability in the 
desiccation or pollution of said environment is detailed and reprimanded.  Alternatively, the local 
!32 populationÕs ignorance of potentially harmful local environmental characteristics may also be 
described in relation to potentially negative health and wellness outcomes.  For example, in the 
above described context, Dr. Muslihiddin elaborated upon the problematic presence of Ascarid 
and other parasites in these waters, the likely source of the seemingly beneficial laxative effect of 
the springs.  He also notes that the surrounding swamps served as breeding grounds for malarial 
Anopheles mosquitos.
    As such, the population is characterized as ill-informed or improperly equipped to utilize 
its environmental surroundings in the most pragmatic fashion.  The implication is that proper 
education and regulation is required to provide for their well-being.  Following these generally 
narrative descriptions, which referenced local names for springs, and surrounding wetlands, 
creeks, and underground water sources (
nebean
),  the governmental authority provided statistical 
legitimation (i.e. grids of specification) to his observations and judgements; these frequently took 
the form of tables, charts, and maps.  For example, several statistical compilations are included 
in relation to the above described section, describing the chemical and nutrient qualities of the 
water (
terkib-õ kimyevi
), its temperature, odor, and clarity, and the conditions of infrastructure 
facilitating travel to these locations
.  Governmental discursive formations, as previously discussed, are infused with myriad 
geographical implications.  As Foucault noted, political economy drives the governmental 
imperatives of the state; therefore it is worth mentioning that ethnographic reports centered on 
considerations of the health and well-being of local populations will also makes reference to 
future developmental imperatives in association with the economic value of  resources 
throughout the state as well as provide criticism of their under or mis-utilization by local 
!33 populations.  For example, outside of the village of Yabanabad, an area that today has been 
engulfed by the expansion of modern Ankara and is now known as the northern Ankara 
metropolitan districts of Kõzõlcahamam and ‡amlõdere, Dr. Muslihiddin noted the confluence of 
several vital water resources in an area otherwise dominated by unowned and undeveloped land 
(arazi-i haliyye
) and forests (Safvet, p. 27).  In these locations, he deemed expenditure on public 
works 
desirable as compared with other sites.  It therefore seems logical to surmise that 
economic imperatives trumped the local and traditionally valorized, and scientifically unfounded, 
health benefits of the springs and surrounding waterways.  Grids of economic value, classifying 
both material as well as knowledge-based resources, were overlain atop other grids emphasizing 
demographic and health characteristics of the local population.   
 In the same vein of political economic classification, another section included an 
infrastructural evaluation that was a common component of each of the individual ethnographic 
reports commissioned by the MHSA.  Primary medical infrastructure is classified and reviewed 
first, beginning with a general survey of the condition of hospitals and pharmacies (
hastahane/
hastane 
and 
eczahane/eczane).  
Fee and fee-free bed counts are tallied, the poor conditions of 
medical infrastructure such as surgery ward bacteriology labs are described, and the number of 
dispensaries are provided.  Following a similar sub-section classifying the conditions of schools 
and hospitals, Dr. Safvet shifts his focus to the general character and composition 
of the local 
villages themselves.   
 The condition of the villages is quite varied with the majority consisting of homes 
constructed on mountain slopes or hillsides and in a few rare conditions in valleys, while some 
!34 homes are so scattered they are not in a condition resembling any  form of collective communal 
space. Some villages are quite large, while some are small consisting of only 10-15 houses all of 
which are constructed in the same mutually desired space.  Up to the present, due to their 
(villagers) lack of encouragement regarding sanitation and standardized methods of village 
construction, they adhere to the methods of theõr ancestors in the construction of what constitutes 
a neighborhood (p. 
39).    Given what is known about the modernizing imperatives of the Kemalist regime and its 
newly founded Republic (Yõlmaz, 2014; Evered, 2008; Zher, 2004; Bozdo
#an, 2001; 
Bozdo
#an & Kasaba, 1997) this sort of statement, which appears in similar fashion throughout 
the individual volumes of the MSG, can be seen as further evidence of the use of statistical and 
ethnographic instruments by the state as a means to push for increased intervention in the daily 
life if its population via methods of standardization and regulation.   According to these 
depictions for want of proper building codes and urban planning schemes, Anatolian 
communities were in a state of disarray.  
  The problematization of conditions of health and sanitation in the village proceeded in 
several steps:  behaviors, actions, and social forms that were deemed undesirable or unhealthy 
were detailed and Ôdiagnosed;Õ solutions were then ÔprescribedÕ and propagandized in such a way 
as to seem self-evident and necessary despite their invasiveness to the subjectified population 
that was compelled to transform.  If done effectively, regulation and reform would seem natural 
and would eventually be undertaken voluntarily.  The use of medicalized verbs to describe the 
desired actions that were to be undertaken by the now self-governing population are more than 
!35 mere colorful linguistic tropes.  As the stateÕs increasing interest in biopower is central to the 
evolving art of government, both health and administration
, as well as body and territory are 
increasingly intertwined.   
 As indicated in the observations translated above, Dr. Safvet simultaneously drew 
attention to the failures of the prior (Ottoman) regime to guide its population in the methods of 
home and village construction that would have been in the best interest of their health and 
vitality (as well as that of the larger empire), while beginning to lay the seeds for greater 
governmental intervention via regulation.  The culmination of these reports, as Evered and 
Evered have demonstrated in 
State, Peasant, and Mosquito
 (2012a), were legislative actions like 
the 1930 Public Health Law (
Umumi Hõfzõssõhha Kanunu) 
as well as the expansion of measures 
first enacted in the 1924 Ankara Municipality Law.  Moreover, from the standpoint of public 
education, health, and well-being, journals, magazines, periodicals, and books proliferated, 
initially represented by a steady stream of expert and practitioner oriented works like the Journal 
of Health (
Sõhhiye Mecmuasõ
) and the Journal of the Turkish Red Crescent Society (
Hilal-i 
Ahmer Mecmuasõ
), but later expanded to include brochures and pamphlets directed at the general 
population. 
  The biopolitical interests of the state are most salient between the third and sixth sections 
of the AMSG.  Here, Dr. Muslihiddin (Safvet) outlined the human and cultural geography of 
rural Anatolia.  Initially this involved a brief survey of the ethnic populations in an area 
surrounding Ankara that extends roughly from 
Eski
#
ehir
 in the west to 
Yozgat
 in the east and 
from 
‡ankõrõ
 in the north to 
Polatlõ
, Haymana
, and 
Kõr
#
ehir
 in the south. This general survey 
!36 rapidly transformed into a discussion and critique of local livelihoods which, the author was
 careful to point out, rapidly devolved as a result of depravation and destruction wrought by WWI  
and the  subsequent War for Independence (
Tk Kurtulu
#
 Sava
#
õ,
 1919-1922).  The following 
description  captures the patriotic fervor in relation to the social, economic, and structural 
upheaval wrought by the conflicts
:  Following the Balkan Wars (1912-1913), the onset of the First World War, and the 
Moudros Armistice (30 October 191
8), the population was justly incensed and a national 
resistance formed as a result of Greek invaders gradual advancement through Anatolia 
beginning in Izmir and expanding as far as the gates of Ankara. Naturally, as the countryÕs trade 
and industry were brought to a standstill and the structure of the overall economy was destroyed 
by the onset of the national struggle agains the Greek armies, the effect was an overall decrease 
in the standard of life to a noticeable extent in both urban and rural populations (p. 54). 
 Safvet used this narrative as a launching point for discussing the nutritional habits of the 
villagers as one of the primary detrimental factors with respect to the vitality of the population.  
Little distinction was drawn between pre-war and post-war era nutritional habits; in fact, there is 
no indication that any such investigation was undertaken at least as part of this survey. For 
example, it is mentioned that a variety of foodstuffs are produced in most rural areas and tables 
are included in the index indicating the amount per month in a given year for each commodity:  
rice, wheat, barley, corn, chickpeas, lentils.  Bulgur and beans were referenced as the primary 
subsistence commodity by which the rural population Òcontents itselfÓ and the vast majority of 
!37 the above listed items as well as luxury agricultural goods like honey, milk, cream, and butter 
were produced solely for the market (Safvet, 1925, p. 54).
  In an interesting and off-hand remark, 
Safvet noted that certain local varieties of bread (
bazlama
) and cured meat (
besi
) typically 
offered to guests had largely disappeared from villagerÕs tables since the onset of war, a notable 
decline in the goodwill and so-called guest hospitality (
misafirperverlik) 
of the local population 
likely attributable to resource scarcity and price increases.  In short, the decline of the 
population's health and well-being produced a reciprocal decline in the region's cultural assets as 
well. 
  In another subsection pertaining to local culture, Safvet focused his attention on declining 
morality in the rural hinterland of Ankara.  However, his gaze is narrowly fixated on one form of 
moral deprivation:  the diffusion of prostitution throughout the country:  
    Prostitution is more prominent in the towns than the villages, though the act of 
prostitution, typically undertaken in a clandestine way, is gradually becoming more visible and 
has lead to the breakdown of morals (fesad-i ahlak) (p. 56).  
  Safvet detailed several reasons for this influx, all essentially attributable to outside 
interference in the livelihoods of the local population.  Wartime
 had stimulated only one 
economy in Anatolia:  the production of widows.  In SafvetÕs depiction, these hapless rural 
women, in desperation Òentered into service (housemaid, etc) with anyone and everyoneÓ and 
became victims to the Òdeceptions of menÓ (1925, p. 56).  Other widows were married off to 
younger boys (between the ages of 10-16) who ultimately divorced them when the age gap 
!38 between bride and groom became apparent (1925, p. 56).  Circumstances such as these were 
allegedly commonplace according to SafvetÕs report and a primary source of moral 
contamination via prostitution as a result of 
destitution.  However, Safvet also attributed a greater 
threat to the wellbeing of the state to these women, of which more will be said below.   
 In a final cultural geography component of the third section, pertaining to traditional 
practices (
ananat), Safvet introduced a highly gendered point of problematization to which he 
would return in the final sections of the report:  birth.   This section is especially notable as it 
begins to lay the foundation for part of his overall regulatory vision with respect to population, 
health, hygiene, and sanitation in Turkey.  In addition, the reader is introduced to a primary 
personified threat to the population and state: the unlicensed 
ebe 
or kabile, 
i.e.. the midwife.  
Safvet argued that, while a majority of the population had adopted the used of licensed midwives 
as part of the birthing process, in rural areas unlicensed and ÒignorantÓ midwives were still 
common (1925, p. 58).  
  The author took issue with several actions undertaken by unlicensed midwives including 
methods for inducing labor (
a!#
iyeyi temzik etme
) and vomiting during labor. He also questioned 
the value of other traditional birthing rituals such as the use of popular religious and folkloric 
incantations, e.g. Ò
Fatma ana eli
Ó and Ò
yel›ikeler “ocu
!u ys
!Ó (1925, p. 58) and 
critically elaborated on a common tradition of placing 
Ôbebe topra
!õÕ or heated clay (bentonite) 
in the bed of the new mother (
lohusa
) as well as the swaddling cloths of the infant. Safvet did not 
fully explain what exactly he found so reprehensible about these practices, aside from the fact 
that the women who are carrying them out were not licensed state practitioners and were not 
subject to regulation via bureaucrats or overseeing (male) doctors.  In his estimation, villagers 
!39 were not necessarily beholden to these practices themselves; rather, they acquiesced to the 
authority of unlicensed midwives simply due to a lack of proper information regarding their 
negligence and potential harm.  Furthermore, he argued that very little information was available 
regarding rates of infection and death in infants and new mothers following birth, ostensibly due 
to this lack of oversight (1925, p. 58).   The circular reasoning here is of note.  Unlicensed 
midwives were undoubtedly the source of innumerable (literally unaccounted for, as opposed to 
a recorded epidemic of) infant deaths.  Under such conditions, regulation and licensing were the 
only logical solutions.  
  In general, his argument was that the population was not indisposed to accepting the 
services of doctors or modern medicine; instead, he viewed the lack of customary practice 
regarding regular doctor visits as more of a structural deficiency attributable to lack of state 
provided intervention and infrastructure (Safvet, 1925, p. 64).  Due to a lack of doctors providing 
medicine and consultation, Safvet argued that these villagers had been left to their own devices.  
He used the example of traveling doctors distributing medicines for treating syphilis and the 
decline in reliance on traditional and ineffective syphilis treatments (
e.g. ts
or incense) to 
argue that modern medicine had placed the countryÕs salvation from syphilis within the Òrealm of 
possibilityÓ (Safvet, 1925, p. 64).  His message was clear; if the state developed and supported 
these efforts and promoted them widely, the population would not only accept them, but desire 
them.  
In essence, there wasn't any local opposition to the states biopolitical gaze; unquestioning 
acceptance of expert medical authority was merely a matter of access.  
 In the closing of section three, entitled Òthe populationÕs bodily constitution,Ó Safvet 
provided a seemingly off-hand summation that served as the biopolitical motif of the entire text.  
!40 He briefly remarked:  Òwhile due to the hardships of war one may not encounter many who 
possess the physique of our fathers, those who possess strong bodies are not fewÓ (Safvet, 1925, 
p. 65).  It was the task of the state to ensure that this limited quantity of strong bodies would 
become many.
 !41 2.2b  Gendered governmental discourses in the 
Medical and Social Geographies
  To be sure, Safvet  expended great time and effort articulating the contaminated and 
irregular conditions of the villages of central Anatolia in and around the site of the young 
RepublicÕs new capital, Ankara, as they contributed to the enfeebling of the population.  In his 
volume of the MSG,
 dilapidated and in some instances non-existent sewers (
la
!õm
), the 
unplanned and irregular siting of cemeteries (
mezarlõk), 
an abundance of both naturally occurring 
wetlands and swamps (
bataklõk, sazlõk)
, as well as man-made reservoirs associated with rice 
cultivation (
“eltik tarlasõ
) are catalogued, described, and mapped in what might as well be called 
a compendium of diseased Anatolia. Each of these renderings bears the typical mantra of the 
early 20th century state, i.e. technological and scientific modernization as a means for Òhealing 
the land and the nationÓ (Sufian, 2008). 
    However, from the perspective of governmentality, such biopolitically oriented 
developmental imperatives enrolled and co-constituted ideal national bodies and spaces.  To 
facilitate this effort, clear distinctions between ÔhealthfulÕ and ÔdiseasedÕ environments, practices, 
and bodies needed to be detected, diagnosed, diagrammed and charted, treated or cured, 
legislated, demonstrated, learned and adopted, and replicated.  While the general population was 
called to task for the detrimental consequences of their ignorance to the health of the national 
population and its environment, women were especially targeted by the modern medical-sanitary 
gaze of the state.  The female Ôbody-in-spaceÕ has frequently been a focus of said governmental 
gaze, particular with respect to the production of what could best be described as sanitary 
citizenship, i.e. the promotion of 
a national body for 
the
 national body.  In the case of the MSG
, !42 the female body-in-space was drawn upon for illustrative and educational purposes.  For 
example, the connections drawn between (female) prostitution and the infiltration and diffusion 
of the ÔforeignÕ intruder syphilis were especially prominent and have recently been attended to in 
critical detail both with respect to central Anatolia
 (Evered, E.– and Evered, K.T., 2013; 2011; 
Evered, K.T. and Evered, E. –., 2012a; 2012b; 2011
) as well in the former imperial capital of 
Istanbul (Wyers, 2012). 
 Yet this gendered trope was not exclusively applied to the example of syphilis and in fact 
reveals a wider, complex, and interwoven relationship between female bodies, public and private 
spaces, and the governmental imperatives of the Turkish state pertaining to health and sanitation 
that remain powerfully relevant today.  Women, typically in their traditionally demarcated 
domestic spaces, were frequently singled out in Dr. Muslihiddin (Safvet)Õs depictions of the 
unsanitary conditions of Anatolia.  For example, it was women who were misusing the public 
fountains (“e
"
me) by washing laundry and allowing their filthy children to wallow in the waters, 
ignorantly and needlessly exposing the entire population of a village to the scourges of cholera, 
typhoid, and typhus.   
  For Dr. Muslihiddin (Safvet), merely one example of an expanding contingent of public 
figures who straddled the boundaries between professional medicine and legislation, women 
were an important, perhaps the most important, facet to the success of the modern Turkish state.    
However it was clear even in the preliminary works of the 
Geographies
 that not all women 
would fit this requirement and only those willing and able to subject themselves fully to re-
education and professionalization would be of use.  Dr. Muslihiddin only began to elaborate 
upon this in the final sections of his publication, i.e. the themes of health, domestic space, and 
!43 women as sanitary citizens or warriors in the various ÔstrugglesÕ and ÔwarsÕ that the Turkish state 
was launching, both against infectious diseases as well as unhygienic behaviors, e.g. the so-
called ÒStruggle with TuberculosisÓ (
veremle madele)
 later renamed as ÒThe Defense Against 
TuberculosisÓ (
vereme kar
#
õ maa
) and later the ÒTuberculosis WarÓ (
verem sava
#
õ) as well as 
campaigns for the protection of the nationÕs youth (
“ocuk korumasõ/esirgemesi) 
which frequently 
focused on topics like midwife practices, breastfeeding, and child-rearing
  The fifth section of the 
Medical and Social Geographies
 is dedicated to the identification 
of disease threats and their distribution across the region.  The power of this section is in its 
ability to reinforce a widespread geographical imaginary of illness, malnutrition, and bodily 
deficiency throughout Anatolia and to set the stage for intervention, reclamation, and re-
education.  The introductory portion of the fifth section is matter-of-fact, opening with a 
reference to the widespread existence of parasite oriented skin infections (
 cereb
), and 
intestinal problems (
didan-i emÕa
), tapeworms (
tenya askarid
), as well as femoral hernias (
fõtõk ma
!beniye
).    The author attributed these destructive ailments to a dramatic reduction in the availability 
of inexpensive soap during the course of World War I and the Struggle for Independence that 
followed.  Additionally, he noted that the digestive tract parasites were likely attributable to the 
consumption of raw vegetables irrigated by waters contaminated with sewage due to the 
previously mentioned lack of adequate sewer infrastructure, as well as the washing of fruits and 
vegetables with contaminated water.  Trachoma and acute swelling around the eyes are also 
reportedly encountered in most villages (Safvet, 1925, p. 90).  Although not explicit, the 
!44 attention paid to improperly carried out domestic chores as a likely source of contamination is 
apparent.  
  After a brief explanation of seasonal illnesses like the common cold (
zam
) and 
pneumonia (
zat-rie
), extensive sections pertaining to the incidence of syphilis (
frengi
) and 
malaria (
sitma) were included.  Evered and Evered have provided detailed discussions of both 
syphilis and malaria and with respect to the later have also noted the way in which the disease 
was framed by practitioners tasked with carrying out the work of the MHSA and how this 
framing emphasized syphilis as a national threat best controlled via the legislation of female 
bodies, regulated prostitution, and the enforcement of pre-marital health exams for both males 
and females (Evered, E.–. & Evered, K.T., 2013; Evered, K.T. & Evered, E.–., 2012b).  The 
rhetorical style of this portion of section five steered noticeably more toward the dramatic and 
poetic than compared with what preceded it:
    Due to a lack of medical examinations of prostitutes coming to Ankara as a result of its 
relationship with other big cities like 
"stanbul, Bursa, and 
"zmir, our youth and by extension the 
core of our society has been gnawed away at (p. 90)
.  As demonstrated by Wyers (2012), prostitution was not necessarily deemed at fault for 
the rampant diffusion of this Òsociety gnawingÓ disease; rather, it was considered a necessary 
evil or safety valve for the preservation of virtuous women and maintenance of virtuous spaces 
from the baser (yet apparently uncontrollable either biologically or legally) sexual proclivities of 
males.  It was unregulated prostitution, or prostitution lacking oversight by a governmental 
!45 ÔPeeping Tom,Õ that was the true threat to the well-being of the population.  As long as prostitutes 
were licensed and registered, and as long as all men and women received a thorough medical 
examination prior to marriage, then the disease could be considered controllable.  These were 
massive regulatory steps in the opening up of the body to governmental discipline.  While the 
socio-economic conditions that preclude prostitution are alluded to, in reference to women who 
were thrown into poverty as a result of wartime, little is said about the possibility of promoting 
programs for government assistance from this perspective. Finally, the increasing social 
stigmatization of syphilis in this era was mentioned by Dr. Muslihiddin as it pertained to the 
reluctance of individuals of higher social standing to seek examination or treatment.   
 Beyond the national threats posed by syphilis and malaria in Anatolia was that of 
tuberculosis (
verem
), the third of four Òvicious monstersÓ that were poised to undo the health and 
stability of the Turkish nation (these monsters included syphilis, gonorrhea, tuberculosis, and 
malaria; Galip, 1929).  According to Dr. Muslihiddin, the burden of tuberculosis was moderate in 
and around Ankara, however co-morbidity with malaria increased the prevalence of the disease 
in areas dominated by both natural and man-made wetlands on the one hand, while on the other 
hand the diseaseÕs relatively recent socio-economic contributing factors were also acknowledged;  
that
 is, Òphysiological weakness is increasing due to poverty and depravationÓ (Safvet, 1925, p. 
103).  In addition, he criticized certain morally ambiguous social behaviors such as alcoholism 
and public spitting as contributing factors to the spread of the disease and argued for their 
inclusion as objects of intensive public awareness campaigns.   
 However, it is in the domestic sphere where the intolerable spread of the disease was 
considered most reprehensible and entirely preventable.  Streets and public spaces were 
!46 characterized generally as sites of rampant and uncontrollable contagion due to a plethora of 
spitting, coughing villagers who Òimpelled by ignoranceÓ (
saik-õ cehaletle)
 splatter phlegm and 
and bacilli 
as they go about their daily activities:   
   As they lack knowledge for protecting themselves against tuberculosis, villagers and 
some urban dwellers have exacerbated the contagion.  The tubercular do not see the harm in 
splattering their phlegm everywhere.  The tendency of the bacillus to remain in the home 
and perpetuate amongst other members of the family is dependent upon those inflicted who, after 
wrapping their sputum in a rag, toss them here and there throughout the home (Safvet, 103). 
 While not explicitly referenced here, in many of the public health brochures and 
instructional pamphlets that the state will produce in line with recommendations made by 
practitioners like Dr. Muslihiddin (Safvet), clear gendered distinctions are made between 
particular types of behaviors that contribute to infection and diffusion of tuberculosis in different 
spaces.  The public spheres remain generally unregulated aside from suggestions such as the 
carrying of personal spittoons and the call for increased ventilation and open space construction 
(open air schools for example).  Much of the onus of prevention is centered on the domestic 
space and, by an extension of the prevailing logic, over the behavior of women.  Men and 
women are both shown to have particular roles to play in the stateÕs burgeoning struggle with 
tuberculosis.  However, when it comes to the population demarcated by the state as most 
valuable, i.e. children, women as front line warriors were of the utmost importance; that is, so 
long as they are able to conform to the new sanitary regime. 
!47  The sixth and final portion of the MSGA is a demographic analysis of the province, 
emphasizing primarily births and deaths but also including information on marriage and divorce.  
Dr. Muslihiddin (Safvet) critiqued the population bureau of the prior Ottoman regime for keeping 
incomplete and erroneous records of the demographic characteristics of Ankara and its 
surroundings.  For example, according to his accounting, infant births and deaths that were 
tallied lacked ÒcredibilityÓ and were overall ÒdeficientÓ as they were self-reported by locals 
lacking the oversight of government officials or officially registered doctors and midwives.  The 
MHSAÕs first year of recorded monthly births is included as a chart, however Dr. Muslihiddin 
(Safvet) complained that these population figures were likely quite low. He argued that, due to a 
lack of legal force to back up census taking  as carried out by professionals, any biopolitical 
statistics that are gathered would remain highly suspect and relatively useless:
    If everyone were obliged to regularly report births on a day-to-day basis and if non-
compliers had been dealt with via legal proceedings, a solid statistical arrangement might have 
been possible.  Instead, the sole outcomes of this are as follows: parents of these children, local 
imams, and mukhtars that fail to report statistics regarding infant birth and death in a timely 
fashion remain unpunished,  research and analysis as to why monthly population decline is 
progressing (in this category) as compared with the population of the general public is left 
undone, necessary precautions to stem this decline are not designed and implemented, and civil 
servants, especially census officials, with the knowledge and authority to draft population charts 
are in short supply when needed
 (p. 54). !48  With respect to the stateÕs biopolitical imperatives, Turkey was not unique in its efforts to 
emphasize demographic capacities and deficiencies, as similar patterns of intense government-
sponsored investigation and legislation of population dynamics were attendant features of newly 
modernizing states throughout the 19th and early 20th century, especially when the targeted 
population was children (Schafer, 1997). In addition, while the statistical analysis of population 
is not unique to any single governmental form, it is especially salient in countries with 
characteristically authoritarian governmental systems (Ipsen, 1996).  
  Statistical analysis, a relatively new form of governmental control in the early twentieth 
century, was increasingly deployed as a means of communicating and condensing complex 
bodies of information about populations in the field, frequently in visual form, as a means for 
conveying simplistic and clear descriptions of and solutions to assorted problems of governance 
back to the metropole (Hannah, 2000; Scott, 1998).  Several such tables and figures are included 
in the 
Medical and Social Geographies
, as Evered and Evered have demonstrated, largely due to 
an increased interest in the ethnographic and infographic methods of French sociologist Fr”d”ric 
Le Play (Evered, E.–. & Evered, K.T., 2013; Evered, K.T. & Evered, E.–., 2012b); however 
from an immediately practical standpoint, these graphics were deemed essential instructional 
tools for initiating the Ògreat tasksÓ of public health and population decline (Safvet, 105).  These 
instructional tools, as well as the physician/ethnographerÕs own depictions of health and wellness 
in the village, clearly indicate which culprits are some of the most dangerous to the health and 
well being of the new republic; diseased and negligent, ÒignorantÓ women engaging in tasks that 
should be set aside solely as professionalized medical spaces (Safvet, 106).     
 Dr. MuslihiddinÕs passion and disgust are evident in these final sections pertaining almost 
!49 exclusively to problems associated with midwives (
ebelik, kabile
) and nursing via bottles (
irz›Õ-i 
sõn›flÕ or Ô
articial breastfeeding
Õ) or from contaminated sources:   
   Throughout the course of 40 pregnancies, local, ignorant midwives who see fit to deploy 
superstitious methods upon mothers and infants have exacerbated these circumstances as they 
lack the knowledge to raise children and have caused an increase in infant mortality (p. 106). 
  He goes on, stating that it seemed appropriate to provide, in detail, an account of the 
shocking and disturbing predicament of the nationÕs children in Anatolia, at the hands of their 
caretakers: 
   The death of children under the age of seven (sinn-i tufuliyyette vefeyat, literally deaths in 
children at the age of losing their baby teeth, approximately designated as seven) is in a 
staggering condition.  It is necessary that this matter of the utmost importance be prevented, or 
else the day-to-day decline of the general population is assured.  Beginning from infancy, let us 
investigate at what age and under which circumstances child mortality increases 
(p. 106).  Here, a more detailed investigation of the spatial and temporal (seasonal) variations of 
infant mortality was called for as mortality rates were not very consistent throughout the 
formative years of a nursing child (Safvet, 106).  Numerous examples were provided of what 
was generally seen as the detrimental effects of ÒignorantÓ as opposed to rational or scientific 
motherhood.  For example, during the summer:  
!50  Despite a cornucopia of available fresh produce, ignorant mothers who lack knowledge 
of proper childrenÕs nutrition, health and hygiene provide poor quality foodstuffs to their 
offspring by feeding them adulterated produce without considering the appropriateness of this 
action and, as a result, induce diarrhea.  A natural outcome of this is the malnutrition of the 
general population and the appearance of rickets in the majority of children (106).  In short, due 
to a lack of knowledge of proper child rearing, the highest number of child deaths are as a result 
of diarrhea (p. 106).    
 Once again, a chain of rhetorical logical is built that connects constructions of ignorance 
and motherhood with observations of illness and malnutrition in a segment of the population and 
articulates this as a general deficiency of society overall, i.e. a national threat constructed from 
improper bodily regimes; in this case the improper behavior is not merely perpetrated against 
oneÕs self but on oneÕs helpless offspring idealized as the future of a nation.  The advanced 
presence of bacterial food-borne illnesses were seen unequivocally as a function of negligent and 
uneducated childrearing behaviors whereas any reflection on the larger socio-economic 
conditions of this region (which at least received passing mention in prior sections) due to the 
destruction and depravation wrought by wartime remained wholly absent.   More specifically, 
while the provision of ÔadulteratedÕ fruits was seen as the main culprit in the epidemic wave of 
diarrhea in children, the source of this adulteration was left to the speculation of the reader.  
While it was perhaps attributable to the same contaminated water sources mentioned previously, 
it was unclear based off of the analysis provided in this report as to whether or not the fruits were 
!51 contaminated in production or after harvest via washing.  Regardless, Dr. Muslihiddin 
emphasized that although a decline in infant mortality rates is typically observed after age one, 
this single misdeed likely resulted in the prolongation of high rates of infant mortality in Turkey 
beyond the first yea
r of life.   
 It is interesting to note that fault is not only found with mothers of lower socio-economic 
standing as reported in the 
Medical and Social Geographies.  
After his anecdotal example of 
food-borne diarrhea, Dr. Muslihiddin shifted the focus to bottle feeding (
sõn›fl õrz›Õ), 
which is 
described as a primary cause of the formation of an array of childhood diseases.  
  According to 
his report, children nursed via bottle and formula are at risk of malnutrition, food-poisoning, and 
other assorted ailments of the stomach and intestines.
  Motherhood is cast as a site of regulatory 
guidance and proper education, as untold evils are scattered throughout the slovenly spaces of 
the mother who has shirked her domestic responsibilities: 
 Later on, when they began to crawl or to take their first steps, children place untold dirty 
objects that they find in their mouths and contract infectious and non-infectious diseases.  For 
want of a few minutes of comfort, these mothers are severely punished due to their neglect by 
way of the fevers experienced by their children (p. 108). 
 !52 2.3  Governing healthful domestic spaces as healthful national spaces 
 In statements that approach a biblical tenor, the micro-spatial discourses of the 
Medical 
and Social Geographies 
have rendered domestic space, essentialized as womenÕs or maternal 
space, as a site of ever-present harm for children via the twin scourges of disease and neglect.  
While there is no malice attributed to the actions of these women through the environment they 
provide their children, the neglect of mothers and midwives is passively yet perhaps more 
powerfully conceived as simply a lack of knowledge regarding proper and scientific methods of 
childcare and domestic sanitation.  This contrasts sharply with the commonly held yet competing 
narrative of motherhood as a genetically encoded trait, as well as historical treatments of 
midwifery and wet-nursing as essential and noble functions of Islamic society (Giladi, 2010).  
The mother who is not constantly vigilant over 
her domestic dominion leaves her family and by 
extension the nation open to calamity. 
 After briefly chronicling a series of other medical conditions that threaten children upon 
their entrance into school (scoliosis, chronic headaches, poor appetite, insomnia, nervous 
breakdowns, palpitations, huntingtonÕs disease, nervous tics, and variable outbreaks of 
tuberculosis, Dr. Muslihiddin outlined a series of preventative measures necessary to limit 
morbidity and mortality in children from birth through adolescence and to best provide for their 
future health and well-being:  
  1.  
Infants are exposed to various harmful disease-causing bacteria during birth.  The 
motherÕs exposure to injury or illness impedes a childÕs access to breast milk.  Therefore, as it is 
!53 crucial that mothers be carefully attended to in the struggle with infant disease, only care 
provided by a licensed midwife is acceptable.   
   2.  Incidence of bacterial infections in infants should be kept to a minimum.  In newborn 
children, the first pathway to infection is via the umbilical cord (sre).  Therefore, precautions 
in the cutting of the umbilical cord are mandatory preventative conditions,
 as tetanus (kazõklõ 
humma) and other infections (kih-i mikroblar) are contractable during this time.   
   3.  The newborn child is especially susceptible to bacterial exposure via the mouth, nose, 
and respiratory system (cõhaz-i teneff).  For example, diseases like pertussis (bo
!maca 
ıks
!ptheria (ku
#
 palazõ), scarlet fever (kõzõl), measles (kõzamõk), and smallpox (“i“ek) 
are contracted this way.  These diseases are especially perilous for underweight and 
malnourished children.  It is essential to isolate such children as they are quickly able to spread 
their infection to others in their surroundings.  It is not permissable that men with runny noses 
and coughs kiss their children.  Following the onset of such diseases (hummeyat-i indifaiyye) in 
families with several children, the immediate quarantine of the exposed child and their clothing 
is necessary.  Mothers and nurses attending to such sick children should have any contact with 
healthy children.  
  Yet allow me to present here a contrary plea that stems from a deficiency in the desired 
result of home quarantine.  Siblings of the child that has contracted an infectious disease are 
immediately sent to neighbors or relatives during the period of quarantine.  However, i wonder if 
the disease remains in a latent state (devr-i tefrih) in these children?  It can be assumed a doctor 
!54 has not been consulted.  Here in the home where the child with the latent infection has gone, the 
disease suddenly flares up and a second center of diffusion (ikinci bir mihrak-i siraye) has 
emerged.  In this way, a disease that emerged from one point develops into numerous centers of 
diffusion in various neighborhoods and causes rapid spread of infection that increases child 
mortality rates.  Therefore, sending the siblings of a sick child to separate homes for a one-
month period of isolation or going to visit the sick are not appropriate techniques.  However, 
quarantine in oneÕs own home, with the conditions of providing proper sanitation, and securing 
the consent of a doctor in accordance with law at the onset of disease in a final location may be 
authorized.  
 4.  Due to the
 motherÕs capacity to transmit syphilis and tuberculosis via milk they should be 
subjected to examination.   
5.  It has been established that infant mortality is higher in children  exposed to nursing via 
bottle feeding (õrz›Õ-i sõn›fl).  In detrimental conditions such as when the mother isnÕt 
knowledgeable of when or how much milk to provide or due to a scarceness in the motherÕs 
supply of milk, attempted compensation of said deficiency by means of supplementary nutrition 
in fact exacerbates infant mortality.  Moreover, if we include nursing mothers who are forced to 
work outside the home in order to provide for daily sustenance, in this state there is no doubt that 
the proportion of infant deaths will increase due to the large hindrance this places on a motherÕs 
ability to carefully attend to and monitor her children.  In short, due to the inclusion of social 
poverty which causes the unraveling of the relationship between husband and wife, the negative 
!55 effect on the health of children in this condition is self-evident (vareste-i arz ve izah or 
Òunencumbered by presentation or explanation
Ó).  With respect to the struggle with these 
conditions there are two tasks at hand, one of which pertains to doctors and the other to 
government:   
1. The task at hand for doctors is to propagandize as well as explain the preferred and more 
effective method of breastfeeding as opposed to bottle feeding 
at conferences, to the press, and to 
midwives and apprentices;  
2. The task at hand for government is the establishment of dairies and their maintenance and 
safeguarding for providing clean, disease-free, and cheap
 animal milk as needed for bottle 
feeding.   
6.  Attention should be paid to quality nutrition for the conservation and protection of the bodies 
of mothers.  In order to achieve this, assistance needs to be provided to impoverished families 
and for the provision of temporary care and nutrition in quality establishments for children of 
mothers who are incapable of feeding them. 
As the motherÕs compassion may keep her from 
sending her children to such establishments, daily check-ups and breast feedings should be 
permitted [by said establishments].   
7.  Social assistance for children should be increased.  A high birth rate alone is not sufficient to 
increase population:  however, researching ways to start children who are born  off on the right 
!56 track is necessary for population increase.  In the past, while the task of providing for the 
protection of women and children has been attempted by religious and private social welfare 
associations, due to a lack of official governmental services infant mortality has not been 
prevented.  The only solution is to be found in the protection and safeguarding of children under 
the auspices of the government and for this purpose a ÒSociety for the Protection of ChildrenÓ or 
a ÒSociety for the Protection of Children Public DirectoryÓ housed within the Ministry for 
Health and Social Assistance is to be established alongside the assigning of specialist doctors to 
each establishment.  These official departments should open free birth clinics throughout the 
country, allocate the largest sources of financial assistance to birth, and take custody of children 
and provide them protection.  These types of organizations should be brought into being in 
whichever provinces, villages, and districts it is possible.  In these circumstances, the assistance 
of humanitarian organizations like the ÒProtection of ChildrenÓ may be deemed influential.  
  In short, this official body will provide for the protection of children from prior to birth 
until adolescence in accordance with its capabilities and will also take great care in making 
allocations to schools and ensuring the education and proper upbringing of these children.  
Done properly, the declining population of our nationÕs youth will be prevented and the 
beneficial outcome of this for the future of our country will be realized (Safvet, p. 109-111).
  In the articles translated above, essentially the closing suggestions offered by Dr. 
Muslihiddin (Safvet) with respect to the much fretted Òpopulation issueÓ (
us meselesi
) faced 
by the new republic in the post-war years, several connections were drawn between disease, the 
!57 role of women, the protection of children, and the governmentÕs stake in the preservation of the 
national body.  As is to be expected, the bacteriological transition reigned supreme in the 
medicalizing of the macro and micro spaces of the state with extra emphasis placed on the need 
for the stateÕs increasingly drastic intervention in the previously quite personal activities of birth 
and child-rearing.  While only brief outlines, these 7 statements highlight the dominant fronts 
that were being promoted in the twin struggles with disease and depopulation:  children's 
and 
female bodies (both physical and in terms of forms or structures of knowledge and practice).   
  Women in Turkey were dissected like medical cadavers, and attention was paid to their 
constituent beneficial and detrimental components.  On the one hand, the
 body of the woman was 
highly valorized as an object of preservation and state intervention; however, this valorization 
was simultaneously tied to its framing as a vessel for birth.  At the same time, the spaces women 
occupy, both physically and cognitively (i.e. the domestic space and domestic habits) were 
scrutinized and heavily criticized beneath the physicianÕs microscope.  Disease in the home was 
essentially rendered a failure of women, whether mother or midwife.  Once problematized as 
such, the doors of these domestic abodes were thrown open, albeit gradually, for state 
observation, intervention, 
and re-organization. 
 In this section, I also detailed
 how the second stage of governmentality, i.e. normative 
judgement, is discursively deployed as a means for realizing the regulatory third stage.  Just as 
the fledgling Turkish state would adopt a militaristic and paternalistic stance toward an 
assortment of national struggles and wars with disease (trachoma, syphilis, malaria, tuberculosis, 
etc), a domestic and maternal narrative was also being cultivated toward the population.  
Children were reframed, not as offspring or even individuals themselves, but as a collective 
!58 national future or resource and as such a worthwhile objective of governmentality.  This 
preservation was largely predicated on a set of specifications that fixed particular spaces of 
regulation (the home, the school) and dictated particular subject positions ( scientific and 
professional motherhood and midwifery). 
 This emphasis on the discursive stylings of the 
Medical and Social Geographies
 should 
not be read as an attempt to downplay the importance of advancements in health and medicine in 
relation to the well-being of state populations and concerns about the social and territorial 
integrity of newly developing state formations; instead, following a long line of governmentality 
studies, this particular approach is 
meant to highlight the formation of said discourses in relation 
to newly popularized medical technologies and terminologies and assess how particular 
populations (i.e. women and children) were especially important and/or vulnerable to the 
creation and deployment of these discourses.   
 In the chapters that follow, similar discursive formations will be examined as they 
emerged from arguably one of the most important medico-bureaucrats of the early republican 
era, Dr. Besim –mer.  In particular, Besim –merÕs status as the so-called 
Ògodfather of modern 
obstetricsÓ and his emphasis on social factors such as marriage and Òscientific motherhoodÓ 
reveal quite a lot about the mentalities of government in the early Republic with respect to the 
Òproblem of populationÓ and the protection of children as vital resources for the health and well-
being of the nation.  
!59 APPENDIX
!60!61Figure 1: 
Graph of Birth and Death Rates in Ankara Province, 1923
. From the 
Medical and Social Geographies 
(Safvet, 1341
/1925, p. 129). Graphic depicting births and deaths in the in Ankara Province in the year 1923.  In 
each column, which is arranged horizontally along the x-axis from left to right by 
month, births are depicted on the left and deaths on the right.  The highest number 
of births indicated occurred in January (466) and the highest number of deaths 
occurred in February 383.  Notice that deaths also surpass births in February and 
March.  Dr. Safvet attributed this to the confluence of illnesses during the early 
spring months.
!62Figure 2:  
Map of Malarial Areas Around 
the Borough of Keskin
. From 
The Medical 
and Social Geographies 
(Safvet, 1341
/1925, p. 131). A map depicting malarial areas in the town 
of Keskin to the southeast of Ankara. The 
town of Kalecik is in the north and Bala is to 
the west. Swamps (bataklik) are indicated 
areas with a grid pattern overlay and Keskin 
is indicated by the ÔbullseyeÕ symbol.
!63Figure 3:  
Map of Malarial Areas Around the Borough of Aya
!. From 
The Medical and Social Geographies 
(Safvet, 1341
/1925, p. 142).!64Figure 4:  
Map of Malarial Areas Around the Central Borough of Ankara.
 From 
The 
Medical and Social Geographies 
(Safvet,1341
/1925, p. 139). A map depicting malarial areas in and around central Ankara. The town of Haymana is to the 
southwest and Bala is to the southeast. Swamps (bataklik) are indicated areas with a grid 
pattern overlay and Aya
"
 is 
indicated by the bullseye. 
!65Figure 5:  
Biopolitical Chart. 
From 
The Medical and Social Geographies 
(Safvet, 1341
/1925, p. 120). The chart depicts birth, marriage, divorce, and death statistics by month and by 
gender in Ankara.
!66Figure 6:  
Tuberculosis and Children. 
Cover to 
Tuberculosis is 
Preventable 
(1953, authorÕs collection). 
 Typical medical brochure released by the Turkish Ministry for 
Health and Social Assistance with support from the United States 
via the Marshall Plan. 
!67Figure 8:  
Child in the Dirt. 
From 
Tuberculosis is Preventable 
(1953, authorÕs collection).   
ÒIf we do not bury objects contaminated 
by microbes deep in the ground, this child 
here will dredge them up and soil her 
hands; afterwards, the child may place her 
dirty hands in her mouth and become 
illÓ (p. 14). Figure 7:  
Child with Contaminated 
Hands. 
From 
Tuberculosis is Preventable 
(1953, authorÕs collection).   
ÒThis child is placing his hands in area 
contaminated by microbes.  If he puts his 
hands in his mouth he may become 
infected.Ó  
One should take note of the 
adult figures standing negligently behind 
the child in many of these images (p. 35). 
!68Figure 9:  
Spreading Tuberculosis from the Elderly to the Young.
  From 
Tuberculosis is Preventable 
(1953, authorÕs collection).
  Tuberculosis that may not be apparent in the elderly can easily be 
spread to children 
(p. 19).  A cautionary note for mothers to be ever 
vigilant, even around elders in the family. 
!69Figure 10.  
Contaminating the Home.  
From 
Tuberculosis is 
Preventable 
(1953, authorÕs collection).  
The hearth of the home invaded by tuberculosis is quickly 
extinguished
 (p. 17). This vivid imagery highlights the emphasis 
placed on the preservation and defense of the domestic space from 
contagious disease and contamination.
!70Figure 11:  
Danger in the Domestic Space. 
From 
Tuberculosis is 
Preventable 
(1953, authorÕs collection).   
If there are microbes in the dust drawn up from the floor, they may fill the 
nose and mouth.  Tuberculosis is contracted in such a fashion 
(p. 48). An 
image that evokes a dominate state sponsored narrative which genders the 
spread of disease and designates the domestic space as a primary site of 
contamination.
!71Figure 12:  
Fighting a National Scourge. 
Cover to 
Tuberculosis in Children 
(1933, authorÕs collection). 
This image symbolically h
ighlights the heightened anxiety 
regarding the threat that contagious diseases like tuberculosis 
posed to the children and thus the future of the nation.  In other 
versions of this image, Ataturk replaces the muscled man 
rescuing the child.  
!72Figure 13:  
Tuberculosis is the Enemy of Man
.  From 
Turkish National Institute for the Campaign Against 
Tuberculosis 
(1948, authorÕs collection).
 There is no mercy for tuberculosis, continue the fightÉ 
Typical propaganda poster in the war against tuberculosis 
(verem).  
The standard spatial and gendered modes of 
contraction and precautionary methods are also highly visible 
in this image.
 Chapter 3 
A shriek in the wasteland:   
governmental narratives of gender, nation, health and place in the 
novels of Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu
 3.1  Geography, literature, and governmentality  
 While a detailed explanation of FoucaultÕs transition from discipline(s) to biopolitics and 
governmentality along with a discussion of the spatial emphasis and geographic deployment of 
these concepts beginning roughly in the 1990s was provided in the opening chapter, I will briefly 
extend this discussion of governmentality and biopolitics by considering a few key insights from 
the relationship between geography and literature as well.  This section facilitates the focused 
critical reading of two seemingly different yet similarly configured texts that reveal the 
production of governmental objects, i.e. the previously assessed 
Medical and Social Geographies 
of Ankara
 by Muslihiddin Safvet and the medical texts of Dr. Besim –mer (Akalõn) with the 
novels 
Yaban 
and
 Ankara
 by Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu
.  As described in the literature review, geographers have taken an increasing interest in 
FoucaultÕs work due to the spatial implications of governmentality and biopolitics.  More 
specifically, for political, cultural, and historical geographers interested in the historical 
constitution of state formations and management of populations, Òby weaving the problematic of 
governmentality into a 
geo-historically specific tale
 (my emphasis), it is possible to give real 
analytical bite to the superficially obvious claim that state formation must be inherently 
geographicalÓ (Hannah, 2000, p. 2).  I have emphasized the phrase 
geo-historically specific
 tale 
"73in order to call attention to the bipolitical imperatives present in various texts produced by the 
young Turkish Republic as a means for establishing the health, hygiene, and sanitation of rural 
populations as objects of government central to the well-being and longevity of the nation.  
While statistical reports and state-sponsored propaganda were frequently utilized as part of this 
effort, I argue that other types of texts (novels for example) were similarly engaged in the 
narrative construction and reproduction of governmentality. 
 Whether ÔscientificÕ or Ôliterary,Õ despite superficial differences in style, these 
governmental modalities frequently produced parallel and generally complementary narratives, 
especially with respect to certain governmental objects (e.g., infant morality, nursing and child 
care, unregulated midwives, etc).  While the linkage between governmentality and literature from 
the perspective of a geographic study is of primary importance here, it is of use to first consider 
some of the other influential ways that literature and geography have interacted. 
"743.1a  Geographic perspectives on critical deployments of literature 
 Upon reflecting on the topography of a map of North America, Laura Dassow Walls 
ruminated, as numerous critical cartographic theorists before her have done (Harley, 2002; 
Pickles, 2004; Wood, 1992) on the seemingly self evident spaces of the map.  With a bit of 
historical knowledge about the discipline of cartography (and, in fact, very little subterfuge or 
obfuscation), the map simultaneously calls to mind its own spatial elisions.  Drawing on 
Alexander Von HumboldtÕs claim that both languages and landforms must acknowledge that 
Òtheir form is their historyÓ, Walls noted that both the represented and real landscapes are in 
constant flux, Òin a reciprocal and unfolding dynamic with no traces of a beginning and no end in 
sightÓ (Walls, 2011, p. 860). 
 For the cultural and historical geographer, these statements are neither controversial nor 
novel.  Walls has advocated for, alongside fellow postmodern spatial theorists Henri Lefebvre, 
David Harvey, Doreen Massey, and Edward Soja, an Òinterpretative significance of spaceÓ that 
functions as an active rather than passive constituent of the social;  a concept widely accepted 
within the discipline and which traces its lineage back to some of the earliest proponents of 
critical cultural geography (Walls, 2011, p. 861).   That being said, Walls has drawn attention to a 
relatively under-utilized and perhaps thinly theorized aspect of the dialectic between spatial 
reality and representation:  the role of literature within geography and the spatial implications of 
text (not to be confused with, yet not entirely distinct from, the reading of landscape AS text) 
(Cosgrove and Daniels, 1988).     
"75 This collection of scholars with diverse interests coming from within and outside of 
geography have attempted to fully explore the hyphenated fusing of 
geo-
 and -
graphy
 as perceived, conceived, and lived space.  In this section, I outline a few of the central arguments 
that have emerged in the liminal space between literature and geography, beginning with some 
more traditional uses within regional and humanistic geography as well as post-colonial/
postmodern critiques of literature in geography, and then consider new engagements with the 
spatio-literary interface; many of which have emerged from outside of the discipline of 
geography itself, i.e. eco-criticism and geo-criticism.  I conclude by considering the implications 
of considering literatures of governmentality in an historical geographic context.  
 While this section initially focuses on the traditional uses of literature within geography 
and addresses primary critiques of these approaches, I also call attention to instances in which 
more nuanced readings of the spatial within literary studies are required.  In addition, I draw 
attention to one of the more detailed and engaging uses of literary sources, George HendersonÕs 
California and the Fictions of Capital 
(2003), by highlighting the ways in which this work 
addresses several of the fundamental critiques discussed.   
"763.1b  Uses of literature in humanist and regional geography 
 Due in large part to a stated goal of promoting the imaginative capacities of the human 
being and associative efforts to transform abstract space into Òintensely human place,Ó (Tuan, 
1976, p. 269) regional and especially humanistic geographers have been the pr
imary users of 
literary sources within geography.  It should be noted that a significant portion of critique 
regarding the use of literary sources by geographers has come from humanistic geographers 
themselves.  For example, J. Douglas Porteous argued that humanistic geographers have almost 
universally relied on a limited subset of literary forms and specific genres. The novel has 
dominated geographic inquiry of fictive forms, while poetry, song lyrics, and plays have 
typically received less attention (1985, p. 117); this is despite the fact that several classic works 
in related fields like history have devoted considerable attentional to (albeit primarily 
environmental) depictions of place (Grove, 1995; Marx, L., 2000). 
 Through a simplistic yet informative schema (see figure 1), Porteous demonstrated that 
the vast majority of literary engagements in geography have promoted particular genres of novel, 
specifically those he described as being invested in promoting a Òsense of placeÓ in typically 
rural settings.  Other spatially destabilizing themes, including exile, ÒentrapmentÓ (the insider 
feeling out of place at home) and most surprisingly considering the discipline, ÒtravellerÓ 
narratives (a person coming to terms with their own identity in a distant or foreign land) have 
received considerably less attention (Porteous, 1985, p.119).  One of the greatest limitations of 
this schema is its own displacement of complex socio-spatial interactions within the novel into a 
"77limited subset of categories.  I will provide a brief example of this in section two by applying his 
schema to the multiple spaces and identities inhabited by Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu in 
Yaban.   
Table 1:  
PorteousÕ Narrative Schema
  More recent critical approaches have addressed the role of literary form as a means for 
reading into underlying structures of power and knowledges in particular times and specific 
locations.  While each approach has been revelatory, their limitations are illustrative of a larger 
gulf between the deployment of other textual and non-textual materials within cultural and 
historical geography.  Maps, for example, have been critically evaluated from multiple sites and 
modes (production, consumption, distribution, etc) and have been treated as textual landscapes, 
pseudo-scientific artifacts, immutable mobiles, and discourses of power (Dodge, et al., 2009).  
Other written, non-scientific sources, have received considerably less attention in geography; this 
is especially true when it comes to fictional texts.   
 Examining the prior foci of the nexus between literature and geography, i.e. regional, 
humanistic, and cultural geography, Joanne Sharp outlined the essential shortcomings of each 
approach.  With respect to the humanistic and regional deployment of literary narrative, Sharp 
noted that: 
INSIDER
OUTSIDER
HOME
Òsense of place,Ó typically rural
entrapment, isolation
AWAY
traveller, ÒÞnding oneselfÓ
exile, journey, yearning, often 
urban
"78 to many geographers, it seems that the expression of literary writers is pure and natural 
(drawing from their ÔinnateÕ intuition, for example), just as 19th century intellectuals saw  non-
western indigenous peoples as presenting a model of living that was closer to nature and instinct, 
and unfettered by the expectations of Civilization.  The ability of literary authors to evoke the feel 
or essence of a place or situation is seen as being unfettered by the restrictions imposed by 
rigorous and structured modes of writing demanded by contemporary (social) science (Sharp, 
2000, p. 328).  Due to the seemingly unstructured nature of literary texts (which is arguably more of a 
disciplinary ignorance on the part of geographers than an actual facet of writing, which ignores 
literary theory and structures like genre, style, etc) Sharp is drawing attention to the treatment of 
these materials as pure or authentic articulations of place.  This justification is further 
problematized (adding additional layers of complexity to the real/represented binary) and 
reinforced by the simultaneous casting of scientific texts as ÒstructuredÓ observations.  Sharp 
draws on TuanÕs own critique, noting that literature is too often seen as a Òuniversal voiceÓ 
whereby the purpose of literature (broadly speaking) and the meaning of individual literary 
forms (like the novel) are supposedly known and mutually understood in advance (Sharp, 2000, 
p. 328).  This despite advances in feminist and post-colonial geographic approaches with respect 
to space, place, and the map, which call attention to the situated knowledges and partial 
perspectives inherent in any spatial representation/reality and the dialectic relationship that unites 
them.  
"79 Sharp noted that critical cultural geographers have made stronger theoretical arguments 
regarding the text as a Òcircuit of cultureÓ or discursive structure capable of producing and 
reproducing social forms (class, nation, gender).  Reading texts in this way reveals the 
production and dissemination of Òimagined geographies.Ó  However, she cautioned against 
deploying literature in such a way that ÒminesÓ the text for theoretical justifications.  Sharp also 
noted that, while some geographers have cherry-picked literary sources for useful place-
constructing narratives that reinforced their particular rendering or understanding of a landscape, 
critical geographic approaches that see the text as a Òcultural discourseÓ run the risk of simply 
using the text to promote a particular 
theoretical
 understanding of cultural space (Sharp, 2000, p. 
329).  As such, it isnÕt entirely clear as to what role Sharp envisions for literature in geography. 
 It seems that the primary concern is that literature not simply be seen as another Òsource 
of dataÓ but rather, to see literature as a means for questioning, subverting, and complicating 
Òconventional meaningÓ both in terms of the way that geographical concepts are deployed, but 
also through the way that individual pieces of literature themselves are constructed (Sharp, 2000, 
p. 329).  Put simply, the tools and styles of myriad literary forms (i.e. the ÒtextualÓ), not merely 
content (i.e.the ÒliteraryÓ), work in tandem to structure knowledge within and about space and 
place.  By only focusing on explicit geographical references within text, the multiple spatial 
modalities embedded within the paragraphs, lines, and stanzas of text are ignored (Saunders, 
2010, p. 437).  Literary texts should not simply be utilized to reinforce other depictions of place, 
as embellishments, decorations, or simply part of a 
triangulation
 of data sources popular in 
mixed methods approaches;  rather, the nature of the literary text allows an array of new spatial 
"80questions and standpoints to surface.  Instead of simply considering the spaces in the text, the 
spaces of the text are also drawn out.  
 As I will discuss, much of the groundwork for these new spatial understandings of 
literature have come from outside of geography (Saunders, 2010, p. 436).  For example, Sharp 
directed attention to the work of literary theorists like Umberto Eco and Roland Barthes.  Eco 
argued that a piece of literature is always ÒrepresentationalÓ and ÒincompleteÓ insofar as a work 
of fiction requires the reader(s) to make manifest the images described, always in reference to 
lived or experienced conditions.  Thus literary depictions are always hybrid forms constantly 
engaged in temporal and spatial Ôscale jumping.Õ  The rural novel morphs between local, 
national, and global sites which can only ever be manifested partially and which are immediately 
destabilized as soon as they come into being.  Barthes further complicated the author-text-reader-
reality relationship by noting that, in juxtaposition to claims about the impossibility of fully 
depicting reality, truly fictional places can never be created (Sharp, 2000, p. 330).  Fiction is 
always cast from the limited scope of comprehensibility of the author, from preexisting subsets 
of symbols and sign systems, and from the readerÕs preconceived notions of what the novel can 
and cannot do; all of which can be used in reference to ideas
 about ideas of place.  
 Cultural and historical geographers should pay attention to three critical geographic 
approaches to literary texts as they shift across space; the interaction of Òcritical 
readingÓ (considering the voice of the text or the way in which particular literary forms and 
devices are capable of evoking hybridized spaces), alongside the activities of writing (the spatial 
situation of the writer) and audience reception (interpretation and use).  Sharp demonstrated this 
method via Salman RushdieÕs 
The Satanic Verses (
Sharp, 2000, p. 331).
  Angharad Saunders 
"81expands these practices within what she refers to as Òtextual geographies.Ó  In addition to the 
points made above, spatial reflections on literature and literary sources should consider shifting 
and often mobile Òspaces of creativityÓ and the practice of writing, Òspaces of showing;Ó 
scientific knowledge is typically ÒshownÓ as a finished product and usually only to select and 
discriminating audiences whereas artistic practices like literature are more amenable to a process 
of gradual or partial unveiling in a variety of settings (Saunders, 2010, p. 443).
  Moreover, Saunders suggests that geographers think even more deeply about what it is 
that they are calling literature.  Again, this requires that considerably more attention be paid to 
the developments of literary theory (Saunders, 2010, p. 438).  As I have mentioned, the modes 
and styles of literature matter.  For example, the structure of a novel naturally reinforces a 
particular conception of space-time, depending on the devices that are mobilized.  For example, 
it seems difficult to conceive of a an experience in Ôreal-timeÕ that is equivalent to the novel that 
starts 
in media res
.  Conversely, as opposed to film, the novel can also come closer to 
approximating the experience of real-time through the sequential presentation of events, both 
mundane and exciting (Saunders, 2010, p. 439).   
 However, even more compelling is the notion that the epistemological philosophy 
undergirding these literary forms allows for fundamentally different interpretations of space 
when compared with ethnographic reports, topographic charts, and the like.  Thus, as Saunders 
asserted, the novel is neither able nor desires to make an appeal to ÒaccuracyÓ or objective truth.  
Instead, it draws attention to perspective, possibility, hypothetical situations, and multiple 
timelines or parallel realities (Saunders, 2010, p. 440).  Other literary devices, such as voice, help 
to unveil the inner workings of these spatial perceptions (i.e. is the writer using first/direct 
"82experience or third person/omnipotent narrative?) (Saunders, 2010, p. 447).   Thus literature 
recognizes, admits to, and explicitly plays off of the representation/reality juncture in myriad 
ways.  In the following section, the approaches offered by geo-criticism and eco-criticism expand 
the scope of this argument. 
  "833.1c  Ecocriticism and geocriticism  
 Fiction does not reproduce the real, rather, it detects new virtualities that had remained 
unformulated which then go on to interact with the real 
(Prieto, 2012, p. 1).
    Professor of Comparative Literature, Eric Prieto alludes to the full scope of possibilities 
inherent in literature for continuing the geographerÕs investigative pursuit into the modes and 
mechanisms of spatial dialectics.  Like Sharp and Saunders, Prieto understands literatureÕs 
capacity to expand the human ability to conceive of alternative understandings of space and 
place and to think about the world in which we inhabit in previously impossible ways. 
   One of PrietoÕs primary concerns is to draw attention to the linkage between two literary 
subfields that should be of interest to geographers:  ecocriticism and geocriticism.  Ecocriticism 
has generally received more attention, although not necessarily from within geography itself, 
especially since the publication of several seminal works by Lawrence Buell (1995) and the 
edited collection by Cheryll Glotfelty and Harold Fromm (1996), along with more recent studies 
attending to post-colonial ecocriticism (Deloughrey, 2011).  Considering the broad intersection 
between the interests of ecocriticism and the various human-environment focused aspects of 
"84geography (e.g. political ecology) it is surprising that little cross-reference exists between the 
subfields.
  1 Ecocriticm assesses human-environmental interaction through a re-reading of texts in 
order to draw attention to the narrative construction of this relationship and its subsequent impact 
on both historical and contemporary environmental thinking and praxis.  Considering the scope 
of historical geography from an environmental perspective, the two are equally committed to a 
fuller understanding, critique, and realignment of the binary opposition between ÔnaturalÕ and 
ÔhumanÕ environments.  If nothing else, both fields (along with environmental history) trace 
similar lineages which touch upon the evolution of ecological thinking (at least in the Western 
context) from its precolonial roots, through classic human-environmental commentators from 
George Perkins Marsh to Rachel CarsonÕs 
Silent Spring
 and Raymond WilliamsÕ 
The Country 
and the City 
(Cronon, 1995; Harvey, 1996; Merchant, 1980; Worster, 1994).
  Prieto contextualizes the silences that exist between ecocriticism and geography by 
addressing Òzones of overlapÓ between ecocriticism and an emerging geocriticism that might 
strengthen interdisciplinary ties across fields interested in human-environmental issues.  
Geocriticism is usually attributed to the French scholar Bertrand Westphal as well as the more 
 For examples of the breadth and depth of ecocriticism, see: 
1Buell, Lawrence. ÒThe Environmental Imagination: Thoreau, Nature Writing, and the Formation of American 
Culture. Harvard University Press, 1995.
 Glotfelty, Cheryll, and Harold Fromm, eds. 
The ecocriticism reader: Landmarks in literary ecology
. University of 
Georgia Press, 1996.
 While sometimes criticized for white, Eurocentric approaches that in some instances reify the very Ònature writingÓ 
genre from which they are attempting to destabilize, more recent works have emphasized a post-colonial approach, 
for example: 
DeLoughrey, Elizabeth, and George B. Handley, eds. 
Postcolonial Ecologies: Literatures of the Environment
. Oxford University Press, 2011.
"85recent works of the American scholar, Robert Tally.  WestphalÕs concern with literary 
representations of place borrows from the same line of thinking that guided David Harvey in his 
Paris, Capital of Modernity 
(2003); namely, the instability of meaning in modern times from a 
spatial perspective.  Spatial forms, whether perceived, conceived, or lived, are in constant flux;  
geocriticism approaches this problematic by considering the value that fictional spaces provide 
toward understanding ÔrealÕ spaces. Spatial fiction(s) (literary or otherwise)  should not be 
conceived of as Òdistractions,Ó but instead as a Òpowerful performative function, changing the 
ways we view the places through which we move, including, and perhaps especially, the places 
we thought we knew, whose characteristics and ÔmeaningÕ had seemed settled once and for 
allÓ (Prieto, 2012, p. 3).   
 While I am primarily concerned with providing an overall theory of ÒvirtualÓ or 
ÒhypotheticalÓ spaces within literary sources, Wesphal has laid out a specific typology for 
engaging in geocritical studies, of which I have merely scratched the surface.  In essence, 
Westphal argues for the place-centric character of the text (in contrast to some of the earlier 
arguments I have noted) where place depiction itself trumps any specific literary modality.  
Second, he argued for Òmultifocalization,Ó i.e. the deployment of multiple narratives about a 
particular place from as many authors as possible.  As also noted by Saunders and Sharp, the 
point of this endeavor is not merely to select narratives that corroborate preconceived 
understandings, but to destabilize such assumptions.  Mirroring SauerÕs landscape approach in 
which landscapes are seen as palimpsests of human activity (Sauer, 2009) and are read as 
ÒtextÓ (Cosgrove & Daniels, 1988
) drawing our attention away from the mere surface appearance 
of a place and away from any assumption that the present condition of a landscape is either 
"86essential or eternal.  Finally, echoing the psychogeographic approach, geocriticism appeals to the 
non-ocular in the represented landscape (i.e. avoiding the privileging of the visual above 
depictions of other sensory phenomenon) (Prieto, 2012, p. 3-5).   
 Through the lens of both geocriticism and ecocriticism, without necessarily adopting 
in 
toto
 their methods additional perspectives can be added to the geographerÕs interrogation of 
space, place, and environment. George Henderson has shown how effective literary texts can be 
at evoking the simultaneous instability of space and meaning.  In his analysis of the flows and 
logics of capital in transforming social relationships and physical environments in southern 
California during the early part of the 20th century, Henderson deployed Òrural realistÓ accounts 
via novels which comment on the agrarian ideals and disruptions associated with capital 
circulation that have shaped and continue to shape knowledge of and experiences within the 
valleys and mountains between San Francisco and San Diego (Henderson, 2003).  His work is 
highly evocative of capitalÕs creative destruction due in large part to the use of literary examples. 
"873.1d  Geography, literature, and governmentality  
 To paraphrase Foucault, governmentality can be thought of as a loose collective 
arrangement of Òinstitutions, procedures, analyses, reflections, calculations, and tacticsÓ brought 
together by the state as a means for directing power toward or administering power over the 
specific target of population for the purpose of generating knowledge about political economy 
(Foucault, 1991, p. 102).  Part of the power of this Òensemble of apparatusesÓ utilized by the 
state pertains to its unique capacity and dynamism which Foucault conceives of as ÒspecificÓ but 
ÒcomplexÓ (1991, p. 102). Due to this elasticity, an array of shifting technologies and modalities 
can be enrolled, deployed, and replaced within the ensemble.  While the technical tools of the 
social scientist (survey, chart, map, statistical table, etc) are most commonly thought of as the 
means by which states generates knowledge about their target populations (Scott, 1999), 
FoucaultÕs definition certainly acknowledges the possibility of adopting other ÒtechnicalÓ means 
by which governmental subjects can arrange knowledge.   
 In his historical geographic study of governmentality in the context of late 19th century 
United States, Hannah justified his ÒintensiveÓ as opposed to ÒextensiveÓ critical reading of the 
works of Francis Amasa Walker (1840-1897), a key figure not only due to his dedication to the 
US census, but also through the transformative socio-spatial discourses he articulated.  Hannah 
states that Amasa as ideal governmental subject functions as Ò a representative, a nexus of 
relationsÓ (Hannah, 2000, p. 3).  Hannah makes it abundantly clear that, while Amasa is central 
to his analysis, his purpose was not merely biographical and there is something revelatory in this 
approach.  His method of assessing governmentality in a particular historical-geographical 
"88context shares quite a lot with similar methods of discourse analysis in critical literary studies; 
from the perspective of historical state formation, WalkerÕs memoirs, notes, charts, and diagrams 
share common ground with period piece novels of the Gilded Age, just as George L. Henderson 
demonstrated the parallel narratives between state agricultural policy and literature during the 
American Progressive Era in 
California and the Fictions of Capital 
(2003).  As FoucaultÕs method considers both apparatuses and modalities of governmentality, 
scholars following in his tradition have argued that it is also important to understand circulation, 
simply described as the way in which governmental techniques move through governable 
populations (Marx, J., 2011, p. 66). Circulation could also be understood as the method by which 
governmental techniques are imagined and experimented upon in relation to constantly changing 
and adapting populations and conditions.  In the realm of the governmental imaginary, it is 
possible to see how literary approaches could be instrumental in excavating the internal logics of 
governmentality.  Put more succinctly, Òfiction and verse shape a literary source of governmental 
thought whenever they associate character with group, population with territory, and 
administration with defining what it means for a population to be secure, productive, and 
otherwise well offÓ (Marx, J., 2011, p. 67).  From the perspective of geography, I would also 
include the conflation of setting (both in space and time) with historical-geographic state 
formation.  Literature, literary forms, authors and literary critics can just as easily function as 
objects and subjects of governmentality as census takers, doctors, and social scientists.  
 Several research trajectories connecting literature and governmentality have been 
outlined.  One trajectory places literary texts on par with the work of social scientists as tools by 
which an array of governmental structures are detailed, Òfrom bureaucratized politics to failed 
"89statesÓ (Marx, J., 2011, p. 68).  The purpose of this trajectory, John Marx argues, is not to present 
arguments about or distinctions between what he describes as ÒidealÓ or ÒindigenousÓ 
expressions of governmentality but rather to demonstrate a range of Òimpure 
administrationsÓ (2011, p. 68).  For example, while Victorian era novels highlighting the poor 
conditions of urban dwellers in an industrializing age can be read as supportive of administrative 
intervention, colonial and postcolonial pieces would be more critically oriented vis a vis 
regulation (Marx, J., 2011, p. 70).  Another more focused trajectory addresses how literature 
frames target populations and how Òlanguage(s) of population better equip (readers) than the 
language of citizenship to explain how procedures for governing diverse groups work within and 
beyond the borders of the nationÓ (Marx, J., 2011, p. 68).  Through discourses of population, 
literature can open up and destabilize governmental narratives across permeable and ethereal 
boundaries that discourses of nation and state seek to concretize.   
 A literary work that emphasizes the centrality of population, as plot, narrative, or setting, 
is also a governmental work, as it too Òfleshes out the challenge of governing an aggregation of 
self-interested individualsÓ (Marx, J., 2011, p. 72).  John Marx provides an example through the 
comparison of two works by Daniel Defoe:  
Robinson Crusoe 
(1719) and 
A Journal of the 
Plague Year 
(1722).  Competing articulations are observable in the enunciative modality, e.g. 
author; for example, 
Robinson Crusoe
 can be read as an Òexemplary chronicle of the self-
regulating individualÓ whereas 
A Journal of the Plague Year
 demonstrates chaotic circulation 
and a lack of self-regulation (2011, p. 72).  Governmental logics are by no means restricted to 
traditionally accepted governmental apparatuses and modalities, and can be extended to a wide 
array of methods for distribution and internalization within the population (Fusilero, 2000; Van 
"90Alstine, 2012).  In the chapter that follows I assess a similar governmental narrative regarding 
gender, place, health, and nation as it emerged from a different governmental object, i.e. the 
novels of Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu, specifically 
Yaban.
  "913.2  Fictional natures: Anatolia, Kadro, and Karaosmano
!lu
  Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu, one of the best known authors of early republican Turkey, 
produced several novels during his tenure as an author, political theorist, politician, and 
diplomat, most notably 
Nur Baba, Kõralõk Konak, Yaban, 
and 
Ankara.
  Born in Cairo in 1889, yet 
coming to age in Istanbul during the Young Turk era alongside trips to Europe (specifically 
Switzerland to deal with a bout of tuberculosis in 1916), the experiences of the Balkan Wars, 
World War I, and the Turkish War for Independence strongly influenced Karaosmano
!luÕs 
perspective and literary style (Serdar 2002).  The influences of French philosopher Henri 
Bergson and the psychoanalytical approaches of Freud are evident throughout his work (–zt
2007).  While the nationalistic sentiments of his novels and their critical perspective on the living 
conditions of post-Ottoman Turkish peasants have been well articulated (Karaımerlio
!lu 2002), 
the intersection between these themes and the environmental and spatial underpinnings of 
Karaosmano
!luÕs Anatolian fictions have received little if any attention.  In the second half of 
this section I outline some of the foundational components of Karaosmano
!luÕs intellectual 
underpinnings (specifically the so-called 
Kadro movement) 
drawing attention to its explicitly 
spatial foundations (etatism/devlet“ilik or statism.  I highlight some of the prior critical readings 
of Karaosmano
!luÕs work, specifically 
Yaban 
and its themes revolving around the apparently 
unbridgeable divide between TurkeyÕs intellectuals and its peasantry in the early republican era.  
I then reconsider the novel from both literary and textual readings of space and environment as a 
"92means for blurring
 the ÒfictionalÓ and ÒrealÓ Anatolian landscapes as they narrate governmental 
themes of health and gender in the new Republic.   
 Karaosmano
!lu is generally depicted as a Kemalist and close friend of Ataturk.  As 
franchisee of the journal 
Kadro
, Karaosmano
!lu has been depicted as a staunch proponent of 
2Kemalist ideology.  In fact, his ideologically underpinnings may be more complex and 
multifaceted.  The bulk of 
KadroÕs
 philosophical principles can be more directly attributed to 
#
evket Syya Aydemir.  A few of 
KadroÕs 
principles deserve articulation, especially in 
juxtaposition to Karaosmano
!luÕs literary renderings of Kemalist ideology.  
Kadro 
shared many 
of the late Ottoman era intellectual critiques, (from both within and outside the Ottoman Empire) 
of the EmpireÕs ÔstagnationÕ and ÔdeclineÕ as a product of its lagging ability to keep up with the 
industrializing and expanding European powers and its own internal corruption.  It bears 
mentioning that most modern scholars of the Ottoman Empire have rejected these simplistic 
notions of imperial decline in favor of more nuanced interpretations of imperial transformation 
and hybrid forms of governance, consolidation and diffusion of populations, shifting degrees of 
tolerance for heterogenous population characteristics, and economic competition within and 
outside of the Empire, alongside the rapid pace of technological innovation and change to which 
the OttomanÕs were no strangers.
 3 The 
Kadro 
writers claimed that all similarities with former critiques of the Empire were 
largely superficial in that the prior intellectual critiques (Young Turk and otherwise) lacked 
 Kadro 
is the Turkification of cadre; in this instance, it specifically refers to a group of  bureaucratic intellectuals 
2envisioned as the overseers of a uniquely Turkish articulation of etatism, i.e. devlet
“ilikBarkey, Karen. 
Empire of difference
. Cambridge University Press, 2008.
3Tezcan, Baki. The Second Ottoman Empire: Political and Social Transformation in the Early Modern World. 
Cambridge University Press, 2010.
"93significant theoretical foundation and consistency.  Moreover, for 
Kadro
, economics was the 
primary driver behind their philosophy, although they were also careful to distinguish themselves 
from both the socialists and fascists on numerous grounds (T
$
 1998).  It must be noted that 
the rejection of these competing ideologies may have in part turned on larger suspicions of the 
geopolitical entities which embodied them (specifically Fascist Italy and Soviet Russia), among 
other things; a complete analysis of the philosophies of 
Kadro 
goes well beyond the scope of this 
paper.  Suffice to say, 
Kadro
 called for liberation of the Turkish state from the tyranny of a global 
economic system.  According to their writings, the best means to accomplish this
 was by placing 
control of capital in the hands of the state, which they argued would facilitate the establishment 
of a truly ÒclasslessÓ society guided by an intellectual cadre. 
 The journal 
Kadro 
was only published between 1932-1934, its ideas deemed too leftist by 
more powerful factions within the Turkish government.  Karaosmano
!lu himself was offered 
foreign diplomatic posts and his journal was shuttered, ostensibly as a means for preventing him 
from espousing his tainted variant of Kemalism (Karaımerlioglu 2002).  However, 
Karaosmano
!luÕs contribution to Turkish philosophical, territorial, and identity formulations 
undoubtedly had more influence in his novels; as Karaımerlioglu noted, this was due to the 
sustained influence that literature has had on Turkish intellectual life (127), and partly due to the 
continued influence Karaosmano
!luÕs novels have had on historians of the early Turkish 
Republic.  A large body of 20th century Turkish literature, known as ÒpeasantismÓ or 
kıyc 
is also traced to his influence.  Karaosmano
!lu is seen, albeit sometimes in too straightforward a 
fashion, as shedding light on the ÒrealityÓ of the peasant life and landscape.  However, just as 
Henderson noted in his analysis of rural realist discourses in novels of early 20th century 
"94California, the novel can reveal a multiplicity of rural and real landscapes.  Moreover, by 
assessing the literary devices deployed by Karaosmano
!lu
, the hybrid spaces of author and text 
can be better implicated in the landscapes thus constructed.  
"953.3  Diagnosing the village body:  gender, sanitation, and national space in 
selected works of Karaosmano
!lu
 ÒOna gıre, tabiat demek, vah
!
ilik, ha
!
inlik, gariplik, õssõzlõk, toz, toprak, “amur, vee 
demekti.....fakat, o vakitten bu vakite kadar, AnadoluÕnun, insan eli de
"meyen bir noktasõ 
kalmamõ
!
tõ. 
Uzaklar yakõnla
!
mõ
!
; “oraklar ye
!
illenmi
!
; ocaklar tmeye ba
!
lamõ
!
tõÉ.Ó
 ÒTo her, to say ÒnatureÓ meant wildness, harshness, strangeness, desolation, dust, dirt, mud and 
manure....but, from that time until now, Anatolia had not remained a point untouched by human 
hands.  Distances were drawn together; deserts had been greened, furnaces had started 
smokingÉ.Ó - Ankara, Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
"lu
  As studies of peasantist discourses have shown, heroic yet simplistically rendered 
depictions of 
kıylatõ
 or Òvillage lifeÓ (Berkes, 1942) would gradually emerge and displace 
prior narratives of decline.  Like other states that have experienced moments of turbulent 
transformation as part of the process of modernization, the Turkish Republic has a complex and 
contradictory history with respect to the role and value of the peasant to 
vatan, i.e. 
the 
geopolitical concept of a Turkish homeland that linked citizen to soil (–zkan, 2012).  The 
Turkish peasant was seen as both a problem of governance and a wellspring of symbolic vatan, 
paradoxically personified as the nation-soil nexus, yet categorically deficient in modern 
sensibilities e.g. rationalism, nationalism, hygiene, etc.        
"96 While this multiplicity of depictions is certainly evident in the more scientifically 
structured reports like the 
Medical and Social Geographies 
produced by the Ministry for Health 
and Social Assistance, due to the explicit co-construction of real and represented spaces, literary 
sources offer additional valuable insights into place construction and the logics of 
governmentality.  The seemingly more objective and aloof nature of scientific and ethnographic 
reports, their content, and their style, can be contextualized alongside literary accounts. When 
done in this way, more nuanced critical appraisals of the peasantist zeitgeist begin to emerge.  As 
previously noted, Karaosmano
!lu accompanied ethnograph
ic and investigative commissions sent 
to evaluate life in occupied regions of western Anatolia.  His notes were often stark and 
disparaging of poverty, war, abandonment, and isolation and spurred sustained investigations into 
the deficiencies of village life.  His observations were always framed by nationalism, Kemalism, 
and mutual critiques of both ignorance and governmental inactivity.  
 In addition to these themes, one also notes an interesting deployment of female characters 
and a keen spatial sensitivity in his writings.  
Ankara
, for example, with its three distinct spatio-
temporal sections (National Struggle/recent past, first years of the new Republic/present, and 
ÔutopianÕ Ankara/near future)
 is centered on the shifting experiences and transformative identity 
4of the heroic and archetypal Ôwoman of the Turkish Nation,Õ Selma Hanõm.  Similar female 
heroes were common in the literature of the early Republic era; one need look no further than the 
famous novels of Halide Edip Adõvar for example.
  While Selma is presented as a relatively 
5 In the introduction to 
AnkaraÕs 
third printing, Karaosmano
!lu laments the fact that his country has basically 
4stagnated in the second spatio-temporal section of the book. Instead of progressing to the utopian vision of social 
and economic development represented in the third section it remains mired in greed, graft, and dysfunction.
 I should note, however, that while there are parallels between these sort of national women characters, the more 
5feminist characters in Halide EdipÕs novels still contrast sharply with characters like Selma Hanõm and her shif
ting 
identity constructions that are only fully realized by encounters with, for lack of a better expression, the right man in 
the right place at the right time.
"97strong (in character, not physical body) 
Istanbullu 
transplanted to Anatolia (especially when 
contrasted to her first husband Nazif), her vague and uncertain feelings of idleness and lack of 
purpose evolve into national fervor through subsequent marriages (her second husband, the war 
hero; and conveniently her third husband, the author).  Her transformation from young uncertain 
girl to idle nationalist woman and teacher is foreshadowed early in the novel and highlights the 
important position that place (central Anatolia) holds in the cultivation of her identity:  
 Selma Hanõm, smiled while coming to accept these jokes (about the mansion that awaited 
her in Ankara).  In that moment, on the verge of a long journey that began in a bare, shabby 
hotel room filled with unfamiliar odors, the dream of a Ômost pleasant, grand homeÓ to her didnÕt 
seem like an impossible or pathetic thought (p. 16).
  This most Òmost pleasant, grand home,Ó initially conceived of as a simple homestead, is a 
metaphor for Ankara and the whole of the Turkish nation.  However it is quite clear that 
Karaosmano
!lu is merely projecting his own nationalistic sentiments through a female voice; 
whether or not they are authentic or even commonly held convictions of women actually 
engaged in the nation-building project is certainly debatable.  
 One of his more famous works, 
Yaban,
 revolves around the experiences of wounded 
former soldier Ahmet Celal during the Turkish War for Independence.  Celal was cast as a 
member of the intellectual elite and a veteran who departs from the war-time fervor and planning 
in Ankara (supposedly in order to avoid pity due to his lost arm) by exiling himself to the 
villages of the borderland periphery in the west.  Celal, while not a direct stand in for 
"98Karaosmano
!lu, served as a vehicle for the authorÕs expressions of frustration with both the 
baseness of rural life in Anatolia, but also the perceived chasm betwee
n the peasant and the 
intellectuals who have appointed themselves to the task of civilizing and building the Turkish 
vatan.   However, as a piece of modernist Þction, the landscapes, characters, plotting, and style 
hint at less than straightforward articulations of place-making in the Republic.  
Beginning with the title, multiple conßations between identity and territory are apparent.  
Yaban
 is translated as Òthe stranger,Ó the short form of the word 
yabanci 
which can mean 
foreigner or stranger.  However, 
yaban
 also connotes meanings that shift between person, 
creature, and landscape.  Yaban also means Ôsavage,Õ Ôuncultivated,Õ and Ôwilderness.Õ  Just as 
environmental historians and ecocriticists have grappled with the development and deployment 
of tropes like ÔnatureÕ and ÔwildernessÕ in European and American contexts, in many respects 
similar understandings of the concept from the perspective of the Ottoman Empire/Modern 
Turkey and its myriad cultural and ethnic assemblages need to be better understood. (Mikhail, 
2011; Davis, 2007).  
Questions such as this allow for interpretations that reconÞgure Karaosmano
!luÕs 
deployment of nature, not just as a setting or lesson for the modernizing Turkish state as a place 
requiring improvement and ÔdominationÕ as a means for rehabilitating the rural peasantry 
(Karaımerlio
!lu 134), but also as a less stable metaphor that anticipates the later critiques of 
technological and bureaucratic control of nature, rurality, and peasant.  In this case, if Ahmet 
Celal was Ôthe strangerÕ was he not also the ÔsavageÕ or ÔuncultivatedÕ himself?  Or was the title 
immediately calling attention to the inherent binary constructions embedded within the novelÕs 
prose, i.e. Celal was Ôthe strangerÕ IN Ôthe wild,Õ the one whom must continually sacriÞce of 
himself for the good of the vatan as he ultimately did both prior to the novelÕs events and in the 
"99Þnal pages where he chose to abandon everything and set off, albeit hopelessly, to Þght for his 
country?   For Karaosmano
!lu
, typically seen as a Þgure whose ideology placed nation above the 
individual, what was the author speaking through the mouthpiece of Celal the Òyaban" about the 
wider governmental problems of an emergent Turkish state, a land conquered by 
ÒyabanciÓ (foreigner) and overßowing with things Òyaban?Ó  Moreover, if Celal can be 
conceived of as the literary personiÞcation of the ideal governmental subject, what does a critical 
reading of his struggles reveal about the internal fears of the governmental subject who has been 
dispatched into the wild?
Before considering this novel as a text engaged in the production of governmental 
objects, I brießy hearken back to PorteousÕ schema, as 
Yaban
 uneasily straddles elements of all 
four of Porteous' spatial archetypes.  While situated in a rural setting,  
Yaban 
was hardly 
evocative of the typical Òsense of placeÓ narrative;  It overßows with ßoating and ßeeting 
timelines, dominated by the drudgery of the village broken only by dreamy recollections of 
garden-like visions of Istanbul.  These dreamscapes were juxtaposed alongside of 
Karaosmano
!lu
Õs depiction of the landscapes of Anatolia as invariably too-wet and too-dry, 
stißing, and rugged, broken only by the happenstance oasis, CelalÕs refuge in the wild.  Celal has 
placed himself in exile, and seems to exhibit features of isolation or entrapment, due to his wish 
to avoid events and Ankara, but is also unable (or unwilling) to connect with the majority of 
villagers in any real sense.  Finally, as the Òtraveller,Ó CelalÕs depressing sense of realization, of 
self acknowledgement, is stunted and dark.  His only salvation, further bodily disÞgurement and 
likely death in battle.  
Metaphors and similes for nature and rural identity pepper the prose while the ephemeral 
structure of the novel mimics the ÒtimelessnessÓ of the village that Celal disparaged.  Typically, 
"100Yaban
 has been interpreted as a work that both criticized and called for improvement of the 
peasant while simultaneously condemning the ineffective or apathetic stance of the intellectual 
community to their plight.  Karaosmano
!lu reveals the mult
iple layers of identity construction 
inherent in these governmental projects of calculation and reform.  In the preface to his third 
edition (1942), he stated, in seeming self-critique of his own work in rural Anatolia:  
 There was a spirit of the Anatolian people;  you were unable to penetrate it.  There was a 
mind; you did not enlighten it.  There was a body; you did not nourish it.  There was inhabited 
soil; you were not able to manage it.  You abandoned it to the hands of animality, ignorance, 
poverty, and famine.  It is finished, like a wild grass between the hard soil and the parched sky.  
Now, with sickle in hand, you come here to harvest.  What have you sown and what will you 
reap? 
(p. 8). Initially, it is unclear as to whether or not the author included himself amongst the 
intellectuals he  condemned (ÒyouÓ as opposed to ÒweÓ).  Considering his own nebulous position 
amidst the powers-that-be which were reconÞguring the Turkish state and his displacement from 
the center of governance via random diplomatic appointments, an argument can be made for the 
overall ambiguity of his subject position.  However,  Karaosmano
!lu clariÞed h
is separate, yet 
culpable, position in the following excerpt:
You and I have abandoned them, in this state, a handful of victims deprived of all the joys 
of life, of everything and everyone, in the belly of rugged nature. Hunger, sickness, and 
"101desolation have surrounded them.  In the complete darkness of ignorance they have been left 
prisoners in a dungeon, enveloping them on all sides (p. 8). 
And; 
There was not a single roof for you to shelter under, not a single pillow where you would 
lay your head.  Though we were in such big cars on pillows softer than the softest of bedsÉa bit 
later, while you went to gather kernels of wheat and barley and to eat them after being ground 
between two stones, we stopped at the green and well-watered spaces on the road and ate ground 
meat, cold bırek
 (pastries) and fresh fruit with pointed forks that shined brighter than silver and 
while we ate there we found your dark-colored war bread a bit tasteless and we recalled the 
greater abundance that was allocated to you in past times (p. 10).
He qualiÞed these statements by noting that these were essentially the imaginary 
constructions of the lives of the surveyor from the perspective of the villager.  In fact, 
Karaosmano
!lu argued, the surveyor was quite anguished by the state of his country.  
Perhaps if 
only we had come Òbarefoot in ragsÓ he wondered aloud.  How much he wanted the peasants to 
see that his pain made him one with them, that he was diseased just like them:
That which I perceive behind your eyes is not due to fear or anger, but due to the feeling 
that the things that spoke of comfort and proßigacy against poverty and tragedy were so rude, co 
contemptible, so much that I wanted to see myself together with you, to be lost amongst you, to 
join you (11)É..We that are full, we that are clothed, we that are among those distributing 
"102justice, our spirits are full of sorrow.  The grief that you do not know, do not see, gnaws at us like 
wolves gnawing on ßesh.  Beneath this clean, comfortable, and soft guilt our skin boils with 
various maladies, known as ambition, arrogance, pride, and doubt (p. 12).  
In depictions such as these, these experts or governmental subjects are casting themselves as  
victims alongside the rural peasantry, on par with Òthe old woman sleeping at the foot of her 
sonÕs graveÓ and Òthe young girl who bleeds her chastityÓ (Karaosmano
!lu
, 1942, p. 12).Here, the imposed spatial experience of Anatolia via the intellectual was also made 
apparent.  Depictions of golden Þelds and hillsides, clear vistas, and networks of infrastructural 
improvements, central to the modernizing vision of the state, contrast sharply with this spatial 
void that overlaps mind and territory.   Karaosmano
!lu played with similar elements of spatial 
and temporal utopia contrasted with harsh ÒrealityÓ in his other works, notably 
Ankara, 
a novel 
that was divided into three parts:  past, present, and near future ÒutopianÓ vision.  In 
Yaban
, these 
spatial conÞgurations shifted between nostalgic and experienced landscapes (Istanbul and the 
village) as well as simultaneously existing landscapes of hope and depravity (the oasis vs the 
wastelands of western Anatolia).  In his vision, the landscapes of rural Anatolia are distopian 
nightmares:
Yaban is not an objective novel. Yaban is the heart-rending cry of a spiritÕs anguished 
conscience that have come face to face with a bitter and terrifying reality 
(p. 8).As Sharp and Saunders noted, one of the virtues of the novel is its ability to depict 
mundane timescales in especially vivid detail, something more difÞcult in other forms of media.  
"103The hand-grinding of grains, whittling of a cane, and the beating of a misbehaving child, 
typically background elements or conversational foils in other media depictions, can serve as 
page-length Þxations with multiple levels of symbolic value.  In the later peasantist discourses, 
these depictions, alongside narratives of labor and customary practice (weddings, etc) are used to 
laud the strong 
Turkish 
character of rural life.  Karaosmano
!lu
 used them, through the 
observations of Celal, to critique the static backwardness of village existence.  
The mutilated Celal noted that Òthere has not been such a conscious, strong-willed, 
perpetual and arduous suicide (as living in Anatolia).Ó  Moreover, he remarked that, once one has 
come to Anatolia, they are Òcondemned to slowly wither here, like a treeÓ (14).  Celal was most 
direct about this in a section of the book where he discussed the 
zaman mefhumu
 or Òsense of 
timeÓ of the villagers.  In his estimation, they hadnÕt any; at least nothing bearing a passing 
resemblance to the experience of time in more cosmopolitan spaces.  While Celal was able to 
acclimate to the temporal malaise of the village, he lamented that Òhis sense of place cannot so 
easily be dispelledÓ (26).  These reßections on time and space proliferated throughout the novel. 
The specter of environmental determinism also haunts the work, where humans and the 
landscapes they are spread across become inseparable.   Celal noted that, in a static landscape 
like Anatolia, it is impossible for a dynamic fervor to develop in its people.  In Òa village that 
resembles old Hittite ruins, what difference is there between people and broken statutes scattered 
beneath the soilÓ (26).  The juxtaposition here between people and statues is foreboding.  
Villages like Yassõhemselves swallowed up in the nationalistic fervor of 
architectural digs, which attempted to link Turkey
Õs present to its imagined past (now on display 
in an historical and cultural heritage museum in Ankara).  Finally, like in any spatial imaginary 
fashioned along a linear sense of time, apocalypse was always looming:
"104Every evening I felt the world was coming to an end.  That the soil upon which I lived 
would swell and crack from the hidden sorrows within, or, with a terrifying sound, would 
collapse to the bottom of the earth (p. 25).
Spatial metaphors of diseased and healthful landscapes were common tropes of the late 
19th and early 20th century (SuÞan, 2008) and these spatial metaphors have had a strong 
inßuence over conÞguration of social and environmental relations (Kaika, 2005).  Literary 
sources provide numerous examples of how these tropes were imaginatively cast and circulated 
through the general populace (Pike, 2005).  Karaosmano
!lu directly infusesd disease and death 
into his landscape depictions of the areas around Porsuk ‡ay (a stream that runs through 
Eski
"
ehir and other small villages west of Ankara)
:It is like a long rift, opened by an earthquake, that divides the monotonous valley in 
twoÉ..the gray soils (that line the stream) give the impression that they have rotted and festered.  
If you hold it in your hand, no matter the time of day or season, it is lukewarm, like pusÉand the 
hills, each is a tumor.  And the world which the horizon frames appears alive with this miserable 
landscapeÉ.within this empty and valueless space I did not see  a single birdÕs passage (p. 24).
Such a place is not timeless or spaceless in the authorÕs vision, nor merely a landscape 
where people live in the squalor of the Stone Age, lacking even the basest degree of civilized 
knowledge regarding the cultivation of the land (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 24), but a place in fact 
situated at the dystopian end of time where Òthe whole world was merely one continuous 
"105expanse of land that starts and ends in the villageÓ (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 26).  
Yaban
 is 
replete with environmental deterministic imagery as well as aspects of self-orientalization, which 
often conßate simplistic depictions of poverty and environmental degradation with the political 
economic conditions of wartime and massive social upheaval: 
When the environment doesnÕt change, there is no possibility of change in the 
individualÉit is from such observations that one may come to a conclusion as to why ideas of 
innovation and Westernism have come to naught here (p. 21).
This sickened landscape, Karaosmano
!lu
 intimated, produced a diseased populace, a land 
of the lame and disÞgured who canÕt even regard CelalÕs missing sacriÞcial limb as abnormal.  
Filth is an omnipresent experience here, characterized both by the landscape and the ignorance 
and laziness of the villagers.  Moreover, the peasant population is suffuse with the mysterious 
characteristics of nature itself.  Upon lamenting his inability to either understand or be 
understood by the peasants, Celal resorted to metaphor:
The spirit of the Turkish peasants is a still, deep water.  What is at the bottom?  Rugged 
stone, slimy silt, or a soft layer of sand.  It was not possible to discoverÉ(p. 16).
  Karaosmano
!lu, like other governmental subjects who have targeted rural and village 
life as objects, (e.g. Dr. Safvet) was particularly harsh on depictions of health, sanitation, and 
from a population perspective, village women.  In a place that Òsmells of straw and cow-shitÓ 
and that is the animal equivalent of a Òmangy water buffalo in the swampÓ (Karaosmano
!lu, 
"1061942, p. 19),  Celal notes that the villagers constantly surveilled his sanitary routine, reversing 
the panoptic gaze and hearkening back to Karaosmano
!luÕs own anguished depictions of the 
experts and bureaucratsÕ victimization via their own conspicuous civility and hygiene 
(Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 17).  The contamination of the village ran so deep and was such an 
ingrained aspect of village life it appeared to the outside observer that the village population had 
fully resigned to their Þlthy fate (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 21).  It bears mentioning that this 
depiction contrasts with other descriptions (in the 
Medical and Social Geographies 
for example) 
of the rural population as largely amenable and in fact pre-disposed to health and sanitation 
reform.  
Through Celal, the author launches a critique of the local power hierarchy as the source 
of backwardness and repression via tradition in the village. For example, Celal criticized the 
villagers deep admiration of 
#
eyh Yusuf, Òa sort of wise man, medicine man, and soothsayer 
(Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 39).Ó  In one key moment in the novel, the enlightened and urbane 
Celal martyrs himself to the cause of modernity (and subsequently deepens the resentment the 
villagers feel toward him) by confronting and denouncing 
#
eyh Yusuf for his failure to heal or 
correct any of the maladies impacting the village population, calling him a charlatan and an old 
goat (
teke) (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 40).  In this modernist vision, traditional Þgures of 
authority like 
#
eyh Yusuf 
were on par with, if not worse than, any foreign invaders.
What is the difference between this treacherous Turk and the English security forces 
occupying Istanbul? (
p. 41)."107Gender factors heavily into the narrative of 
Yaban
 on multiple levels.  Women are 
fashioned as both ignorant beasts, culpable in the ongoing desecration of rural Anatolia, and as 
objects of the author/main characterÕs affection or even lust, the source of his (potential) 
salvation and by extension perhaps the nation itself.  Life in the village stirred up the Òmasculine 
primal desiresÓ of these civilized outside observers (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 27).  However, this 
nationalistic ÔarousalÕ all depended on the cultivation and exaltation of a particular type of 
woman, and based off of the narratives presented in texts like the 
Medical and Social 
Geographies
 and 
Yaban
, the standard village woman would not sufÞce.  The passage below 
presents many of the same themes regarding the disposition, temperament, and function of the 
stereotypical village woman (
kıyladõn) 
and her impact on the health and well-being of village 
spaces
:In effect, there was no water in the village.  This was despite the fact that there were wells 
and fountains Þlled from morning until evening.  The elderly bathed themselves, women and 
young girls gathered water for domestic use, and innumerable children played their Þlthy games 
there.  Sometimes, women who were too lazy to bring their laundry to the stream washed them in 
the troughs of the fountain (p. 20).
In this short excerpt, references are made to village womenÕs dereliction of the domestic 
sphere on two fronts;  poor sanitary practices and disregard of childrenÕs behavior.  Villagers in 
general are described as exhibits in a carnival, as monstrous or grotesque, and the land they 
inhabit is both symptom and vector of their maladies:
"108As days pass I understand betterÉwithin this immense and desolate world that is called 
Ôthe country of the TurkÕ is a strange isolationÉI should call it a ÔfreakÕÉone can not imagine 
from what race or breed it comes (p. 30).
While other groups are also disparaged, women are most frequently the ones who take 
the brunt of this dehumanizing language.  For example, the banal village women is seen as 
lacking a proper feminine body, or in fact any body at all.  Several such depictions are provided 
at a wedding:
The majority (of village women) were formless, squat, round and needlessly largeÉpiled 
over with layers of fabricÉone was unable to make out their shapeÉ (p. 29).
The bride herself suffered a perhaps worse depiction, with a comparison to a diseased 
insect:
Finally, the bride emerged like a cockroach from a soulless and impersonal home (p. 30).
Only the narratorÕs chance encounter with the Òonly woman he ever loved,Ó the village 
girl Emine, counters this imagery.  Despite the fact that she too was draped in the attire of the 
village women, her Òattractiveness could still be perceived through her rugged, course outer shell 
of clothing (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 41).Ó Her potential was there, buried beneath the heavy 
cloak of village life, awaiting the right Þgure of authority to help her realize her true potential.  
Another frequent trope for dehumanizing the female villager emerges from their rendering as 
"109beasts of labor, a depiction that contrasts concurrent representations as lazy and degenerate.   
Utilizing a commonly held mental image of Anatolian women, the narrator dwells on images of 
women devoid of all idealized femininity, carrying loads across their back that even a donkey 
was unable to tolerate Òwithout expelling a single drop of sweatÓ (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 
31).Perhaps one of the more telling metaphorical parallels that is drawn between the village 
woman and the nation revolved around the fate of the pitiful village child (in the novel most 
notably characterized by the dwarÞsh, rugged, and beaten-down man-child of Zeynep Kadõn, the 
mother of CelalÕs village host, Mehmet Ali) (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 20).  The narrator Celal 
ruminated on the life of this child, ravaged from head to toe by labor and malaria alike
:Poor peasant childÉyou are the offspring of two step mothers; the one that beats you day 
in and day out and the other that has beaten you every day since you were born: the vatan 
(homeland) (p. 32).
While none of the metaphors and motifs regarding village women can be singularly 
attributed to any semblance of purely objective critique of the socio-economic conditions of 
village life, some are more blatantly misogynistic than others.  Celal made it quite clear 
throughout the novel that, with the exception of his idealized Emine, he had never before felt any 
love for women.  As a man who Òis all that remains after one thousand hardshipsÓ he found it 
Òsweeter to deceive a woman rather than believe in herÓ (Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 37).  Perhaps 
in his harshest diatribe he declared that Òthere is nothing as unbearable as a women who is 
lovedÉfor in this state, the vile and treacherous nature of women achieves a bloodthirsty quality 
(Karaosmano
!lu, 1942, p. 
38).  "110
The culmination of this Ôvile and treacherous womenÕ motif came with the parable of the 
hapless and weak Seyman and his unfaithful yet powerful spouse, Cennet.  Despite being 
caught in the act of adultery by the village, SeymanÕs unwillingness to allow her to be punished 
tips the scales of power in favor of Cennet who continues to more publicly and proudly ßaunt her 
sexuality while her husband sinks into quite despair in the home.  This parable is particularly 
interesting as it reverses the gendered spatial expectations of traditional Turkish culture:  Cennet 
owns the public sphere while her husband is conÞned to the domestic prison (Karaosmano
!lu, 
1942, p. 43-44).   It also reveals a degree of fear undergirding the misogyny, a fear that without 
proper structural guidance and regulation, without clearly demarcating the appropriate spaces 
and roles of women, deviant and powerful women pose a threat to the patriarchal structures of 
power of the state and society. 
"1113.4. Utopian ends and dystopian conclusions
In this concluding section I will Þrst brießy reiterate the major points of consideration 
with respect to conducting an archaeology of governmentality in line with FoucaultÕs approach.  
Archaeology requires intensive critical analysis of discourses (i.e. Òthings saidÓ) and discursive 
formations (the communicative structures and systems that maintain and disperse discourses) 
(Foucault, 1972).  Foucault used his archaeological approach to examine the historical power-
knowledge relationships of bodies of knowledge, many of which would today be described as 
academic subjects or disciplines, as a means for understanding the formation of objects of 
knowledge and the enunciative modalities or subject positions that were deemed experts of these 
Þelds.  
With the gradual formation of the modern state emerged the so-called problem of 
government.  As a means for honing administrative powers over the populations of these modern 
states, governing authorities gradually shifted away from systems of bodily punishment towards 
the promotion of self-governing individuals.  At the center of this effort, linked to emergent and 
modernizing Þelds of calculation, visualization, and circulation like statistics and scientiÞc 
cartography, were attempts at better understanding the biopolitics of population, the so-called 
politics of life that were at the core of the state.  StateÕs increasingly sought to gather more and 
better data about population: fecundity, morbidity and mortality, and a wide array of other 
demographic information.  This Òart of governmentÓ in the modern state, or governmentality, 
while never singular nor universally controlled in its logics and practices, enrolled experts 
(subjects) in a variety of social sciences to conduct these investigations and to produce the the 
so-called objects of governmentality that can be classiÞed in three inter-linked movements:  
"112
observation, regulation, and normative judgement.  While these objects were frequently ofÞcial 
reports and documents, as the logics of governmentality are multifaceted and circulate 
throughout the territories of the state, numerous other texts can be read and critically evaluated 
with respect to the governmental objects they address.  
As in many other modernizing states in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, in early 
republican Turkey medical, sanitation, and demographic discourses were central to the discursive 
formation of governmentality and the promotion of a proper Òconduct of conduct.Ó  As  I have 
described, certain spatial logics are central to governmentality.  Territories and populations are 
classiÞed and categorized side-by-side and governmental objects need to be considered in 
relation to their Òsurfaces of emergence,Ó i.e. their sites of production and dissemination.  
Governmentality is also spatially uneven, due to the logics and practices of governmental 
subjects which are developed in Latourian centers of calculation and applied to places with 
mixed effort and effect (Latour, 1987).  These logics and practices are also used to create the 
deÞnitions of, and act upon, target populations of interest to the state; they syphilitic prostitute, 
the unlicensed midwife, the ignorant mother, the sick and deformed child.   
Here I have considered some of the writings of Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu with respect 
to their reproduction of governmental narratives regarding space, place, gender, and health.  This 
involved considering their surfaces of emergence, i.e. the Þelds or sites from which these objects 
emerged (e.g. modern medicine and Kemalism), their authorities of delimitation, i.e those 
designated as experts with valid credentials to speak on the topics at hand (e.g. the scholar, 
bureaucrat, and politician Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
!lu), and their grids of speciÞcation, i.e. the 
systems by which objects were delineated and calculated (ethnographic reports and surveys).  By 
using this method of analysis I was able to demonstrate how the state produced certain objects of 
"113
governmentality and how these objects were made amenable to observation, normative 
judgement, and eventually regulation.  I was especially interested in the production of gendered 
governmental objects and the spaces they occupied; similar narratives were also demonstrated in 
Dr. Muslihiddin SafvetÕs volume of the 
Medical and Social Geographies,
 ÔunofÞcialÕ midwives 
and ÔignorantÕ mothers.
These objects were central to the demographic and nation-building concerns of the 
ßedling Turkish state in which the fashioning of governmentality can perhaps be described as the 
stateÕs attempt at playing house by producing and maintaining stable boundaries between public 
and domestic, masculine and feminine spaces.  Medical discourses were utillized to legitimate 
these efforts and delegitimate other ÔproblematicÕ and unsanitary or unhealthful practices which 
frequently involved classifying certain types of woman and their behaviors as out of place 
(playing off of Mary Douglas assertion that what society regards as ÔdirtÕ or ÔtabooÕ is that which 
is out of place (2005)).  Frequently these medical discourses, or in the case of Karaosmano
!lu 
medicalized due to his lack of actual medical training or experience discourses juxtapose the 
negligent female Þgure alongside the Þgure of the helpless child.  Examples of infant mortality 
and deformity are used to spur the national imagination toward a nightmare scenario of 
continued population decline and the collapse of the 
vatan
.  The future of the state, represented 
by the bodies of these children, could only be assured through the medicalization and regulation 
of the spaces of motherhood.  
While not perfectly cohesive, there are numerous parallels between these two types of 
governmental literatures which I have assessed
: i.e. governmentality as Ôplaying houseÕ by way 
of the regulation of womenÕs bodies and spaces in relation to the health and well-fare of children.
"114
In the chapter that follows, I will build on this concept by considering the writings of a 
prominent governmental Þgure who was central efforts to produce scientiÞc and rational 
motherhood for the betterment of the national body, Dr. Besim –mer 
(Akalin).
"115
APPENDIX
"116
!117
Figure 14:  
Diseases in Ankara Province in 1923
 (Safvet, 1341
/1925, p. 115). 
Diseases monitored included Typhoid, Typhus, Diphtheria, Phrenitis, Child Bed Fever, 
Measles, Dysentery, Smallpox, Rabies, Trachoma, Tetanus, Paratyphus, and various mental 
illnesses
.!118
Figure 15:  
Map of Zir Borough in Ankara Province
 (Ankara Vilayeti) (Safvet, 
1341/1925, p. 140). Surrounding sub provinces include Aya
"
 to the northwest, Yabanabad to the north, 
Haymana to the south, and Eski
"
ehir to the southwest. Ankara is located to the east.  It 
should also be noted that areas of wetlands (bataklõk) are symbolõzed by the checkered 
pattern shown in the top left legend
.Chapter 4 
ÒTurkish children should live!Ó:  
gendered governmental narratives in the later works of TurkeyÕs 
Ôfather of obstetricsÕ, Dr. Besim –mer (Akalõn)
 4.1  Historicizing narratives of disease, hygiene, population, and gender 
 Much has been written on the shifting and unstable discourses and modalities of 
modernity in the period of upheaval that witnessed the Anatolian remnants of the Ottoman 
Empire transform into the Turkish Republic in the 1920s (Lerner, 1966; Sibel and Bozdo
!an, 
1997; Bozdo
!an, 2001;  Lewis, 2002; Meeker, 2002; Zher, 2004; Findley, 2010; Yõlmaz
, 2013).  Generally speaking, one of the most notable features of these histories is a shift in focus 
from ÔtotalÕ historical accounts that articulate a linear progressive transition from the Ottoman 
Empire to the Turkish Republic to Ôgeneral historiesÕ that break-down traditional periodization, 
highlight new ruptures and continuities, and place increasing emphasis on subject formations and 
discourses that de-emphasize statist readings and highlight social and cultural issues during this 
era. 
 Throughout the early Republican period, due to the collective ideologies of their 
contributors, both fictional and ethnographic accounts framed narratives of health, environment, 
and the nation in ways that relied heavily on gendered geographies of disease, decline, and the 
path to national salvation.  That being said, the seeming boundary between these fictional 
accounts of rural and urban modernization in the novels of Kemalist political philosophers and 
scientific surveys of Anatolian villages and cities conducted by a rising medical bureaucracy was 
" 119
frequently blurred.  In general, the narrative content and style in both accounts was mutually 
reinforcing.  An examination of the historical and narrative geographies and governmentalities of 
health, disease, and gender has been central to this study.  I have emphasized not only the content 
of these depictions regarding conditions of health, hygiene, and sanitation in the rural Anatolian 
ÔheartlandÕ of 
the early Turkish Republic as they pertain to gender, but also the co-mingling of 
narrative styles and devices that are deployed in the construction of both fictional and non-
fictional representations of said environments and the bodies that reside within them. 
 The production of historical accounts that attest to the ways in which particular diseases 
are understood and experienced from a narrative and socially embedded and constructed 
standpoint (Mol, 2002; Rosenberg and Golden, 1992), i.e. approaches that move beyond purely 
medicalized depictions of etiology and epidemiology, morbidity and mortality, and the 
ÔdiscoveryÕ of diseases and their Ôorigins,Õ can generally be attributed to the holistic and socially 
conscious medical histories of scholars like Jean Dubos and his oft-cited 
The White Plague: 
Tuberculosis, Man, and Society 
(1987).  As an extension of DubosÕ approach to the social history 
of tuberculosis, historical geographer Susan Craddock has pointed out in her book 
City of 
Plagues 
that myriad social frames can be applied, though not necessarily simultaneously, as a 
means for dismantling medical narratives and revealing the underlying political, social, and 
spatial constructions that shape the ways in which a social 
disease like tuberculosis can shift in 
terms of its interaction with individuals and the wider public (2000).   
 For example, in her recent 
Spitting Blood: the history of tuberculosis
, Helen Bynum 
defined one such discursive shift as occurring when ÒconsumptionÓ was transformed into 
ÒtuberculosisÓ via Robert KochÕs 1882 discovery or, put more aptly, ÒvisualizationÓ of the 
" 120Tubercle Bacillus via the scientific tools of staining and microscopy (Bynum, 2012, p. 94)   From 
a more explicitly gendered perspective, shifting from questions of scientific objectivity to body 
politics, Bynum detailed the narrative framing of Romantic Era male and female consumptives 
as Òfashionistas:Ó in particular, the female consumptive body, feeble, sickly, Òwilting,Ó and 
ÒslightÓ was valorized as a thing of beauty and desire.   
 There was a circular logic to this framing of the female body, from the perspective of 
susceptibility to disease:  weakened, frail forms had now become the ideal type and this 
fetishization of a particular incarnation of the female body diffused into the popular imagination, 
likely leading to mimicry amongst upper class women, initially less at risk of contracting 
tuberculosis as compared to their working-class counterparts.  Bynum described how the 
Victorians constructed a particular historical-geographic formation as a result of this framing of 
the diseased female body;  they produced a Òcult of invalidismÓ by promoting fashions and 
lifestyles characterized by highly sedentary behaviors and cloistered spaces amongst women of 
means (Bynum, 2012, p. 89). The consumptive life, despite its grotesque and painful end, 
became a social-status fantasy, despite the paradoxical spatial reality of diseases like tuberculosis 
as ailments of the poor and working classes.  These spaces were epitomized in the prevailing 
binary of public/male versus private/female spatial ordering; domestic life, often simplistically 
rendered as the ÔwomenÕs spaceÕ of the hom
e, was described in both medical and popular 
narratives as the most common space for contracting diseases like tuberculosis due to a lack of 
fresh air in poorly ventilated structures and the presence of children. 
" 1214.1a  Narratives of pronatalism and population politics 
 The association of gendered bodies and spaces with narratives of health and disease is a 
long-standing preoccupation of the modern nation state. This has undoubtedly been most salient 
in pronatalist governmental narratives concerning such highly gendered and spatially demarcated 
practices as birth and child-rearing.  In the literature on pronatalism and the state there tends to 
be a geographic bias toward Western Europe and the United States.  While this literature often 
focuses more heavily on the 19th and 20th century and the rise of eugenicist concerns, there are 
exceptions that extend further back in the history of historical state formation.
  With respect to 
1the history of pronatalist policy in the United States, recent historical accounts such as Laura 
LovettÕs 
Conceiving the Future
 have argued for more nuanced distinctions between pronatalist 
policies as imagined and enacted, both on bodies and in space (2007).      
 Lovett provided a rough linear framework for considering the historical geography of 
pronatalism and eugenicist policy; she noted that pronatalist policy can be viewed along a 
continuum from active to passive while eugenics existed in both negative and positive 
articulations.  For example, direct subsidies and state sponsored programs for increasing family 
size would constitute active pronatalist policy which was more common in Europe whereas 
pronatalist policy tended to include more indirect measures such as the construction of 
playgrounds and the promotion of suburban growth.  The spatial implications of each of these 
pathways is quite apparent and adds a layer of understanding to comparative arguments about the 
 See Leslie TuttleÕs 
Conceiving the Old Regime 
for a particularly well-done accounting of the historical geography 
1of pronatalist policy in early modern France. 
Tuttle, L. (2010). Conceiving the old regime: Pronatalism and the politics of reproduction in early modern France. 
New York: Oxford University Press.
" 122development of the built environment in each of these settings.       
 In addition, negative eugenics included those policies aimed at discouraging reproduction 
amongst undesirable segments of the population (i.e. sterilization) whereas positive eugenics 
focused on efforts to promote reproduction amongst desirable factions as a means for combatting 
so-called race suicide.  Motherhood figured heavily into each of these configurations and Lovett 
demonstrates how narratives of motherhood were deployed in the passive pronatalist/positive 
eugenicist environment of late 19th and early 20th century America where, amongst others, 
President Theodore Roosevelt actively promoted motherhood as ÒwomenÕs duty to the stateÓ in 
combatting race suicide (Lovett, 2007, p. 7).  In effect, Lovett traced the development of 
a ÒmaternalistÓ movement which should be contrasted with the various feminist movements and 
will be discussed further in the following section.   
" 1234.1b  Maternalist politics and narratives of scientific motherhood in the Middle East 
 Scholars have begun to move beyond the Western European and American-centric 
historical geographies of population politics and the state by interrogating primary archival 
materials and documents ranging from first-hand midwife accounts of birthing practices to 
medical treatises and ethnographic reports.  In the Middle East, a few recent studies are 
particularly noteworthy in pointing to both the points of confluence and departure regarding 
Western histories and experiences with pronatalist policy and population politics in general; 
Firoozeh Kashani-SabetÕs 
Conceiving Citizens:  Women and the Politics of Motherhood in Iran, 
Lisa PollardÕs 
Nurturing the Nation: The Family Politics of Modernizing, Colonizing, and 
Liberating Egypt, 1805-1923, 
and
  Ghan BalsoyÕs 
The Politics of Reproduction in Ottoman 
Society, 1838-1900
 are notable due to the overlap in both their content and approach to sexual an 
reproductive politics in relation to the state as well as in regards to their emphasis on the late 
19th and early 20th centuries.  Until recently the historiography regarding sanitation, hygiene 
(and in particular womenÕs hygiene), and the state in the Middle East has been quite limited.  
Studies like Kashani-Sabet, Pollard, and BalsoyÕs are vital to the expansion of this literature.   
However, I must also note that while Pollard and Kashani-Sabet utilized elements of a 
Foucauldian genealogy of medicine and sexuality to some extent
, a governmental lens was not 
2deployed in any of the three studies.   
 To be sure, Kashani-SabetÕs study is heavily indebted to the unification of body politics 
with environmental and social history.  This approach dovetails with recent efforts in 
 For example, see p. 92 and p. 231, footnote 29 in 
Conceiving Citizens 
and p. 226 footnote 9 in 
Nurturing the 
2Nation
" 124environmental history to place the body directly at the messy interstitial space between human 
and environment.  For example, in her book 
Inescapable Ecologies,
 Lina Nash questioned the 
notion that increasingly prevalent arguments regarding the link between environment and health 
in the post-World War II era were an entirely new phenomenon; rather, she argued that the 
previous miasmatic theories and other earlier forms of environmental medicine were displaced 
by bacteriological narratives in the late 19th and early 20th century, which abruptly detached the 
body from its surrounding environment  The bacteriological argument, while certainly accurate, 
uneasily partitioned and bracketed off the body from nature; health was construed as merely the 
Òabsence of diseaseÓ and Òpathogens were situated in human bodies, not environmentsÓ (Nash, 
2006, p. 6).  Furthermore, Nash argued that the main question posed to environmental historians 
was Ònot why and how the link between environment and health was finally recognized in the 
late twentieth century but why it had ever become invisible.  From this perspective, the narrow 
situating of disease in the organic dysfunction of bodies and particular pathogens begins to look 
like a brief period of modernist amnesiaÓ (p. 6). 
 NashÕs argument is predicated on a multi-scalar articulation of space.  At one level, she is 
committed to re-situating the human body directly at the center of environmental history, which 
has consistently argued for the destabilization of the boundary between humans and their 
environments but has not always succeeded at erasing this false binary.  In this sense, any study 
of health or medicine is inherently also concerned with the environment; when faced with the 
question Òwhere does the body end and non-human nature begin?Ó, clear demarcations are not 
easily ascertained (Nash, 2007, p. 8).   At another level, her argument is concerned with the ways 
in which the history of health and medicine is itself intensely spatialized.  According to Nash, 
" 125Ò(environmental and medical) knowledge and ideas do not emerge from nowhere but from the 
interaction of human minds with specific places, materials, and thingsÓ (p. 9).  As a result of this 
spatial dependency, simultaneously existing yet seemingly paradoxical bodies of knowledge 
coexist.  For example, the ecological narratives of science and health deployed by sanitary 
engineers and hygienists 
contrasted with yet complemented evolving bacteriological narratives 
of disease and the body as deployed in Western medicine despite the medical fieldÕs distancing of 
itself from ecological narratives of health in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  
  I should note that NashÕs argument is situated in the context of environment and health in 
 the fin de si‘cle Central Valley of California.  It can be argued that in many non-Western contexts 
this separation or,
 in the Latourian sense, 
purification
 was not necessarily sought out nor 
conceived of in the same fashion.  In 
Conceiving Citizens, 
Kashani-Sabet noted that the 
religious-philosophical concept of 
insan-i kamil, 
i.e. the Ôperfect manÕ was linked to notions of 
health and hygiene in late 19th century Persia (Kashani-Sabet, 2011, p. 21).  In short, hygiene 
was described by medical practitioners, academics, statesmen, and religious leaders as a means 
for achieving the conquest of the human body as an unpredictable outpost of savage and 
uncivilized nature.           
  In addition to the environmental health arguments that undergird her study of body-
 politics, another of Kashani-SabetÕs primary objectives in 
Conceiving Citizens
 was to outline the 
ways in which the late Qajar and early Pahlavi state came to identify with and promote 
maternalist discourses as a form of womenÕs rights or, what might be more aptly described as the 
right to a particular vision and usage of the (healhful and vital) female body in support of the 
(healthful and vital) nation.  Kashani-Sabet described the mentality that supported these 
" 126apparatuses of power directed at female bodies, i.e maternalism as opposed to feminism,
 in the 
following terms: 
 What distinguished the feminist from the maternalist? Simply put, feminists cared about 
womenÕs rights; materialists did not make that a priority.  While materialists strove to improve 
the health of women, especially pregnant  women, and to prolong the lives of women and 
children, they did not all wish to establish gender equality or to combat patriarchy.  The 
reproductive responsibility of women to the nation was simply too critical  a matter to entrust to 
ordinary citizens, and overturning the status quo could inadvertently jeopardize national 
interests.  Many materialists also took on the subject of womenÕs health because of national or 
religious priorities.  In other words, maternalist priorities for Iranian policy makers mattered 
because they advanced the stateÕs political ideology  
(p. 5).  For the materialists, the female body was a means to a political ends; or perhaps more 
correctly, it was a vital node in a  newly developing constellation of state powers in the modern 
era that were attendant to and indeed fixated upon population and territory.   Women were 
essential factors in the production of Ònation(s) of healthy patriotsÓ and their bodies were 
spatially fixed at the Òintersection of maternalism and hygiene.Ó In Persian and Ottoman, the 
word hygiene, which is written as 
hifz al-sihhat
 and literally translates as 
the defense of health, 
emphasizes the promotion of a clean, orderly, and sanitary society by uniting and defending both 
body and territory
  (Kashani-Sabet, 2011, p. 5). Kashani-Sabet noted that Òalthough hygiene 
interested Iranian administrators for demographic and humanitarian purposes, it also had a 
patriotic dimension that centered on the need to shield the homeland from pestilence and on the 
" 127desire to forge a vigorous and physically fit citizenry - a public that could better serve the 
stateÓ (p. 17). 
  As part of this process, women were being refashioned as a new type of warrior or soldier 
of the recently fashioned geopolitical construct of vatan, i.e. homeland (Kashani-Sabet, 2011, p. 
27).  It should also be emphasized that, w
hile the state was certainly invested in these efforts, 
3power does not flow in a linear unidirectional fashion; Kashani-Sabet was also quick to point out 
that women benefited from maternalist discourses and the turn toward hygiene as a state 
preoccupation as these activities opened up new spaces of political participation for women.   
 With respect to the general population, Iranians were faced with the conundrum of 
responsibility that these new biopolitical imperatives presented. Kashani Sabet summarizes, 
Ògrappling with the social realities of disease, Iranians questioned who was principally 
responsible for creating the conditions of health and hygiene:  the individual or the state?Ó (8).  I 
argue that this conundrum was an engineered element of the way in which the narrative was 
constructed, i.e. it was a classic example of fostering the conduct of conduct.  Fashioning 
hygiene and health as a state-facilitated and supported practice via education and the provision of 
infrastructural and material support that were otherwise largely up to the individual to carry out 
can be seen as an extension of the larger project of producing 
millet (nation) and 
vatan.  
  In other words, by enacting hygiene and sanitation as governmental object, Iran (and 
Turkey) Òappropriated (but not necessarily imitated) the lineaments of modernity and nationhood 
in attempting to eliminate (their) figurative diseasesÓ (Kashani-Sabet, 2011, p. 28).
  Hygienic 
practices engendered sanitary citizens who were able to sustain themselves as both an act of 
 For an explanation of this in the Turkish context, see 
–zkan, B. (2012). From the abode of Islam to the Turkish 
3vatan: The making of a national homeland in Turkey. New Haven: Yale University Press.
" 128national defense and a patriotic duty.  This is an extension of the earlier pronatalist forms of 
population politics which were largely concerned with increasing but not necessarily sustaining 
population. In fact, it is more appropriate to say that sanitary citizenship was interested in 
sustaining a particularly robust, vibrant, and virile national body; it did not necessarily seek the 
sustenance of just any national body as the corollary eugenicist movements indicate.  
 One of the most interesting facetÕs of Kashani-SabetÕs argument in 
Conceiving Citizens
 is 
her indication of the widespread diffusion and circulation of narratives about sanitary citizenship 
within the general public via journals and other publications.  For example, topical, science-
oriented journals like 
Farhang
 and 
Ruznamah-i ÔIlmi, 
and 
Ittila'
 emerged as early as the late 19th 
century promoting a wide array of sanitary matters and publishing diatribes against sources of 
persistent health problems in Iran that included but were not limited to:  sickness or excessive 
labor in communal work setting; widespread alcoholism and the abundant presence of other 
Òintoxicating beveragesÓ; either a complete lack of or the existence of dysfunctional sewage 
management system; a lack of governmental and public regulation and surveillance of sanitation 
in the cities; and limited quantities of (potable) water (Kashani-Sabet, 2011, p. 19).  Other 
journals, such as the appropriately titled 
Hifz al Sihhat,
which was first printed in 1906, targeted a 
less professional and scientific audience and helped disseminate materials to Iranian families on 
venereal disease, domestic and bodily cleanliness, the value of sport to health and wellness, 
beauty and fashion tips, problems associated with physical and mental disability, drug abuse, 
alcoholism, and other assorted debilitations and ailments (Kashani Sabet, 2011, p. 31).   
 Aside from engendering sanitary citizenship, these publications also assisted in the 
gendering
 of sanitary citizenship.  ÒBodily health (metaphors) in relation to political prosperityÓ 
" 129disseminated widely.  These publications frequently promoted mothers as the handmaidens of 
hygiene and touted them as a sort of domestic appendage of national defense (Kashani-Sabet, 
2011, p. 24)  Kashani-Sabet presented an especially interesting visualization of the narrative 
construction of motherhood as an explicitly female form of patriotism; in one image reproduced 
in 
Conceiving Citizens, madar-i vatan  
or the Òmother of the homelandÓ is depicted as an invalid 
looked after by a flock of her daughters.  This image is accompanied by the inscription, Òour dear 
mother, as long as your daughters are alive, we will not allow you to become so abject.  We will 
not stop curing youÓ (32).  
  As I have argued and will further demonstrate in this and the following chapter, this 
promotion of sanitary citizenship and Òscientific motherhood,Ó i.e. the practices of motherhood 
as guided by the rational hand of masculine science and medicine, were of primary interest in the 
stateÕs biopolitical imperatives.  That being said, the female body was largely conceived of as a 
vessel or medium; its material components and biological and mechanical functions were useful 
to the state (and, even more importantly, not harmful) so long as it was properly molded, trained, 
and located appropriately in space.   It is also of interest to note the shifting conceptions of the 
ideal female body in countries like Iran and Turkey during this period;  in contrast to the 
previous discussion of tuberculoid fashionistas, during late 19th century Iran dichotomized 
representations existed that vacillated between weak civilized and strong strong pastoral 
feminine bodies (25).  I explored some of this tension in the prior chapter on the literary 
environments of Karaosmano
!luÕs novels. 
Moreover, I will return to this notion of publicizing 
and circulating information about public health matters to the general public in the final 
" 130substantive chapter of the dissertation where I evaluate narratives of health, gender, and 
environment in the publication of the Turkish Red Crescent Society.  
 In 
The Politics of Reproduction in Ottoman Society, 
Ghan Balsoy addressed several of 
the same themes as Kashani
-Sabet in the context of late Ottoman society.  BalsoyÕs larger goal 
was to gender 19th century Ottoman political and social history via the framing device of the 
Ottoman Ôpopulation problem,Õ an administrative concern with declining population in the 
Empire that emerged in an era of Tanzimat reforms and territorial losses.  Balsoy contended that  
Òthe population policies of the 19th century were predominantly formulated through womenÕs 
sexualityÓ (p. 1).  
  I argue that this gendered enframing of the population problem fits squarely in the late 
        Ottoman historiography that argues for a continuum as opposed to a break between late Ottoman 
and early Republican era political and social transformation.   Maternalist narratives dominated 
the politicization of population in both the 19th and 20th centuries; while the late 19th century 
narratives primarily revolved around scientific and material innovation and adoption (e.g. the 
deployment of forceps during parturition, the establishment of maternity clinics) regulatory and 
popular educational approaches were  gradually developed and deployed at the turn of the 
century (e.g. the publication of instructional manuals detailing the self-regulation of the domestic 
sphere, methods for promoting the general health and well-being of the population). 
   As in 
Conceiving Citizens 
and 
Nurturing the Nation, 
the (female) body features 
           prominently as the object in BalsoyÕs work whereby the body is conceptualized as the vehicle by 
which a host of interventions via governmental apparatuses are made throughout the course of 
the volatile Ottoman 19th century.  Balsoy contextualized her historical study by placing the 
" 131population problem at the center of political and social anxieties in the reformist post-Tanzimat 
era (from just prior to the 1839 Ghane edict until roughly the end of the 19th century); this 
emphasis is in large part due to a reading of primary texts from the era that explicitly refer to 
population as central to broader concerns regarding Òeconomic development, fiscal 
reorganization, administrative specialization, and military renovationÓ (Balsoy, 2013, p 5).  
However, in true Foucauldian fashion (albeit without reference to his approach) Balsoy noted 
that these concerns also spurred an increased interest in statistical analysis. Of course this 
shifting concern with the Òcomposition, control, regulation, and surveillanceÓ of population as a 
Ònew functions of the Ômodern stateÕÓ (Balsoy, 2013, p. 6) is one of the key components of 
FoucaultÕs genealogy of governmentality.
   4  Balsoy briefly outlined the emerging demographic regime throughout the course of the 
           19th century.  Following the establishment of the 
Ceride-iõs Nazareti 
or Office of Population 
Registers the first census commenced in 1830 and was by completed 1838.  However, this census 
could hardly be construed as scientific due to its relatively large margin of error and deployment 
of counting measures that were in fact minor alterations of prior methods deployed in the old 
tahrir
 registers, with one major exception; intead of the 
hane or household unit, this census 
counted adult males (Balsoy, 2013, p. 7).  Another partial census followed in 1844 with a new 
full census in 1866 which was accompanied by the provision of 
tezkere-i Osmaniye 
(Ottoman 
James C. Scott has of course provided an historical overview of this process in his oft-cited 
Seeing Like a State.  
4However, more nuanced, primary document dependent approaches to the emergence of this preoccupation with 
space, hygiene, population, statistics, and calculation can be found in studies like Stephen J. LeggÕs 
Spaces of 
Colonialism
 or Brenda YeohÕs 
Contesting Space in Colonial Singapore.  
Of course, for recent work in this vein in 
the late Ottoman Empire and Early Turkish, see the previously mentioned studies by Emine and Kyle Evered and 
Mark David Wyers, amongst others.  Balsoy herself is quite aware of the connection between the regulation of 
population and the management of territory; she noted that demographic data was not only vital to monitoring the 
health and well-being of the population but was also used to transform physical space through the construction of 
Òroads, railways, irrigation networks, schools, and hospitalsÓ via a statistical bureaucracy that Òreconceptualized 
population as human resourceÓ (Balsoy, 2013, p. 6)
." 132identity cards).  The 
!ura-yõ Devlet
 or Council of State initiated a full investigation into the 
effectiveness of the census in 1874 and began a process of structural adjustment; this process 
continued with the 1881 establishment of the N-u Umumi 
#daresi  (General Population 
Administration) within the Dahiliye Nezareti
 (Ministry of the Interior).  It was at this point that 
the unit of measurement shifted again to account for the individual regardless of gender (Balsoy, 
2013, p. 8). " 1334.1c  Dr. Besim –mer and population politics in the late 19th and early 20th centuries
  These increasingly accurate censuses painted a stark picture of the condition of 
population throughout the Empire.  This unfavorable portrayal was particularly useful to a 
scientific and intellectual elite that was dissatisfied with the Hamidian regime; Dr. Besim –mer 
Akalõn, obstetrician, eventual parliamentarian
, and foundational figure in the modernization of 
5medicine in the late Ottoman Empire and early Turkish Republic, was one of these individuals as 
well as a key proponent of sanitary citizenship and scientific motherhood as handmaidens of 
government.
  He received initial training in midwifery at the School of Medicine in Istanbul in 1879 at 
the age of 17.  By 1887 he was studying obstetrics and puericulture in Paris where he was 
heavily influenced by French eugenicist Aldophe Pinard.  His anti-Malthusian sentiments were 
likely solidified at this juncture.  He returned to Istanbul in 1891 in order to teach midwifery and 
obstetrics to male students.  Dr. Besim –mer published extensively on a range of topics 
including general histories of medicine, hygiene, birthing practices, and midwifery, to more 
 Dr. Besim –mer Akalõn served as the representative of Bilecik in the 5th congress of the Turkish National 
5Assembly (1935-1939). He began a second term in the 6th congress (1939-1943) which was cut short by his death in 
1940 (T.N.A .Album)
" 134specific scientific discussions of birth.
  While all of his works are infused with his own personal 
6politics, it is his later writings that are most revelatory of his particular governmental 
inclinations.  It is to these which I will turn for a fuller analysis of his shift from pronatalism to 
the politics of child rearing and the production of sanitary citizenship and scientific motherhood. 
 Dr. Besim –mer is an authoritative and ideal example of the governmental subject, much 
akin to Francis A. Walker in HannahÕs 
Governmentality and the Mastery of Territory
.  Without 
transitioning purely into biography, I aim to use –mer in much the same way as Matthew 
Hannah used Walker: as a nexus for rendering visible the multiplicity of governmental 
subjectivities and modalities inherent in the production of sanitary citizenship and scientific 
motherhood as an outgrowth and extension of pronatalism and the Ôproblem of population.Õ  As 
Balsoy has demonstrated, this ÔauthoritativeÕ character is not necessarily an organic outgrowth of 
–merÕs scientific contributions; rather, it is emblematic of the prolongation of –merÕs own 
politicized science.  As cultural geographers have long demonstrated with respect to travel 
literature and depictions of place, a circular referentiality developed in Turkish medical histories 
that has sustained –mer
Õs position as the Òfather of modern obstetricsÓ or the Òangel 
doctorÓ (Balsoy, 2013, p. 2), which is quite an ironic moniker.  Balsoy noted that:  
 Texts include but are not limited to:  Obesity and Infirmity (
!i
"
manlõk ve Zayõflõk
, 1885), Wellness Guide to 
6Children, Families (
Sõhhata-i Etfal, Aile, 
1885, 1886), Care of Weak and Premature Infants (
Zayõf ve Vakitsiz 
Do
#an ‡ocuklara Takayy
 1886), Plague (
Veba
, 1886), Tobacco (
T
, 1886), Alcohol (
kirat
, 1887), Opium 
and Marijuana (
Afyon ve Esrar,
 1887), Hynotism and Mesmerization (
$pnotizma-Manyetizma
 1889), Reproduction 
(Tenas
, 1889), Wellness Guide to Marriage (
Sõhhata-i 
$zdiva“
, 1891), Wellness Guide to Reproduction 
(Sõhhata-i Tenas
, 1891), Know Yourself, (
Kendini Bil
, 1894), Wellness Guide to Newborns (Sõhhata-i 
Nevzat yahut Be
$
ik-Kundak-Emzik, 1894), Pediatrics - translated from French (
Tabib-i Etfal, 
1896), Yalova Hot 
Springs (Yalova Kaplõcasõ, 1901), Nursery (
$rzahane
, 1903), During and After Birth (Do
!urken ve Do
!urduktan 
Sonra, 1904), The Abundance of Infant Mortality (
 ‡ocuklara Vefeyat Kesreti,
 1906), Doctors and Advocates 
(Doktorlar Ve Avukatlar, 1906), Hygiene for Preparatory School (
$dadiler i“in Hõfz-õ Sõhhat
, 1914), First Aid and 
Assistance 
($lk 
$mdad ve Muavenet
, 1918), Science and Marriage (
Fen ve 
$zdiva“
, 1924), To Live One Hundred 
Years (
Y Yõl Ya
"
amak,
 1927), Courses in Midwifery (
Ebelik Dersleri,
 1928), History of Birth (
Do
#um Tarihi
, 1932), Grapes and Grape Based Cures (
ƒz ve ƒzle Tedavi,
 1933), Protecting and Sustaining Youth (
Gen“li
#i 
Koruma, ‡ok Ya
"
ama
, 1934). " 135it is significant that Besim –mer is not only used as the primary source of information on 
midwifery, but that his evidence and accounts are accepted as incontestable.  Besim –mer
 was 
one of the very benefactors of the newly established medical system, and he had an axe to grind 
when hew was writing a certain type of historyÉI argue that cooperation between several 
generations of obstetrician-historians reflects a certain structure of thought which serves 
particular social and political purposes  (25). 
 In short, Besim –merÕs own politicization of history and its subsequent prolongation can 
be described as having developed along two narrative trajectories:  first, beginning with his 
initial histories of practices and pregnancy in such works as 
Fenn-i Vilade 
(Obstetrics)
 and Do
#um Tarõhõ 
(History of Birth) the perspective and experience of non-medically/professionally 
trained midwives and ÒignorantÓ pregnant women were often down-played in favor of modern 
medical descriptions and understandings.  This process would continue on in the Turkish 
histories of modern obstetrics and nursing written in later decades (Balsoy, 2013, p. 23); second, 
Besim –merÕs own anti-Hamidian biases (due in large part to the SultanÕs expulsion of his father 
and brother) can be read as part of a larger anti-Ottoman motif that existed in the writings of the 
early RepublicÕs bureaucrats.  Ottoman historiography has been quick to point out that these anti-
Ottoman sentiments were rooted in an intellectual elite that was itself quite 
Ottoman
 in thought 
and practice.  Overall, it must be emphasized that these narratives coalesced in an effort to 
demarcate the proper spaces of obstetrics, and as will soon be demonstrated other female-
" 136dominated and domestic activities, as a masculine field of knowledge directed at and through 
female bodies.  Balsoy noted that ÒboundariesÓ were erected between doctor and midwife and  
were symbolically rendered via the white coat of the medical practitioner (Balsoy, 2013, p. 18)
.  I argue that these narratives in the Ottoman and Early Republican contexts can and 
should  be extended in a similar fashion as Kashani-Sabet has done with respect to late Qajar and 
early Pahlavi Iran.  The particular arguments about birthing practices, midwives, and pronatalism 
that developed during the 19th century shaped the form of later arguments about health, 
population, sanitary citizenship, scientific motherhood, and defense of 
vatan.  
Motherhood was 
deployed in support of both biological (race suicide) and territorial (defense of the national body) 
narratives of defense, with women again at the center of the effort.  Moreover, I argue that 
viewing Besim –mer as a governmental subject functions as a useful framing device for 
considering his later works and the shift from producing knowledge about birth and the birthing 
practice to promoting sanitary citizenship and scientific motherhood as elements of what 
Foucault would describe as the shifting governmental imperatives regarding Òthe right of death 
and power over lifeÓ (Foucault, 1990).
        
 In these studies conducted by Kashani-Sabet, Balsoy, and others, FoucaultÕs terminology 
is useful for loosely sketching out the logics of government at play in the gendering of 
population and the production of sanitary citizenship and scientific motherhood.  The Ôgrids of 
specificationÕ laid out by the state included an array of gendered factors that were argued to be 
central to the well-being of the nation, e.g. midwifery, pregnancy, infant mortality, and abortion, 
" 137and infertility
, marriage, 
puericulture
 (child rearing).
  Moreover, the logics of governing 
78population gradually expanded and jumped scales to draw domestic spaces more tightly into 
state-building projects.  In the context of the early Turkish Republic, emphasis gradually shifted 
from the mere reproduction of population to the sustenance of a vital and vibrant citizenry; this 
narrative often centered on the well-being of children and emphasized the regulation of the 
domestic sphere (via scientific motherhood) and the maintenance of the national body, especially 
when it pertained to the health and well-being of infants, children, and youth (sanitary 
citizenship). Finally, Ôauthorities of delimitationÕ like Dr. Besim –mer were able to extend the 
scope of their arguments within
 these expanding socio-spatial constructs.   
 In the discussion that follows, I extend this argument by considering a few of Dr. Besim 
–merÕs later writings (in both Ottoman and modern Turkish) from between roughly 1923 and 
1938 while reflecting on them in relation to the broader scope of his work.  Gendered matters of 
health and hygiene were frequently at the center of the stateÕs biopolitical agenda, from 
midwifery, parturition, and infant mortality, to venereal disease, marriage, and puericulture. 
Throughout the remainder of the chapter I assess the production of scientific motherhood as a 
facet of sanitary citizenship in the writings of Besim –mer between 1923 and 1938
.  For another excellent discussion of the intersection between governmental regulation of infertility in a patriarchal 
7Middle Eastern Society and the experiences of women with such a culture see:  Similar narratives of patriarchy and 
gender politics.  infertile women in a patriarchal society Òmissing motherhoodÓ in patriarchal Egypt  
             Inhorn, M. C. (1996). Infertility and patriarchy: The cultural politics of gender and family 
life in Egypt. 
Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
For an exploration of Puericultural concerns like nursing from a Western standpoint see: 
8Apple, R. D. (1987). Mothers and medicine: A social history of infant feeding, 1890-1950. Madison, Wis: University 
of Wisconsin Press.
" 1384.2  Governmental narratives of gender, hygiene, and space in the later works 
of Dr. Besim –mer (Akalõn)
  I have sought to demonstrate how Dr. Besim –mer operated as a governmental subject 
and an authority of delimitation in the early decades of the Turkish Republic through a critical 
and concentrated reading of his later writings.  Previous scholars (such as Balsoy) have reflected 
on the historical body of Dr. Besim –merÕs work, paying particular attention to his explicitly 
medical texts (e.g. his four volume magnum opus, F
enn-i Vilade
 or the science of birth) or his 
admittedly biased medical histories (e.g. 
Do
#um Tarõhõ 
or the History of Birth) in which he 
detailed his vision of obstetrics and designated who is authorized to speak knowledge to power 
on the matters of pregnancy, birth, and midwifery.  I argue that, after colonizing these fields of 
knowledge, his later writings shifted in tone, emphasis, and purpose; to put it simply, these later 
works were intended for a wider audience and promoted a gendered and explicitly spatial 
governmental vision of hygiene in the nascent Turkish Republic.  
  The grids of specification laid out by Dr. Besim –mer were gendered and spatialized in 
that they delineated and reinforced domestic and regulatory spaces of health and hygiene that 
were predominantly intended to promote the health, well-being, and especially longevity of a 
robust young generation.  In addition, as a good governmental subject, Dr. Besim –merÕs 
commitment to statistical calculation and graphical representation is on display throughout these 
works.  Charts, tables, and maps abound, alongside less serious (and frequently downright 
comical) graphics, images, and illustrations;  this bricolage of infographics highlights the hybrid 
nature of these pieces of propaganda.  The texts that I rely on extend from 1923 until 1938, 
" 139coincidentally also the year of Atats passing and two years prior to Dr. Besim –merÕs own 
death in 1940.  They also
 extend from his late medical career into his terms as a Deputy of 
Bilecik Province in the Turkish Parliament (beginning in 1935).   
 In particular, I emphasize the gendered and spatialized governmental narratives regarding 
health and hygiene that emerged in his miniseries, 
us Siyaseti 
or Population Politics. 
Population Politics 
consisted of four books:  
 “ocuklarda vefey›t  
or Infant mortality 
(1339/1923), 
Fen ve 
$zdiva“ 
or Science and Marriage 
(1340/1924), 
Gebelik ve Gebelikte Tedabir 
or Pregnancy and Precautions in Pregnancy
 (1340/1924), and 
‡ocukmek 
or Child 
Rearing/Puericulture
 (1341/1925).  
 While
 some of the general themes that emerged in this 
series of books had appeared in his earlier writings (for example, 
Pregnancy
 and 
Child Rearing
 had appeared in previous forms in earlier publications, 1902 and 1905 respectively), the 
unification of these texts under the particular heading of 
Population Politics, 
the shift in tone 
away from medical and technical language, and the inclusion of policy advice regarding social 
welfare and assistance programs is of note.   
 In addition to this series, I also look to two of his final pieces, the evocatively titled 
Tk 
‡ocu
#u Ya
"
amalõdõr ‡ocuklara Bakõm ve Sosyal Yarõdm 
or Turkish Children Should 
Live:  Care and Social Assistance for Small Children 
and 
Tk ‡ocu
#unu Nasõl Ya
"
atmalõ?  
us Siyasetinde ‡ocuk:  Sa
#lam nesil - –jenizm - Sa
#lam Irk 
or How should Turkish Children 
be Sustained? The child in Population Politics:  Robust bloodline - Eugenicism - Robust Race.  
In the analysis of these texts that follows I have outlined the interplay between hygiene, gender, 
and space from the perspective of Besim –mer as a highly gendered and gendering governmental 
subject.
 " 1404.2a  From population politics 
to the sustenance of children, 1923-1938 
 Several themes emerged in the governmental narratives that Dr. Besim –mer promoted in 
his writings between the 
Population Politics
 series and his final publications were central to his 
overall vision of the centrality of demographic analysis to the administration of the state.  First, it 
is interesting to note the parallels between Dr. –merÕs understanding of the sources of disease 
and contamination of the nation, with author medico-bureaucrats of the era:  e.g. Dr. Muslihiddin 
Safvet and his depictions in the 
Medical and Social Geographies.
  Without referencing nor 
acknowledging it, Dr. –mer advocated for a ÒMedical GeographyÓ based on demographic 
analysis and ethnographic investigation, that would take under consideration the intersection 
between physical environment and societal structure and Òseek to establish the character of each 
space and its effect on healthÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 41).
   He also noted that demographic analysis of a condition such as the Turkish Òpopulation 
problemÓ was only a means to an ends:  the effective multiplication and most importantly 
sustenance of a vital and robust young Turkish citizenry.  While Dr. Besim –merÕs European 
encounters with eugenicist thinking are certainly evident and he relies heavily on population data 
and methods, the centrality of ÔTurkishnessÕ
 (i.e. both its material and ideological maintenance) 
is evident throughout his argument.  For example, the point is made throughout his writings that 
reproduction itself is not a problem for Turkey; according to –mer, the Turkish 
race
 (õrk) was 
cast as exceptionally 
fecund
 (do#urgan)
 but simply lacking in the infrastructural support and 
background knowledge to properly sustain itself and reach its full potential as sanitary citizens 
and scientific mothers (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 44). 
 " 141 Hence the overarching structure of the 
Population Politics 
series.  The first book lays the 
foundation of the population problem by drawing upon European demographic data and 
discussing the ways in which demographic crisis threatens the nation and its territorial and racial 
integrity. It is in this book where the protection and sustenance of children are promoted as the 
primary concern for all Turks but especially Turkish women.  The books that follow add 
additional context by considering the major issues of concern that pertain to the production and 
puericulture (hygienic care) of children: scientific and hygienic management of marriage, control 
and regulation of sanitary birthing spaces and procedures, and intelligent and sound methods of 
child-rearing (nursing, swaddling, protection from disease, provision of healthful and natural 
surroundings).  
  Dr. –mer clearly saw both the reproduction and maintenance of population as the 
cornerstone of not only national success but also survival.  According to him Òthe politics of 
population are of life for both nation and country.  To increase the population, to strengthen and 
cultivate the individual - is an important principle for those engaged in hygienic and social 
activities but also politicsÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 7).  He noted that the rapid 
development of sanitary and hygienic reforms as a means for bolstering existing populations and 
recuperating from devastating losses was a primary preoccupation of most countries that had 
recently experienced the impact of war and its aftermath; the Anatolian remnants of the Ottoman 
Empire were no different, having reorganized or established new ministries of public works, 
resettlement and population exchange, and reclamation and planning (
imar, mle, õskan
) following territorial loss and population upheaval after World War I.  The state needed to rapidly 
transition from one form of national defense to another.  While –mer himself does not directly 
" 142say so, the carry-over of a militaristic lexicon into the field of hygiene and health is blunt (as 
previously discussed in regards to the various ÔwarsÕ and ÔstrugglesÕ that were waged against 
enemy combatants ranging from syphilis to tuberculosis).  
  Early on in these writings  one can see traces of the holistic human ecology approach as 
elaborated upon by Nash in Dr. Besim –merÕs approach to both the social  and environmental 
dimensions of health and hygiene.  For –mer, the Òstructure of the stateÓ was quite simple; it 
consisted of ÒsoilÓ and Òpeople,Ó further simplified as the population and its living space.  
However, he noted that: Òwhile the term society typical connotes an institution comprised of 
humans, even though we do consider human requirements for soil, water, plants, animals, and 
minerals, it is appropriate to take a much more inclusive understanding of the concept.  
Therefore, it may be said that the social body (
beden-i ictim›fl) 
is comprised of two elements:  
one is a Ôsocial geographyÕ that consists of the spaces that are considered central to human need; 
while the other is called ÔdemographyÕ and is entirely connected to human populationÓ (–mer 
(Akalin), 1339
/1923, p. 8).   
 While it is unsurprising to see a governmental subject linking social geography and 
demography, it is interesting to see the rhetorical and pedagogical work being done in his attempt 
to teach a wider public about the statistical encroachment into their lives; one that proposes to  
provide Òmore correct information about the structure and composition of populationÓ which can 
then be used by the government to administer vital precautions and measures for the general 
well-being (–mer (Akalin), 1339/1923, p. 9).  In short, it was important that demography be seen 
as benevolent in order to frame censuses and ethnographic surveys as not only informational but 
also crucial. Furthermore, not only does Dr. Besim –mer act as a booster of sorts for the highly 
" 143regulated and scientific deployment of statistics (rendered throughout the text as both
 ihs›iyy›t 
and 
istatistik
) and demographic techniques. He also notably relied upon numerous infographic 
representations of demographic data as seen in
 images 18 through 40.
   Statistical analysis 
coupled with scientific expertise was the answer, for Òas an eye accustomed to a deep darkness is 
influenced by the light, so too does one remain in a state of ignorance until the expert shocks the 
one left in silence with soundÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 
53).   This bodily imagery is not 
merely a cliched metaphorical device; in his writings, it is also the primary object of 
governmental intervention.   
 For Dr. Besim –mer, it is abundantly clear that a dearth in reliable statistical information 
(a critique that was also observed in the writings of Dr. Muslihiddin Safvet) was Òa hindrance to 
any state effort to understand the demographic factors so central to the livelihood of the Turkish 
nationÓ and to heal the social body of the state (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 14); moreover, he 
argued that European nations had been expanding statistical analysis in all branches of 
government for quite some time, find the fields of economics, social and political affairs, health 
and hygiene, and public works and infrastructural development equally amenable to 
quantification and analysis (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 20) and that the Turkish state should 
spend as much if not more time, effort, and resources on scientific demography as it does on 
other political and military activities in order to better understand the nature of population 
decline in the young Republic Òbefore it should tumble into a pit of despairÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 
1339/1923, p. 20-21).  
  With the importance of statistical analysis of populations established, –mer moved on to 
address his primary concern:  the detrimental impact of both population decline and a poorly 
" 144constituted population on the health of the national body.  Here he shifts metaphorical structures 
again, this time using medical terminology to diagnose the state.  Essentially, population decline 
is attributed to two sources, which –mer categorized as Òsocial diseasesÓ or those factors that are 
usually temporary and exogenous in nature (e.g. war with a foreign nation) and Òdiseases of the 
stateÓ which are seen as chronic and persistent structural deficiencies of governance and 
leadership (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 9).  It is these chronic diseases of the state that are 
most harmful and hardest to overcome.  While Dr. –mer did acknowledge that  past regimes 
have taken seriously the matter of population decline, he lamented that these efforts were 
frequently short-lived; he noted that even in the revolutionary fervor surrounding the war for 
independence, the topic of population decline was Òbriefly taken up as a matter of concern, but 
then quickly forgottenÓ  (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 10).  As such, these persistent forms of 
systematic population decline, linked to the negligence of the state, were Òfar more dangerous 
than even the most terrifying of conflicts and the most virulent of diseases.Ó  In fact:
  It is impossible to heal from such a malady 
(chronic population decline); 
one is overcome 
by the effect of an imperceptible yet persistent and common malady; although they see the 
danger, the causes of said destruction are not perceived; a population comprised of such 
(ignorant)
 individuals resembles the tree whose branches have withered and yellowed in spring 
having yielded its sap  
(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 10).
  ÒWeak states are naturally overcome by strong ones;Ó however, for him a far more 
terrifying prospect was the state succumbing to a Òlanguid yet stealthy, persistent, and chronic 
" 145anemic conditionÓ (
i.e. mmin bir fakrmdir) 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 11).
  He continued by noting that history is replete with such societies which, on the outside, appear 
vibrant and prosperous, yet inside they rot away until one day these previously ÒfecundÓ 
societies become barren.  The intersection of medical and landscape metaphors is of note here, 
especially after considering the nature of environmental narratives centered in the Anatolian 
bozkõr
 (literally barren or uncultivated land) which were discussed in the previous chapters.   
  Dr. Besim –mer often focused on explicating the causes of population decline in an 
international comparative context by providing a detailed yet simplistic accounting of various 
demographic terms and concepts like population density (
kesafet-ius), 
which are generally 
accompanied by charts and tables detailing the population densities of several European 
countries .  One such chart is transliterated (from Ottoman), translated, and replicated below:
 Memleket (Country)   kilometre-i murabbõna isabet eden nfus (pop/sq km)
 Bel“ika (Belgium)      
252 #ngiltere ve Gal (England and Wales)    239     
 #talya (Italy)       121     
 Almanya (Germany)      120
 Table 2: 
Population Density in Selected European Countries
 (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 
13).     
 " 146Table 2 (contÕd) 
Avusturya ve Macaristan (Austria and Hungary)  76     
 Fransa (France)      74 
  Dr. –mer spends a fair amount of time detailing the historical geographies of 
demography for a few countries.  The case study of France was of particular interest to him;  the 
French population stood at twenty million in 1700, making it the largest country in Europe in 
terms of population at the time as it accounted for forty percent of the total European population 
that year.  However, by 1800 its population had only grown by seven million and it accounted for 
merely fifteen percent if the total European population and by 1900, at a meager twenty eight 
million, only about 10 percent of the total European population.  Comparing Germany to France, 
he emphasized that over a 40 year period (figure 2), Germany had grown by over twenty four 
million while France struggled to grow by three million.  In the alarmist narrative that Dr. –mer 
created,  it appears that despite an overall trend toward population growth in countries 
throughout the world,  the French population remained stagnant and periodically experienced 
population loss despite an era free of war and contagious disease.       
 Based off of his calculations, while Saxony, Norway, Prussia, Holland, and Romania 
topped the charts with average annual crude birth rates of between thirteen and fourteen per one 
thousand between 1881 and 1900, countries like Ireland and Spain were near the bottom at about 
five per one thousand and France barely registered at one per one thousand (–mer (Akalõn), 
1339/1923, p. 19).  It should be noted that these figures seem low compared to more modern 
" 147evaluations of crude birth and death rates during these years and due to a lack of sources cited in 
his writings it is unclear as to where his figures came from.  Nevertheless,  he used these 
statistical summaries and graphics as a narrative device for demonstrating comparative growth 
and decline and illustrating the danger inherent in low population growth via charts (see, for 
example, figures 3 and 4 below) as well as line graphs and even sensationalized flag emblazoned 
bar graphs which represented new births out of every ten thousand in the population in 1913 in 
selected countries throughout Europe (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 16, 18) (see images 18, 19, 
and 20 at the end of this chapter).
 Country  1871   1910   Additional Population 
Germany  41 million  65 million   24 million  
Austria   35    51    15   
England  31   45    14   
France   36   39    3   
Italy   26   35    9 
Table 3: 
Population Growth Over a 40 Year Span in Selected European Empires
 (–mer 
(Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 17).
 " 148Year  Germany Aust/Hung England Italy     France 
  1899  795,107 535,874 376,847 385,165 31,394   
1900  759,757 507,752 339,232 208,450 -25,988  
1905  792,830 390,838 409,202 345,178 37,120   
1910  879,113 572,520 413,779 461,774 71,418
 Table 4:  
Annual Change in Population in Selected Years, 1899-1910
 (–mer (Akalõn), 
1339/1923, p. 1
7).  For Dr. Besim –mer, population density was a highly contingent phenomenon that both 
impacted and was influenced by spatially variable social, political, economic, and environmental 
factors.  He is quick to point out the devastating impact brought about by sudden and dramatic 
shifts in population (attributable for example, to war and disease) such as recent mass rural-to-
urban migrations:  
  As a result of this population shift, not only will sanitary conditions in the city be 
degraded, so too will many be exposed to contagious disease, deprived of important agricultural 
labors of the villages,
 and subsequently a generation of villagers will decline, languishing in the 
9cities (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 13).
    i.e. those rural labors frequently described in texts of the era as virtuous and character building, similar to pro-
9agrarian narratives in other regions
" 149 Furthermore, in support of his pastoral ideals, Dr. –mer also saw urban life as a 
corrupting force upon the reproductive proclivities of a fertile Turkish nation.  He saw urban 
lifestyle as one which engendered and internal conflict in most Turks, who were naturally 
inclined to a particular way of life but were tempted by the material comforts and ÒprosperityÓ of 
an urban lifestyle which thus served as a check on the desire for larger families, a Òsign of the 
vileness found in all urbane nations and societiesÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 24). Urban 
lifestyles and the wealthy factions of Turkish society were less likely to contribute to the vital 
demographic life blood of the nation. He argued that wealthy families opted to have fewer if any 
children as a means for controlling the allocation of family fortunes.  A deplorable outgrowth of 
this was the single-child wealthy family in which the young scion Òpassed their time in a leprous 
way, assured of their monetary inheritanceÓ but deprived of any noble genetic stock or work 
ethic ((–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 25).
  The inclusion of such social commentaries was a common facet of all of his works but 
especially of his later writings.  He was quick to describe the fundamental difference between 
contributing facets of population change, most notably the differing causes of increased and 
decreased rates of birth (
tevlfld›t), 
death (
vefey›t), 
and migration (
muh›ceret)
.  While each of 
these is attended to in the opening book of the 
Population Politics
 series, managing birth rates 
and decreasing infant mortality rates is given immediate prominence, particular in light of what 
Dr. –mer described as a trend toward declining birth rates in industrialized nations (see image 20 
at the end of this chapter, a line graph he included that detailed declining birth rates between 
roughly 1875 and 1911 in Germany, Italy, England, and France) (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 
22).   " 150 For Dr. –mer, with respect to birth rates in Turkey, one pressing matter was the 
persistence of Malthusian Ôvoluntary limits to population growthÕ especially in urban centers.  
More specifically, he laments what he sees as the widespread (yet tacit) acceptance of the 
Òcriminal actÓ of forced or compelled abortion (
õskat-i cenin) 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 22).  
However, for him this was merely part of a complex of political, social, structural, and sanitary 
matters that disrupted the ÒfecundÓ and ÒbountifulÓ nature of Turkish women, of whom 
frequently produced Òeight to ten or moreÓ children in a lifetime (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 
23).  And here is where the –merian mantra that will come to dominant his later works is most 
clearly articulated:  
  The population of a nation increases not with new infant birth, but with those that remain 
healthyÉmoreover, the provision of health and sanitary services that contribute to the longevity 
of elderly populations facilitates only sustenance of the inactive component of a the 
populationÉ.therefore, in order to increase population in support of the nation, the most 
effective measure is the encouragement and support of high birth rates and of families consisting 
of at least three children (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 23-24).
  As previously noted, urban conditions tended to have a detrimental impact on overall 
population growth rates.  While I have already articulated his argument in this vein with respect 
to wealthier classes, he also saw urban and, more specifically, industrialized society as having a 
negative impact on birth rates amongst the lower classes.  Forced to work long hours laboring 
away in factories, both poor men and women are impacted negatively; in particular, the 
" 151traditional domestic duties of women are severely circumscribed and their health is placed at 
risk, making it less likely for them to have children. Here, he valorized what was considered the 
most vital role of women: as vessels for the production and maintenance of children.  So much so 
that Òevery pregnant women and wet nurse should underlie the preservation of society.Ó 
Moreover, in order to facilitate the preservation of these reproductive powers, all manner of 
governmental assistance should be supplied; for Òif there is a lack of children in a country with 
sufficient resources, let us use these resources to acquire children as we acquire armaments and 
iron-clad machines that are put into service in industry and agricultureÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 
1339/1923, p. 26-
27).    Dr. Besim –merÕs regulatory proposals are numerous and he called for a much stronger 
governmental role as both a provider of material support and as a facilitator of quality education 
in carrying out ÔdomesticÕ affairs in a sanitary way.  For example, he noted that governmental 
support or regulations should be established which allowed pregnant lower class women to take a 
two-month paid leave of absence from their place of work; furthermore, he advocated for a four-
month paid maternity leave for these women as well, allowing them to bond with and, most 
importantly, nurse their infant children.  He also promoted numerous benefits for larger families 
of three or more children, including the provision of sanitary work and dwelling places at lower 
rents, decreased property taxes for families of six children or more, and raises and promotions 
for civil servant fathers of larger families.  He even went so far as to advocate legislated 
ÔpunishmentsÕ for childless families including additional taxes and, in the case of civil servants, 
ÔpromotionsÕ to less desirable locales (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 27-28)
.   " 152 In terms of educational measures, he called for the establishment and support of various 
charitable and collective organizations, such as the 
Society for Solidarity Amongst Mothers
 and 
the publication of journals and propaganda targeting the general population that extoll the virtues 
of large families, denounce Malthusian principles, and vilify abortion in all circumstances.
  The 
10issue of censorship emerged repeatedly throughout the texts.  Most notably, he argued that some 
journals had gone so far as to make quite blasphemous arguments about the natural law of 
population growth.  He fumed that Òinfant and child mortality should not be considered a natural 
law of population growthÓ and that Òallegations that the extension and support of life in 
sanitariums and hospitals would place undue burdens upon countries and familiesÓ were patently 
false (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 57).  Since he does not disclose his sources, additional work 
is necessary to determine the prominence of Malthusian-oriented and alternative perspectives on 
population during this period.  Taking things further, he called for legal reforms that would place 
abortion on par with murder, punish non-licensed midwives to the fullest extent of the law, 
provide supervisory measures for all birthing clinics, and suppress newspapers and other 
periodicals that promoted favorable views on abortion clinics and Malthusian ideas (–mer 
(Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 
30-31).  Beyond the regulation and promotion of birth, Dr. Besim –mer also articulated a clear 
concern with the impact of highly contagious diseases (
emr›z-i s›riye, indif›iyye, ve mtevliye)
; however, his primary concern is their detrimental impact on infants and young children, the 
future generations and prestige of the Turkish nation.  Many of his concerns mirror the 
concurrent work that was being done in the previously assessed 
Medical and Social 
 Balsoy demonstrated that the place of abortion in Islamic jurisprudence was not necessarily cut and dry and was 
10frequently more of a religio-political matter.
" 153Geographies.
  For instance, drawing on recent efforts in European countries like France, 
Germany, and the UK, he noted that inoculations, vaccines, sanitary engineering
 and the like 
11had been steadily halving, and even eradicating in some instances, morbidity and mortality rates 
for a host of illnesses, from smallpox (“icek), cholera (
kolera
), typhoid fever (
karahumma
), typhus 
(lekelihumma)
, malaria (
õsõtma), measles (kõzamõk), paratyphoid fever (humma-i 
$
ebeh 
tifo) and a host of other debilitating ailments which were commonplace throughout Anatolia as 
well (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 32-35)
.    A point of departure from the 
Medical and Social Geographies
 was Dr. –merÕs additional 
interest in a host of other degenerative social ailments, e.g alcoholism (
D›'-k 
or alkol 
"
k
#).  He had previously written extensively on the topics of drugs and society in his 
three book collection entitled 
Narcotics and Intoxicants 
(eyyifat vekirattan
), which 
focused especially on alcohol (
mkirat
), tobacco (
t
), coffee (
kahve
), tea (
“ay
), marijuana 
(esrar
), and opium (
afyon
).  In all of his later writings he lamented the rising prevalence of 
alcoholism in a nation that Òtraditionally experienced relatively low incidence in relation to 
Europe,Ó treating it as a symptom of the disorder and disarray of the late Ottoman decades (–mer 
(Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 32-35).   As Ottoman scholars and historians of the wider region have 
demonstrated, periods of alcohol (and other intoxicant) consumption and prohibition reveals a 
 At several points, he makes similar reference as Muslihiddin Safvet to Òdirty and previously used waterÓ flowing 
11uncontrollably through villages and neighborhoods as a primary cause of especially epidemic bouts of tyhoid fever 
and cholera (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 3
6)." 154much more complicated history than such a linear-degenerative narrative would indicate.
  This 
12interpretation is no doubt partially related to –merÕs anti-Hamidian, eugenicist, and pro-social 
welfare and regulation stance.  As such, he praised the recent (1920) establishment of 
organizations like the Turkish Green Crescent Society or Hilal-i Ahdar' CemÕiyyetleri and its 
frequent publication of manuals and pamphlets that graphically depicted the dangers of alcohol 
and drug consumption, including the ways in which such intoxicants contributed to behaviors, 
environments, and bodily dispositions that invited and exacerbated diseases.
  According to the 
13governmental logic that drives Dr. Besim –mer the implementation of measures for diagnosing 
and eradicating such social diseases is not only a matter of state interest, but vital to its very 
survival:  ÒFrom a scientific standpoint, the day we provide defensive measures against these 
preventable diseases, every additional year we will regain that population we have lostÓ and that 
the government should Òoccupy itself with matters of hygieneÓ as a means for Òstrengthening the 
raceÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 35).
    See, for example, such classic works on the topic as: 
12Hattox, R. S. (1985). Coffee and coffeehouses: The origins of a social beverage in the Medieval Near East. Seattle: 
Distributed by University of Washington Press.
 Matthee, R. P. (2005). The pursuit of pleasure: Drugs and stimulants in Iranian history, 1500-1900. Princeton, N.J: 
Princeton University Press.
 As well as more recent engagements in the late Ottoman and early Republican context: 
Evered, K. (Forthcoming). From rakõ to ayran: regulating the place and practice of drinking in Turkey. 
Space and 
Polity. 
Evered, – and Evered, K. (Forthcoming). A geopolitics of drinking:  Debating the place of alcohol in early 
republican Turkey. 
Political Geography.
 This line of governmental propagandizing against alcohol and drug consumption and their link to infectious 
13disease would continue on, as represented by image 13, 
Tuberculosis is the Enemy of Man 
in which alcohol 
consumption is intimated to directly (by weakening the immune system) and indirectly (by enticing individuals to 
engage in harmful and even lascivious behavior that exposed them to disease) contribute to the contraction and 
spread of infectious disease.
" 155 He simplified his overall narrative to four fundamental talking points:  Òfirst, protection 
from disease is absolutely possible (and thus any failure engage with these precautions sooner 
indicated a failure of government, i.e. the triumphalist scientific argument); second, preventable 
diseases do not only cause death, but they impact the future health and livelihood of the nation 
(i.e. the eugenicist argument); the means and necessary tasks for struggling with and defending 
against disease is well known, i.e. public hygiene; in order for public and private measures to be 
effective, a well trained coterie of medical professionals and public officials are required to 
ensure the publicÕs participation (the governmental subject, i.e. authorities of delimitation 
argument).  To know (the proper sanitary behaviors and tasks), and pursue diligently,  is the basis 
of hygieneÓ  (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 37).
   And the primary object of this diligent focus on sanitation and hygiene was the Turkish 
          child for Òthe death of a child is the loss of social capital that can never be restored to the parents 
or the countryÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 47).  For Dr. Besim –mer it is absolutely 
unconscionable that child and infant mortality rates remain so high in his country as, in his 
estimation, the childÕs body should start off as naturally unspoiled and unsullied by the 
contaminants and lifestyle choices of adults.  As such, the exorbitant infant mortality rate in 
Turkey
 as compared with other European nations (see Figure 5 and 6 below) was seen by him 
14as breakdown on two levels: the individual (i.e. parenting, or more specifically, motherhood) and 
the social (i.e. the establishment of a sufficient child welfare system by the state) (–mer 
 Again, he includes several graphical references to this in the text (see, for example, see images 20 through 25 
14(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 60-61, 63)).
  He also lamented that European must have been shocked by the child 
mortality rates in Turkey, often in excess of eighty percent mortality (as compared with the European conception of 
Ôrelatively highÕ rates in the vicinity of twenty five percent mortality) (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 51).  Similar 
graphics, depicting infant mortality via a thermometer, appeared in the later 1936 publication, as depicted in Image 
24 (–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 
14" 156(Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 50).  He also noted that recording mortality rates alone was insufficient, 
as including incidence rates of disease would provide a more complete picture of the widespread 
depravation.
 Country  Infant Mortality Rate
                                           Saxony  28.2         
                                                                                                   Bavaria  28        
                                                                                                      Wtemberg  26         
                                                                                             Austria  25         
                                                                                                      Prussia  20.7         
                                                                                                   Italy  19         
                                                                                                           Spain  19         
                                                                                                         Holland  17.5         
                                                                                                  France  17         
                                                                                                       Belgium  16.2    
                                                                          
                                                                                                                      Table 5:  
Countries with the Highest Rates of Child Mortality in 1905 (in Percentages or 
Deaths/100) 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 55).
 " 157Country  Infant Mortality Rate 
                                          England  14        
                                                                                                     Scotland  12         
                                                                                                    Switzerland  11         
                                                                                               Sweden  10         
                                                                                                     Ireland  9.6         
                                                                                                      Norway  9.0   
                                                                   Table 6:  
Countries with the Lowest Rates of Child Mortality in 1905 (in percentages or 
deaths/100)
: (note that German regions maintain the highest child mortality rates) (–mer 
(Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 56)
.    
                                                         While disease certainly loomed large as a threat to the nationÕs children, in Besim –merÕs 
            narrative a much greater danger presented itself.  He drew comparisons between infant humans 
and other animals, noting that young humans lacked the development of early survival instincts 
and were thus entirely dependent on their parents.  And while he commiserated with parents, 
acknowledging that Òthe one who raises a child faces far greater challenges than the gardener in 
his gardenÓ a the dry Anatolian 
bozkir, 
he made it clear that the survival of future generations 
hinged upon attentive parenting that was always vigilant of the danger inherent in  a childÕs 
surroundings (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 50).
  He scoffed at those who held either 
15 This was graphically illustrated by several of the images that came from sanitation and hygiene propaganda 
15related to the Òwar on tuberculosisÓ as shown in images 6-10.  
" 158Malthusian or certain pseudo-Darwinian perspective and those who saw infant and child 
mortality as a ÔnaturalÕ forms of population control.  For example, he pointed to the example of 
Bavaria and noted that, while some argued that child mortality helped cull the population of the 
unfit, countries like Bavaria were in fact ravaged by persistent disease Òas indicated by large 
numbers of individuals exempt from military conscription due to their poor health and 
constitutionÓ (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 57).      
                                           He instead argued that alleviating infant morality rates would lead to the desired outcome 
            of a stronger national body.  To be sure, concern about infant and child mortality was and 
remains not only a matter of prudent governance but of general humanistic impulses; that being 
said, Dr. Besim –mer doesnÕt obfuscate his overarching concerns with child welfare behind a 
purely humanitarian veil.  It is the livelihood and longevity of nation and state that are the 
primary driving factors behind his articulation of the population problem, its causes, and 
potential amelioration and eventual elimination.  The darker edge to these biopolitical concerns 
is best articulated in the following statement and occurs in different forms throughout his later 
works:            
                                                                                                                     
                                                                                                                        In the countries where infant and child mortality rates are higher, concern regarding this 
            matter is no doubt well understood in the office of military conscription.  (Beyond This) The 
causes of infant and child mortality do not only deprive oneÕs country of many children.  Perhaps 
another important effect is found in the overall weakening of those who survive and remain.  As 
such, the primary task of public health is to study the causes of child mortality and its prevention 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 50).  
 " 159 The most important factor to consider, regarding a countryÕs endurance, existence, and 
             future is the protection of children against the sources of pre-mature death and, given a wide 
array of (scientific) information, to work to eliminate these sources as much as possible (–mer 
(Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 5
8).  If we are able to sustain the lives of the children that pass away each year, our homeland 
             will have been afforded thousands and thousands of brave soldiers (–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 5).
16                Reading these statements together reveals his primary concerns: the preservation and 
            strengthening of a Turkish 
race 
capable of defending the 
vatan
 or motherland.  Read in the 
broader context of late Ottoman and early Republican history, this can be seen as an outgrowth 
of the Turkish geographical imaginary that fashioned Anatolia as a beleaguered and vulnerable 
land, constantly besieged by enemies from all sides, and in need of strong ÔdomesticÕ warriors in 
both contexts.  Soldiers defended territory. But these soldiers needed to be born, protected, 
nurtured, strengthened, and cultivated.  As such, their mothers and (primarily female) caregivers 
were also conscripted.  Motherhood was a patriotic duty and one not to be taken lightly.  In a 
schizophrenic fashion, that most vital, basic, and natural of roles, one that had been instinctually 
taken up and fashioned for centuries, required guidance and reshaping under the penetrating gaze 
of modern hygiene and medicine.  With this rubric in place, three specific fronts for combatting 
infant and child mortality are explicated, all of which are initially detailed in the first volume and 
 Perhaps even more convincing are the captions included on many of the patriotic and propagandistic images 
16scattered throughout his writings alongside the seemingly more ÔobjectiveÕ charts, tables, and other assorted 
graphics.  See images 26 through 29 and image 40.
" 160then fleshed out in volumes two through four, i.e. 
Science and Marriage, Pregnancy and 
Precautions in Pregnancy, 
and 
Child Rearing
:  monitoring and modifying the environmental and 
sanitary characteristics at the childÕs place of residence, punishing parental neglect, and re-
educating ignorant mothers (as well as midwives, wet nurses, and physicians assistants) as 
scientific mothers (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 59).     
                                    With respect to governmental involvement on these fronts, Dr. Besim –mer noted that 
            public health campaigns alone would not bring an end to the sources of child and infant 
mortality, as centuries of superstition and tradition had solidified a culture of ignorance and 
acceptance of unsanitary and unscientific medical conditions and practices.  As such, a carefully 
crafted Òcampaign against ignoranceÓ and a thorough Òreminder of the errors of the pastÓ would 
be initially required (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 60).  This overall campaign, as articulated in 
one popular medical source (the Journal of the Turkish Red Crescent) in conjunction with a host 
of public health laws that were launched in the late 1920s and early 1930s, as it was targeted 
especially to women is the subject of the following chapter.       
                        As expected, while parents are initially mentioned, mothers are the primary target of 
            regulation and reform, as their material and productive capacities are diagrammed and analyzed 
with respect to where regulatory and scientific intervention are required.  For example, nursing 
via breastmilk (
irz›Õ-i m›der-›ne
), its sanitary provisioning, and the procurement of equally 
hygienic substitutes in extreme circumstances are fundamental concerns throughout his writings. 
Nourishing the youth of the nation depended upon it, though he cautioned that Òalthough 
motherÕs breast milk is an effective agent in the campaign against child mortality, it is of the 
utmost importance that its use be in accordance with sanitary conditionsÓ as impure or 
" 161contaminated breast milk was also a source of disease and debilitation (from tuberculosis for 
example) (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 63).  He also warned that reliance on animal milk 
($rz›Õ-i sõn›fl
) indicated either laziness (on the part of typically more affluent mothers) or poverty 
(due to the young mother being forced to return immediately to work) and that it would 
ultimately cause weakness, poor development, and even death.  The simple chart he provided is 
replicated below in Figure 7: 
Artificial/Animal Milk   80 percent mortality    
                                                   Non-continual Breastfeeding   12 percent mortality    
                                         Only Breastfeed   3 percent mortality
                                                          
                                                                                                                      Table 7:  
High Rate of Infant Mortality in Infants Nourished on CowÕs Milk From Birth
 (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 63)
.  Dr. Besim –mer essentialized the Turkish women down to her primary role as a mother, 
            and all good Turkish mothers, he argued, should be properly trained and forced to dispel all 
foolish folklore and traditional practices.  Furthermore, he argued, women should not even be 
allowed to marry Òso long as they donÕt learn the proper science of child rearingÓ as dictated by 
" 162this new cadre of experts in fields like obstetrics and  sanitary engineering.
  He laid out three 
17tenets central to this practice of scientific motherhood:  first, every mother should, to the best of 
her ability, breastfeed her own child; in extreme circumstances where this may be impossible, the 
state should step in and provide hygienic and pure animal milk
; finally, every girl and young 
18women should be educated in the Òscience of child rearingÓ (“ocmek fenni) (–mer 
(Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 71).            
                                                                         The stateÕs primary role (a nanny state of sorts, although quite different than the 
            pejorative term used in the western European and American contexts since the 1960s) is to 
ensure primary motherly practices; in short, this meant both the punishment of dereliction of 
maternal duties and the establishment of an infrastructure of support, particularly for the 
impoverished factions of Turkish society.  Both state founded organizations as well as hybrid 
state supported yet private foundations, ranging from the Red Crescent Society to the Milk Drops 
program, to the MothersÕ Union and the Kindness of MothersÕ Society and the more expansive 
laws and societies geared toward the protection of children (of which more will be said in the 
following chapter) were incorporated into this vision (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 72-75).  In 
terms of physical infrastructure, he also called upon the state to construct and regulate sanitary 
dairies and construct nurseries as well as clinics and sanatariums
 geared toward obstetrics and 
19 Graphic depictions of this science can be found throughout his writings.  This included images displaying the 
17proper use of breast pumps, appropriate methods for swaddling and bathing children, and even charts for analyzing 
an infantÕs stool in order to determine the digestive health of the baby.  See images
 30 through 35 for a few examples 
of this.
 Dr. Besim –mer provided lots of examples as to  how this should proceed and provided numerous detailed charts 
18and graphics including those that demonstrated how the milk pasteurization process should occur and where 
facilities should be located with respect to the population.  See images 36 and 
37. This included the detailed mapping of the layout and structures of these facilities alongside the extolling of their 
19virtues and benefits.  See 
image 38 and 39.
" 163pediatrics that would provide support and regular examines for both infants and their mothers.   
 Dr. Besim –merÕs governmental vision was expansive with respect to all aspects of 
            maternity and post-maternity.  His opinions on child birth and child rearing, as I have 
demonstrated, mixed scientific observation with patriotic fervor and political grand-standing; this 
is made all the more interesting when one takes into account not his decades of medical training, 
Directorship of the Turkish Red Crescent Society during WWI, establishment of professional 
nursing programs and the training of hundreds of nurses, nor his founding of organizations to 
combat childhood tuberculosis and preserve general child welfare, but rather the fact that he 
himself never appears to have married nor had any children.  Marriage, the production of 
children, the preservation of the hygienic domestic sphere:  these were all tasks that he deemed 
essential to the survival of the fledgling Turkish state.  Yet he himself didnÕt directly participate.  
Instead, he fashioned himself as another symbolic father figure; though, perhaps it would be 
more appropriate to see him as the metaphorical or archetypal matriarch that engendered modern 
TurkeyÕs engagement with scientific motherhood, i.e. a sort of transgendered sacrifice to the 
vatan.               
                                                                                                         In the chapter that follows, I further explore the production and dissemination of these 
            gendered governmentalities regarding health, hygiene, space, sanitary citizenship, and scientific 
motherhood.  I pay particular attention to the journal of the Turkish Red Crescent Society, but 
also draw attention to various laws and regulations that emerged during the period.   
" 164APPENDIX 
!165!166Figure 16:  
The Population of Large Countries in Western Europe (in 
millions)
 (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 16).
 Note that German is the large trend line on the top of the chart, followed 
in descending order by Austria/Hungary, England, France, and Italy.He 
draws attention to FranceÕs stagnant population growth via the dark black 
trend line.
!167Figure 17: 
 Relative Annual Population Growth Ratio per 10,000 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 18).
 The German Empire is on top, followed by England, Austria/Hungary, 
Italy, and France.  Period covers 1881-1900.
       !168Figure 18:  
Crude Birth Rates of the Principle European Countries (per 1000 
population)
 (–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 22).  
  Note Germany an the top, followed by Italy, England, and France.  CBR is generally 
declining in all of these countries (period between 1875-1911).
      !169Figure 19: 
The Primary Causes 
of Death in Infants 
(–mer 
(Akalõn), 
1339/1923, p. 60).
Figure 20:  
The Primary Causes 
of Death in Infants (Reprint)
(–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 42)
.!170Figure 21:  
Infant Mortality and Type of Nursing 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 61)
.  This chart demonstrates recorded infant mortality 
rates of babies at nursing age. The graph was used to 
highlight the relatively high spike in infant mortality 
rates of babies nursed on formula (gray bars) versus 
those nursed on motherÕs milk (black bars).
!171Figure 22:  
Infant Mortality Rates of Nursing Age Children 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 63)
.   Another graphic chart infant mortality rates of nursing children 
!172Figure 23:  
Thermometer of Child Mortality
 (–mer
 (Akalõn), 1339/1923, p. 63).
 Top: 
Out of every thousand children born, those that die by the age of one. 
Bottom:  
Thermometer showing the child mortality. 
!173Figure 24: 
 Be Certain, My Beloved Homeland! 
(–mer 
(Akalõn), 1341/1925, p. 2, authorÕs collection). 
  This sample propaganda piece highlights the fusing of infant 
care and patriotic duty.  These images were typically included 
alongside the more scientifically oriented graphics and charts.
!174Figure 25:  
MotherÕs Love and Care
 –mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 
63, authorÕs collection).
   Without that pink face the flag is meaningless.  Without the 
child, there is nothing for tomorrow!
 !175Figure
 26:  
Child and Crescent 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1938, Back 
Cover
, authorÕs collection). 
!176Figure 27:
  If We Save and Protect
 (–mer (Akalõn), 1938, p. 1, authorÕs collection). 
 If we save and protect each of our children that is born each year, if we nurture them 
through good care, our homeland will be strengthened, enriched, and advanced
,!177Figure 28:  
Healthy, Robust Children
 (–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 22, authorÕs collection).  
 The child on top 
(right)
 is at six weeks and unable to hold its head up.  The child on the 
bottom 
(left) 
is now curious about everything.  The child in the middle is at ten months and 
although he is being held, he is able to stand and take a few steps on his own.  
This is a 
sample detailed graphic depiction of proper scientific child rearing tactics.  These were 
frequent images in the texts produced by medical experts in Turkey.
!178Figure 29:  
Baby Feces Barometer 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 43, authorÕs collection).  
 Just as the barometer provides information on impending weather conditions, so to is 
it able to demonstrate whether or not a childÕs fecal matter indicates healthy digestion 
The four categories, clockwise from top, indicate healthy golden stool, indigestion, 
diarrhea, green and slimy stool.
!179Figure 30: 
The Proper Way to Remove a Newborn Child from the Bath 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1341/1925, p. 
37, authorÕs collection).
!180Figure 31:  
Special Space Allocated to Children Not Yet Able to 
Walk 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1341/1925, p. 158, authorÕs collection)
. !181Figure 32:  
Why Am I Crying? 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 48, authorÕs collection). 
 Another sample graphic used to simplify motherhood through the categorization of 
infant needs and their signals. 
!182Figure 33:  
Children Require Ample Fresh Air and Sunlight 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 62, authorÕs collection)
. !183Figure 34:  
Clean and Sterile MilkingÉspecialized milking spaces, bottles being 
filled with milk on the lower level
 (–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 33, authorÕs 
collection)
.   Domestic care was expanded beyond the space of the home to other sites of national 
well-being. 
!184Figure 35:  
Ideal Dairy Industry 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 36, authorÕs collection). 
Along the top: 
farms in separate neighborhoods. 
Center
:  pasteurization and testing 
laboratory.
 Bottom:  
train station for distribution 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 36, 
authorÕs collection)
. !185Figure 36:  
A Nursing Room Plan 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 72, authorÕs collection).
   1. Nursing Hall.  2. Changing station. 3. Kitchen. 4. Vestibule. 5. and 6. Quarantine station. 
a. cupboard. c. chair. f. stove and oven. i. furnace. s. dirty laundry. t. table. v. water closet. 
B. bathtub. T. carpet.
!186Figure 37:  
Edirnekapõ Health Center 
(–mer (Akalõn), 
1936, p. 118).
 Facility. Lower level - sun and sand baths. Conference hall, 
nursery, children at dinner and playtime
.!187Figure 38:  
Infant Demands 
(–mer (Akalõn), 1936, p. 21, authorÕs collection).
Certainly we also have a right to be heard.  In order for us not too die or be killed we 
require:  motherÕs milk and care,knowledgeable and experienced midwives, protection from 
flies, to live in sanitary conditions, healthy parents, dry diapers, fresh air and sun, etc.  In 
addition to these we want social care and assistance
. Chapter 5 
ÒHow shall we overcome ignorance?Ó
: 1the Red Crescent Magazine & the conscription of sanitary citizens
 5.1  Anatomo-politics, biopolitics, and the state 
 In this fourth and final chapter, I seek to extend the argument developed by Evered and 
Evered concerning education as an essential apparatus within a stateÕs Òsphere of governingÓ as it 
pertains to measuring and directing biopower (2012a) and the rise of preventative forms of 
medicine (2011).  Specifically, Òas a practice integral to statesÕ Òconduct of conduct,Ó (as 
originally cited in Foucault, 1991, p. 48) schooling/training/propagandizing is a technique 
exercised in concert with statesÕ deployments of their resources throughout their territories to 
fulfill their populationsÕ perceived needsÑand to reassure their populations that these needs have 
been addressedÓ (Evered, K.T. & Evered, E.–., 2012a
, p. 311-312). 
 Thus far, the documents that I have relied upon have demonstrated various methods by 
which narratives of health and hygiene, as well as gendered bodies and spaces, were constructed, 
replicated, and disseminated within and amongst the surfaces of emergence of these narratives. 
In particular, the social and medical geographies and the writings of Besim –mer relate 
interwoven patterns of reasoning and diffuse deployments of power in republican era Turkey as 
fashioned and practiced within the discourse of public health and the governance of population.  
These discursive practices reflected the dualistic sense of power that Foucault famously fleshed 
 Title of lead story in the Hõlal-i Ahmer Mecmuasi
, Issue #90, 15 February 1929
1!188out in 
The History of Sexuality, Volume 1: An Introduction: 
i.e. over bodies in a direct 
disciplinary sense (Òanatomo-politics of the bodyÓ); and through populations in a regulatory 
capacity (Òbiopolitics of the populationÓ) (Foucault, 1990, p. 139).   
 As such, following more traditional understandings of formal power structures, one path 
of further inquiry might compel the researcher or historian to consider the legal articulation and 
codification of these efforts at further regulating and mandating health and hygiene reform in the 
young Republic, i.e. power as conceived in a juridical sense; with regards to the early Turkish 
Republic, as an authoritarian and single party state, there were numerous examples to consider in 
this context, including but not limited to such sweeping legal reforms as the 1930 Public Health 
Law.  However in the final chapter, as throughout this dissertation, I have opted to focus less on 
direct legal ramifications of the Turkish RepublicÕs increasing fascination with population 
management in the early years of its founding.  Again, this is inspired by (and to some extent 
partially a comment upon) HannahÕs call for a deep and engaged reading of governmental texts 
and a selective use of FoucaultÕs writings in a less than orthodox sense. However, my approach 
was also inspired by a re-reading of some of FoucaultÕs own (albeit oftentimes inconsistent and 
unclear) comments regarding his genealogical method. 
 As discussed in the literature review/methods chapter at the beginning of this dissertation,   
Anglophone geographers in particular began reading and engaging with FoucaultÕs work quite 
late.  Additionally, as discussed by Elden and Crampton in the introduction to 
Space, Knowledge, 
and Power, 
(2007) this engagement has tended to center selectively on the so-called Ôlater 
Foucault,Õ specifically his posthumously translated lectures (
Society Must Be Defended 
(1975-76), Security, Territory, and Population
 (1977-78), and 
The Birth of Biopolitics 
(1978-79).  !189Elden and Crampton note that much of this interest, beginning in the mid-1980s, also centered on  
the translation of interviews with geographers in the French journal 
H”rodote 
that appeared in 
the 1980 volume 
Power/Knowledge
 in which more directly accounts for some of his 
geographical interests.
 2 Despite this increasing and sustained interest in FoucaultÕs writings from the perspective 
of geography, I must re-emphasize at this point the complexity of engaging with FoucaultÕs 
works in a rigid periodization or from a sheltered perspective within one of these stages 
(something the ÔlaterÕ Foucault would have no doubt been intrigued and ÒamusedÓ by
).  As such, 
3a complex balance must be struck when selectively reading Foucault without considering the 
breadth and transformation of his thought and deployment of concepts.  While it is not essential 
(or perhaps even possible) to remain an orthodox Foucauldian (as Hannah repeatedly reminds us) 
without choosing one of his various incarnations, an archaeology/genealogy of FoucaultÕs 
concepts themselves is of some merit; if for no other reason than to draw out previously ignored 
or under-utilized concepts in his work.  
 Returning to my original point, in considering one of the foundational arguments put 
forth by Foucault regarding the nature of power (and biopower) in 
The History of Sexuality, 
it is 
important not to remain mesmerized by those fictitious understandings of power promulgated 
and sustained in the west that center its analysis on the legal and juridical, the restrictive and 
prohibitionary.  As such, further considerations of education (institutional or otherwise) as one 
 They are careful to note throughout 
Space, Knowledge, and Power
 that Foucault himself never seemed to focus 
2solely on the spatial or geographic in his work (Crampton and Elden, 2007).
 When asked in an interview, essentially, why the second volume of 
The History of Sexuality
 did not follow directly 
3from the plan outlined in the first, Foucault casually remarked ÒI changed my mind.  When a piece of work is not 
also an attempt to change what one thinks and even what one is, it is not very amusing.Ó
!190apparatus of the state directed at biopower are essential; however, I note that such an emphasis 
may still suffer from an over-emphasis on Òtop-downÓ as opposed to Òbottom-upÓ deployments 
of power if it only considers institutionally directed and centrally mandated educational methods 
and propagandizing techniques. This is a difficult problem to overcome given the limited 
availability and/or existence of certain archival materials. 
 In the chapter that follows, I emphasize the educational capacities of one such Ôauthority 
of delimitationÕ in the early Turkish Republic; the Turkish Red Crescent Society (Red Cross 
Society). Specifically, I will consider the publication of its own magazine; this was a publication 
that, like the writings of Dr. –mer, straddled both the technological, expert, and jargonistic, as 
well as the mundane and general-audience-oriented.  I have emphasized the interwar period 
(roughly 1921-1941) though the majority of directly relevant articles appeared between roughly 
1924-1935.  Finally, I have outlined in the paragraph below the three primary reasons why I have 
selected this publication as an extension of my argument thus far; 
I hope that my reasoning will 
become clearer following a brief discussion of the history of the organization and its role in the 
transition from the Ottoman Empire into the Turkish Republic.   
 First, many of the RepublicÕs leading medical authorities, including Dr. Besim –mer, 
served as executive officers with the Red Cross Society.  As such, the organizationÕs agenda 
(aside from those activities explicitly mandated of all institutions party to and/or ratifiers of the 
1863 International Red Cross Convention) was often a reflection of the individual interests of 
executive members
 (Hna, 2004, p. 60
!).  Second, while wartime humanitarian aid and 
191disaster relief were two of the major tasks of the Red Cross Society, beginning in the mid-1920s 
public health became an increasingly important focus Ñ sometimes to the extreme level of 
!191micro-management and micro-scale regulation of individual bodily functions, care, nutrition, etc.  
The title of this chapter itself is a direct play on the Red CrescentÕs overall place in the 
geographical imaginary of wartime (even-in-peacetime) activities and the frequent use of 
militaristic metaphors in public health propaganda.  Finally, again partly due to the nature of the 
individuals at its helm, the Red Cross Society often emphasized population management, infant 
mortality, and domestic care; realms that were highly gendered as female but often intervened 
upon by predominately male doctors and medical experts (though as many short histories of the 
Red Cross Society note, they also promoted the mediated entrance of women into the regulated 
field of medicine as nurses).  
  Following a short history I critically assess twenty years of the Red Cross SocietyÕs 
Hilal-
i Ahmer Mecmuasi, 
i.e. the Red Crescent Magazine.
  I provide an overall accounting of the 
4types and style of stories and articles presented in the journal, focusing primarily on those 
concerned with population management and the promotion of domestic (space of the home) 
health and hygiene practices; that being said, I will also reflect on shifting trends and emphases 
within the journal as they related to historical preoccupations.  Following this 20 year survey of 
the journal, book-ended by wars and consequently a dramatic shift in the focus of the publication 
beginning in the mid-1930s, I situate the narrative presented in the context of my overarching 
argument regarding the biopolitical imperatives of the Turkish state as they pertained to health, 
gender, and space Ñand more specifically, the Òproblem of populationÓ Ñ in the early decades 
of the twentieth century.  
 This would undergo several gradual name changes, eventually become the 
Kõzõlay Derne
!i 
following first the 
4official administrative end of the Ottoman Empire (1923) and later the Turkish language (script reform in 1928, 
establishment of the Turkish Language Institute in 1932).
!1925.2  The Red Crescent Society in the context of public health in the early         
Turkish Republic
 While it is nearly impossible to step into a bookstore in major cities like Ankara or Istanbul 
without seeing a general or pictorial history of the Red Crescent Society (common titles might 
proclaim 
Kõzõlay Derne
!õ tarih“esi
  Ñ a short history of the Red Crescent Society Ñ or 
occasionally under its Ottoman Era title 
Hilal-i Ahmer Cemiyeti
) critical histories of the 
5organization are significantly less common. That being said, Turkish scholars have produced a 
few notable works (in both English and Turkish) and I present a few of those here as they relate 
to my general argument.   
 First, a bit of background on the history of the Red Crescent Society.  In general, the 
Ottoman/Turkish incarnation of the Red Crescent Society has a fairly discontinuous and 
sputtering origin story.  While the Ottoman Empire originally ratified the International Red Cross 
and Red Crescent Movement on July 5th, 1865, roughly one year after the Geneva Convention 
that birthed it, the Ottoman Red Crescent Society was actually founded three separate times 
before it finally took hold in 1911. While medical professionals like the Ottoman Red CrescentÕs 
initial founder Dr. Abdullah Bey took an interest in the overall philosophy of the Red Cross/Red 
Crescent movement, i.e. the neutral assistance of wounded soldiers reconceptualized after injury 
as noncombatants, the Ottoman military in particular remained suspicious of the deployment of 
non-miltary individuals in wartime.  As such, interest and support in the maintenance of the Red 
Crescent Society periodically waxed and waned.   
 More recent examples include 
Hilal-i Ahmer'den KõzõlayÕa (from the Ottoman Red Crescent to the Turkish Red 
5Crescent - 
the title reflects the impact of the language reform as well as structural changes) by 
A. K., & 
Ulu
"tekin, M. (2001).
!193 In terms of less general and more topically oriented histories, it is quite easy to find 
passing reference to the influence of both the organization and its executive membership in the 
founding and support of modern nursing throughout the late Ottoman era and early Republic.  
This histories are commonplace in journals focused on nursing and nursing education and tend to 
follow a rather formulaic pattern as evidenced by this opening passage from a standard example; 
Florence Nightingale has considerable influence on the implementation of nursing in Turkey in a 
modern sense. Professor Dr. Besim –mer Akalin, representative of the Red Crescent Association, 
went to London in 1907 to attend the Red Cross Conference. When he met Florence Nightingale 
during this conference he was very impressed with her personality and her professional 
activitiesÉ
(Uyer
, 1984, p. 209). In fact, this narrative style is so commonplace in histories on the role of the Red Crescent in the 
establishment and promotion of nursing and nursing education programs that authors 
occasionally do not even bother to change the titles of their pieces.
  Other historical themes 
6include considerations of the relationship between the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies 
(Benthall, 1997)
 and the Red Crescent SocietyÕs war-time activities (Korkut, 2013).  
 7 However, One of the more ÔcriticalÕ strands of Red Crescent historiography considers the 
role of the institution as a Ôcivil society organization.Õ  In these approaches, an emphasis is placed 
 For example, compare UyerÕs publication in the 
International Journal of Nursing Studies 
in 1984 (Nursing 
6education in Turkey: past and present) with Bah“ecik and AlparÕs more recent piece (2009) in 
Nurse education today 
(Nursing education in Turkey: From past to present).  A slightly less similar but still derivative example can be seen 
in Dal and Kiti
#
Õs piece from 2008 in 
The Online Journal of Issues in Nursing 
(The historical development and 
current status of nursing in Turkey
).   Hilal-i Ahmer Mecmuasi 
often presented stories within its own publication that related the foundational 
7relationship between this institutions.  Annual retellings of this history were a common theme within the magazine.
!194on complicating and contextualizing the shifting spaces and symbolism of various public 
assistance programs (ranging from poor houses and orphanages to the Red Crescent itself) in the 
volatile Second Constitutional period ushered in by the Young Turk Revolution (1908).  For 
example, in the tradition of historians working on alternative articulations of modernization, 
–zbek (1999) described Òthe emergence of modern poor-relief institutions in the late-nineteenth-
century Ottoman Empire not as a sign of modernization, progress, or the very first signs of a 
welfare stateÓ (p. 5).  Instead, he argued that pre-Second Constitutional Era humanitarian and 
poor-relief organizations (which tended to include the frequently false-starting Red Crescent 
Society
) were Hamidian symbolic extensions in an era in which, due to his increasingly 
8conspiratorial suspicions, Ahamid II
 kept himself sequestered despite an increasingly visible 
and penetrating presence of government in the everyday lives of citizens.   
 As such, the orphanage and poorhouse were expressions of Òsultanic authorityÓ and 
assurances to the populace of the SultanÕs care and protection of his people (–zbek, 1999, p. 13).  
Geography played a prominent role in that these institutions were sited in highly prominent and 
symbolic locations within the capital (e.g. the placement of the poorhouse, 
Daraceze
, on the 
hills of Ka
"õthane, a relatively uncrowded site that had served as an upperclass recreational era 
for over a century) (–zbek, 1999, p. 15).  As such, –zbek argued that it was Òpolitical 
competitionÓ along with the shifting landscape of the Empire in wartime (Italian war of 
1911-1912, Balkan Wars of 1912-1913) that fueled Young Turk interest in the largely ignored 
Red Crescent Society (–zbek, 1999, 2007).  To put it simply, it offered them an opportunity to 
 As detailed above.
8!195counter the Hamidian vision of relief and welfare with one of Òpublic assistanceÓ (–zbek, 1999, 
p. 22).  As an extension of this critical history offered by –zbek, HAda has also argued for a 
more nuanced understanding of the shifting relationship between the Red Crescent society and 
the Turkish State.  AdaÕs evaluation provides support for my own critical reading of the Red 
Crescent SocietyÕs magazine as a discursive practice situated in the dynamic interaction amongst 
local centers in the skein of power/knowledge that constituted public health and assistance and 
the production of sanitary citizens in the early decades of the Turkish Republic.  For example, he 
noted that as both a consequence of its reactivation during wartime and as a result of its much-
lauded and sustained efforts at providing beneficial relief and disaster assistance in a time of 
great turmoil, the Red Crescent was able to quickly garner the support and trust of the general 
populace (Ada, 2004, p. 2).  Additionally, in the first years of the Republic, the Red Crescent 
Society also curried favor with the new political elite in Ankara due to the valuable assistance 
and communication link it provided being Ankara in Istanbul as a last-minute hold-out in the 
occupied former imperial capital (Ada, 2004, p. 36).  Finally, Ada also considered the activities 
and functions of the society in relation to a schema of ÔinterestsÕ that undergirded the societyÕs 
structure.              
 While many of the Red CrescentÕs activities were related to its charter (wartime relief, 
disaster aid, etc), several of the societyÕs day-to-day interests were reflections of individual 
personalities in the executive echelon of the organization (e.g. individuals like Besim –mer) (p. 
81).  AdaÕs critical historical account offers much to my own reading of the organization in 
relation to the discourse of public health and sanitary citizenship.  Both he and –zbek 
provide 
!196interesting accounts of the ways in which the image of the Red Crescent Society rose in the 
public trust.  In the sections that follow I consider the Red Crescent Society in this light, as an 
established semi-organ or apparatus of government, one that was given legitimacy in wartime 
and extended itself in peace-time via the discourses of health, hygiene, population management 
Ñ a node in the skein of power/knowledge in the early Republic. As in the other chapters, I 
focus on gendered articulations in this context.  However, I do this not simply as a means of 
narrowing the scope of the this study, but because the spaces of gender and hygiene were 
especially salient subjects of these discourses.   
 First, I provide an overview of the 
Hilal-i Ahmer Mecmuasi 
between 1921
-1941 by detailing the common themes and narratives that appeared.  I will include a general translation of 
all article titles during this period at the end of the chapter.  While many of the common topics 
that appeared pertained to the chartered interests of the Red Cross/Red Crescent Societies 
(wartime aid, assistance to refugees, disaster relief, fellowship between the societies, the 
establishment of youth oriented Red Crescent organizations) many articles focus on rather 
mundane and sometimes invasive hygienic practices.  Population politics are also a dominant 
theme.  Finally, a major shift in focus and a panicked  demarcates the last few years in the run-up 
to the Second World War.  Throughout the discussion I will draw attention to the gendered 
emphasis of many of the articles, particularly as they relate to population management and 
domestic sanitation and hygiene.   
!1975.3  Reading
 the Red Crescent:  from population exchange to chemical 
warfare preparedness and all the mundane spaces in-between
.  The Red Crescent Society magazine (
Hilal-i Ahmer mecmuasi - 
RCSM) was a primary 
source for both the articulation and dissemination of Red Crescent activities as well as general 
public health and hygiene news, concerns, and advice at the local, national, and global scales.  As 
previously discussed, due in part to its semi-independent chartered status but also to the unstable 
particularities of its founding, it cannot be situated neatly as a direct mouthpiece of state policy.  
However, following FoucaultÕs methodological argument in 
The History of Sexuality
 (1990) regarding analyses of power/knowledge and discursive formations,
 it is useful to analyze the 
9Red Crescent Society and its publication as a Ôlocal centerÕ in the matrix of discourses regarding 
public health and hygiene in the Turkish Republic.  The RCSM didnÕt merely replicate narratives 
about health, disease, gender, space, and citizenship; it was also producing new ones, altering 
older arguments, and as such altering their very conceptualization of the connection between 
hygiene and the state.   Additionally, as Ada noted, the Red Crescent Society was tactically 
successful in garnering widespread support amidst the general population; this was, no doubt, 
due in part to its perceived (if not completely real) autonomous status. 
 In terms of discursive practices, the RCSM was of course heavily shaped by the 
militaristic language of crisis, conflict, aid, and relief.   This is most obvious in the articles that 
are directly related to the chartered activities of the Red Crescent society: e.g. refugee assistance, 
 As discussed in the methods section, Foucault refers to these specific (and inherently spatial) characteristics as 
9immanence 
(the capacity for power to emerge from local centers), 
continual variations 
(the shifting capacities of 
power within matrices of local centers), 
double conditioning 
(powers mutual constitution of local centers as well as 
overall strategies), and 
polyvalance of discourses 
(the tactical deployment and emergence of discourses) (Foucault, 
1990, p. 98-101).!198earthquake and fire emergency response, etc.  However, the metaphors and modes of language 
are also prevalent in various topics presented by the RCSM pertaining to the increasing 
prominence of public health and hygiene.  It should also be noted that, like the writings of Besim 
–mer, 
it was not always clear to whom the publication was being targeted.  The inner workings 
and proceedings of the Red Crescent Society, its bylaws, and fiscal accounts, seem directed at a 
more elite and educated crowd.  Yet some of the more propagandistic health pieces are clearly 
aimed at a general audience.  One can assume that publications were either targeted toward a 
general audience or to medical practitioners and government employees with the hopes that the 
information provided inside would be spread widely. There were also frequent calls for 
membership that occurred throughout the publication run. 
 The chartered activities of the Red Crescent Society (wartime, refugee, disaster 
management and relief) do dominant many issues of the RCSM between 1921 and 1941 (of 
which 176 issues were published between these years).
  Nearly every issue include short news 
10reports and updates on the activities of both the Red Cross and the Red Crescent Organization as 
well as spotlight pieces on various local branches.
  Another semi-frequent featurette was the 
11inclusion of short historical retellings of the origin and transformation of both the Red Cross and 
Red Crescent Society.  This pieces were occasionally accompanied by poems and short stories 
and were often affiliated with pledge and membership drives.  Finally, it was also commonplace 
to see articles regarding the funding sources and spending activities of the organizations as well 
 The Red Crescent Society published one issue a month (the 15th of every month) between 1921-1931. In 1932, 
10the publication switched to a 6 issue a year publication rate with new issues coming out roughly every other month.
 In the section below, I will highlight some of these as they relate to population management and hygiene practices 
11in other states; this contrasts with the typical Òregional updateÓ pieces that look at war relief and disaster aid 
activities of various Red Cross and Crescent divisions (Japan, India, etc).  
!199as developments in the establishment of new regional branches, neighborhood organizations, and 
youth Red Cross/Crescent divisions.   
 In terms of the most common thematic topics, stories regarding the status of refugees and 
victims of the occupations and population transfers associated with the end of WWI and the 
Turkish/Greek imbroglio dominated the pages of the publication.  Between 1921-1931, these 
sorts of articles appeared no less than 36 times.  Another consistent focus of the publication was 
nursing education, which appeared some 34 times between 1921-1938.  Other common story 
themes are as follows, in terms of frequency of appearance: 
Public health and hygiene:  39 times 
Earthquakes and assistance victims  23 times 
The health of children, their proper nutrition and protection:  21 times 
Health and hygiene propaganda films:  18 times 
Dealing with parasites and parasitic animals (fleas, rats, flies, bedbugs) in the home:  15 times  
Fire and assistance for victims:  10 times 
Syphilis:  7 times (not including stories on venereal diseases collectively) 
Tuberculosis:  7 times (between 1923-1928) 
Drug and alcohol abuse:  6 times  
Small Pox:  6 times (prior to 1925) 
Infant mortality:  4 times 
Table 8:  
List of Commonly Occurring Topics
 !200 Returning briefly to Foucault in order to contextualize the various shifting components of 
the discourses on Òsanitary citizenshipÓ and Òscientific motherhoodÓ that appeared in the RCS 
journal, recall that as part of  his genealogy of sexuality and the simultaneous constitution of the 
subject category sex, psychiatry, law, the church, etc, ÒdeployedÓ sexuality as a means for 
diagnosing and delineating certain Òstrategic unitiesÓ as part of the process of Òform(ing) specific 
mechanisms of power and knowledge centered on sexÓ (Foucault, 1990, p. 102): specifically, the 
Òhysterization of womenÕs bodiesÓ (rendering them as highly sex objects requiring numerous 
regulatory interventions); the Òpedagogization of childrenÕs sexÓ (the simultaneous naturalization 
and abnormalization of childrenÕs sexual activities and proclivities allowing for the early 
introduction of proper sexual conduct via education); Òthe socialization of procreative 
behaviorÓ (the linking of managed and scientifically curated reproduction as occurring in 
idealized husband/wife couplings as a vital duty on behalf of the state while disparaging against, 
and in fact rendering as diseased and perhaps depraved, various forms of birth control); and 
finally, the Òpsychiatrization of perverse pleasureÓ (the concretization of previously nebulous yet 
diffuse sexual practices into medicalized categories of abnormality, i.e. the transformation of 
sodomy into numerous sexuality-identity categories and the numerous instrument effects this 
produced) (Foucault, 1990, p. 103-104).  These delineations were indicative of gradual 
transformation in the power of the state vis-‹-vis life and death.
  As disciplinary power shifted 
12toward biopower, the anatomo-politics of the state (power directed over and through the body 
 Interestingly enough, I want to point out that a series of articles between issue 73 and issue 85 (10 separate 
12articles) appeared with the evocative title ÒWhat are Life and DeathÓ and focused on both the philosophical and 
practical meanings of these concepts in a unification of spirituality and medicine, nationalism and everyday 
existence. 
!201itself) became further indistinguishable from the biopolitcal (power directed over and through 
populations).   
 The articles in the RCS journal, when viewed within this framework, over an interesting 
glimpse at the Turkish stateÕs discursive ÒpolyvalenceÓ with respect to population, health, place, 
and gender.  It is of note that not all of FocaultÕs deployments appear in the various articles; the 
pedagogization of childrenÕs sex and the psychiatrization of perverse pleasure seem entirely 
absent from the journalÉthough the rhetoric of silence regarding these issues speaks volumes.  
Nonetheless, his insights into the connection between the Òtwo polesÓ of the governmental 
Òpower over life,Ó produced in slightly different temporalities (with the anatomo-political 
predating the biopolitical) and the Òintermediary cluster of relationsÓ produced in the interstitial 
space between these poles, i.e. the actions, policies, and statements made regarding the mutual 
regulation of body and population, their dissemination, and finally their degree of uptake by the 
population at large, are instructional.   
 The RCS journal, from the standpoint of the anatomo-political and biopolitical, certainly 
emphasizes the hysterization of womenÕs bodies and the socialization of procreative behavior.  
To a lesser extent, one can argue that while the pedagogization of childÕs sex is certainly absent 
from the articles, most other behaviors of all social groups and age categorizes certainly are 
instructionalized often to minute detail.  The absence of child sexuality in the journal is of note 
and requires additional research into the various standards and practices regarding youth 
sexuality in the late Ottoman and early Turkish Republic.  In addition, numerous works have 
considered the shifting discourses on so-called sexual perversity throughout the broader Middle 
East, and their absence here could be considered a product of this complex era of  
!202transformation.
  With these facts in mind, I will focus primarily on the appearance of 
13discourses regarding gender, place, health and population in line with these two Foucauldian 
deployments: i.e., the  hysterization of women (HW) and the socialization of procreative 
behavior (SPB).   Furthermore, for the sake of simplicity I have grouped the diversity of HW and 
SPB discourses into two general categories due to their overwhelming presence throughout the 
20 year, inter-war publication period assessed:  articles pertaining to the so-called Òproblem of 
populationÓ and the many points where this concern intersects with arguments regarding the 
fostering of scientific motherhood; articles regarding the production of sanitary citizens.   While 
one might also consider labeling the first category Òthe biopolitical imperatives of the stateÓ and 
the second category Òthe anatomo-political imperatives of the state,Ó such a delineation would 
unnecessarily bifurcate that which I seek to unite.   
 See, for example:  
13Najmabadi, A. (2005). Women with mustaches and Men without beards. 
Gender and Sexual Anxieties of Iranian 
Modernity. Berkeley
, 366. (Also the book by the same name for a more detailed analysis of Iranian encounters with 
shifting sexual mores.   
In the Ottoman context, consider: 
Ze'evi, D. (2006). 
Producing desire: changing sexual discourse in the Ottoman Middle East, 1500-1900
 (Vol. 52). 
Univ of California Press.
 Kalpakli, M. (2005). 
The age of beloveds: love and the beloved in early-modern Ottoman and European culture and 
society
. Duke University Press.
 !2035.3a  The population problem & scientific motherhood and the Red Crescent Society  
 Following decades of war, social disruption, and (given the perspective of many of the 
medical professionals contributing to the publication), Imperial neglect, the RCS journal was 
filled with concern regarding the science and politics of population calculation and management 
and the so-called Òproblem of populationÓ looming over Turkey and Europe in general; this 
frequently manifested itself in the publication in anti-Malthusian rhetoric and public health 
assessments regarding the impact of infectious and venereal diseases on the genetic stock of the 
nation
 and the causes and effects of infant mortality both at home and abroad.  Below are a 
14listing of sample articles by year and issue number that exemplify the parameters of this 
categorization: 
Issue # 26:   15 October 1923 - Public Health and Tuberculosis 
Issue # 27:   15 November 1923
 - Public Health and Syphilis 
Issue # 28:   15 December 1923
 - Public Health and Smallpox 
Issue # 30:   15 February 1925
 - Public Health and Scabies 
Issue # 31:   15 March 1924
 - Flies and Nursing 
Issue # 32:  15 April 1924 - Public Health and Roundworm 
Issue # 33:   15 May 1924 - Public Health and Infant Mortality 
Table 9:  
Articles Pertaining to the Population Problem and Scientific Motherhood
  See part four and five of 
The History of Sexuality Volume 1
14!204Table 9 (contÕd) 
Issue # 35:   15 July 1924
 - The Population Issue 
Issue # 36:   15 August 1924 - Population Politics; the Science of Marriage**
 15Issue # 37:   15 September 1924 - Public Health and Marriage 
Issue # 39:   15 November 1924
 - Benefits of Improvements to Public and Military Health 
Issue # 42:   15 February 1925 - Malaria Education in School; Public Health and Malaria
** 16Issue # 50.   15 October 1925
 - Public Health and Fresh Air; Population Politics** 
Issue # 52:   15 December 1925
 - Comparative Statistics Regarding Child Birth in America 
Issue # 53:   15 January 1926
 - Public Health and the Protection of Children; Miscarriage** 
Issue # 54:   15 February 1926
 - Public Health and Typhus; Programs for the Protection of  
               
  Woman and Children in America; ChildrenÕs Proper Nutrition** 
Issue # 55:   15 Mart 1926
 - Vital Demographic Statistics; Syphilis and its Impact on   
  Bloodline; Public Health and Trachoma** 
Issue # 57:   15 May 1926
 - Health in Schools; General Medical Precautions; the Impact of       
                Venereal Diseases** 
Issue # 60:   15 August 1926
 - Impact of Excessive Heat on Infant Mortality 
Issue # 66:   15 February 1927
 - The Role of Milk in ChildrenÕs Proper Bodily Development 
Issue # 69:   15 May 1927
 - Public Health and Infant Mortality 
Issue # 70:   15 June 1927 - The Detrimental Social Impact of Abortion and Miscarriage 
Issue # 72:   15 August 1927
 - Medical Advice to Young Turkish Women 
 ** indicates that these are two separate articles
15 The discussion on Malaria is continued in issue #43 a month later, focusing on many of the same concerns that 
16were articulated in the 
Medical and Social Geographies
!205Table 9 (contÕd) 
Issue # 79:   15 March 1928 - Assistance for Pregnant Women
 17Issue # 83:   15 July 1928 - Infant Mortality
 18Issue # 102: 15 February 1930 - Our Children DonÕt Want to Eat! 
Issue # 104: 15 April 1930 - Very Busy Fathers 
Issue # 124: 15 May 1932 - How Shall We Nourish Our Children? 
Issue # 136: 15 June 1934 - Providing Lunches to Malnourished Students 
Issue # 135:  15 April 1934
 - The Importance of Child Protection; The Politics of National  
   Population. 
 A few general comments on the overall nature of articles in this first category.  
Campaigns against disease were a primary preoccupation of the journal, especially those 
considered the Òfour ferocious monsters,Ó i.e. Syphilis, Gonorrhea, Malaria, and Tuberculosis.  
Trachoma, Smallpox, Typhus and a host of other ailments with observed and perceived 
debilitating impacts on the overall population were also emphasized.  Occasional references to 
state-sponsored programs for the support of parents appear throughout the journal, including 
assistance for working fathers, training of mothers, and nutritional assistance for students.  Other 
general trends included a sustained emphasis on the importance of developing and incorporating 
demographic statistics (calculating biopower) as a vital state activity.  Infant mortality was 
especially emphasized, often in relation to foreign (typically European) figures.  I also want to 
draw attention to a few important shifts in focus in the general trend of the articles.  The most 
 This topic was continued the following month.
17 This topic was continued the following month.
18!206notable trend is the gradual decline overall in health and sanitation topics towards the middle of 
the 1930s as more pressing matter of war in Europe began to rear its head (specifically, concern 
over the use and impact of chemical weapons).  Second, and more important with respect to this 
study, is the tendency toward articles emphasizing sanitary citizenship gradually increasing in 
number in the 1930s as articles focused on Òthe population issueÓ and the promotion of scientific 
motherhood via discussions of infant mortality and proper birthing practices and child rearing 
began to decline.  I will return to this last point in the next section.  However, before doing so I 
will spend some time enunciating the myriad articulations and apparatuses that constitute the 
formation of Òthe population issueÓ and its corresponding discourse of scientific motherhood. 
 While there are abundant examples to draw from, I will focus on two particular articles in 
detail as a means for illustrating some of the most common discursive practices that were utilized  
with respect to the discourses of population management and scientific motherhood.  First, I 
focus on an article from issue # 50 (1925) entitled 
Dr. Besim –mer Pa
"
aÕs Important Conference 
Regarding ÔPopulation PoliticsÕ - ÔLet Us Not Deceive OurselvesÕ 
as a means for connecting this 
chapterÕs discussion thematically to the prior chapter (via the authority of delimitation 
extraordinaire, Dr. Besim –mer).  I then consider this piece alongside an interesting article from 
issue # 84 (1928) entitled 
Is Child Mortality In Our Country Quite High? 
in order to highlight 
the so-called polyvalance, or constantly shifting multiplicity of statements, strategies, and 
practices, that make up the formation of a discourse such as ÔPopulation PoliticsÕ and its 
gendered counterpart of Scientific Motherhood. 
 The first article, 
Population Politics,
 is written from the perspective of an unnamed 
member of the audience (who is also a doctor) to a speech delivered by Dr. Besim –mer before a 
!207group of students at a school for the instruction of male teachers.   This observer remarked that, 
while the Doctor began his speech congratulating the nation on its burgeoning successes in the 
fields of public health and sanitation, which had resulted in revolutionary changes in society, and 
by emotionally expressing the need to consider as a sacred task the recognition of those who had 
given their lives in sacrifice to the nation,  he melded this emotional introduction (in my 
estimation, rather directly and ungracefully) into an articulation of population politics, what it 
meant, and how it directly effected both the audience (male teachers)
 and the nation as a whole 
(p. 200).  Several themes emerged which demonstrate overall trends throughout the course of the 
publicationÕs various articles that emphasize population, infant mortality, and scientific 
motherhood.  First, is the constant effort to incorporate statistical analyses (despite their 
ÒdeficientÓ character at that time) of population as well as a corollary attempt at providing 
general instruction regarding the value of demography to healthful and successful statecraft.  
Take, for instance, his inclusion of a German study on comparative population densities (per 
square km) in Turkey (16) as contrasted with Belgium (251), England and Wales (239), Italy 
(121), Germany (120), and France (74) to which he noted that Òif a nationÕs population is not in-
line with other nearby nations, the situation is quite dangerousÓ (p. 201).   
 He goes on to articulate some of the most commonly heard refrains within the discourse 
of population politics; i.e. the notion that, despite the exceptional fecundity of Turkish women, 
infant mortality rates are morbidly high.  With a flair for the dramatic, he noted that nearly 70 
percent (unreferenced) ÒdieÉno, in fact they are murdered.  How many friends of lucky young 
men named Ya
#
ar have perishedÉ?Ó  Again, he juxtaposes this qualitative consideration 
!208alongside quantitative comparative demographics of declining infant mortality rates in Europe 
(p. 201).  These discursive tactics reveal the efforts to rearticulate individuals and communities 
as ÔpopulationÕ via the grid of specification ÔdemographyÕ as a natural and progressive step, one 
integrally connected to the imperatives of nationalism which saw the fusing of population and 
territory as vital to a nationÕs survival.  
  For Dr. Besim –mer and other medical professionals associated with the RCS, the 
pathway to sustained population growth is clearly linked to regulatory interventions into the 
domestic (and personal) sphere via such measures as campaigns against infectious and venereal 
disease (specific attention is paid to Gonorrhea here, which I will return to shortly) via the 
implementation of carefully cultivated sanitary regimes (comprised of tactics and practices 
ranging from frequent medical evaluations to the reeducation of women in the science of 
housekeeping and child-rearing), as well as inducements for supporting large families while 
simultaneously punishing childless couples and bachelors
 (e.g. tax benefits and the provision of 
19reduced rate housing in quality environments for families with more children) (p.201-203).  
  However, narratives undergirding the discourse of population politics in the early Turkish 
Republic were not always in perfect lock-step.  For instance, the validity of demography as 
practiced was occasionally called in to question by some medical professionals in the Republic 
and their concerns appeared in RCS articles.  A case in point is an article that appeared in issue 
#84 (1928) entitled 
Is Child Mortality In Our Country Quite High? 
which reveals some of the 
complexity and competing perspectives inherent (at least with reference to certain technical 
matters but not necessarily gendered preoccupations) the production of sanitary and medical 
 There is quite a lot of room for conducting more work on state-sponsored efforts that punished single individuals 
19and childless couples
 both in an historical and contemporary context.
!209discourses pertaining to population management during that period.  The author (another medical 
professional) does not quibble on the need for better sanitary reform and a higher degree of 
vigilance in the domestic sphere as a means for defending the youth population and thus shoring 
up the biopower resources of the state.  Rather, his quibble in this piece is with what he perceives 
as the flawed gathering and deployment of demographic statistics regarding child (vs infant) 
mortality rates in Turkey.  In the article the author argued that these reports, which were used to 
demonstrate infant mortality rates in Turkey and were often latched on to by foreign sources due 
to their shockingly high numbers, were highly error-prone in that they likely included the death 
of children older than one and thus were not accurately portraying nor adhering to the recognized 
methods for calculating infant mortality.  He goes on by explaining the proper techniques for 
measurement which would require more frequent excursions into rural areas and a more robust 
statisical branch of the government that would ensure proper reporting.  A table is then presented 
(p. 576) showing foreign infant mortality rates, qualified by the statement that rates in excess of 
100 were considered high: 
Countries   
Mortality Rate 
New Zealand     43 
Norway    52 
Australia     58 
Sweden    60 
Netherlands    64 
Table 10: 
Infant Mortality Rate by Country
 !210Table 10 (contÕd) 
Switzerland    65 
USA     72 
South Africa    73 
Ireland     75 
England    76 
Denmark    82 
Ontario Canada   84 
Scotland    95 
Finland    96 
Belgium    100 
Germany    122 
Italy     127 
Austria     142 
Spain     143 
Puerto Rico    147 
Phillipines     156 
Bulgaria    156 
Japan     159 
Jamaica    176 
India     184 
Hungary    187 
!211
Table 10 (contÕd) 
Singapore     204 
Romania    205 
Chile     265
 !2125.3b  Sanitary citizenship and the Red Crescent Society 
 As noted previously, the RCS journal frequently included articles pertaining to the so-
called anatomo-political imperatives of the state, emphasizing sanitary citizenship through an 
explicit politics of the properly constituted body.  These anatomo-political interests, while often 
predating the stateÕs biopolitical agenda, were never entirely distinct from and in fact were often 
integrated into the stateÕs shifting interests in government as the management of population.  
While population concerns, dominated by discussions of infant mortality, proper midwife and 
breastfeeding practices, domestic space management, and state-sponsored demography were 
common featured pieces of the RCS journal during the 1920s, an emerging emphasis on the 
micro-politics of body as shaped by shifting medical and sanitary discourses began to remerge in 
the late 1920s and into the 1930s.  However, they appeared as a fusing of the anatom-political 
and biopolitical; the properly constituted, scientifically managed, and appropriately and 
functionally gendered body in service of the state.  Below are a listing of sample articles by year 
and issue number that exemplify the parameters of this categorization: 
Issue # 29:   15 January 1924 - Public Health and Baldness 
Issue # 52:   15 December 1925 - Public Health and Sun Bathing; The Sin of Drunkenness and  
   Opposition to Alcohol Consumption**
 20Table 11:  
Articles Pertaining to the Production of Sanitary Citizens
    ** indicates that these are separate articles
20!213Table 11 (contÕd) 
Issue # 55:  15 March 1926 - The Matter of Digestion/Physiology of Digestion
 21Issue # 57:   15 M
ay 1926 - The Cleanliness of Money 
Issue # 58:  15 June 1926 - Public Health and Proper Oral Hygiene 
Issue # 62:   15 October 1926 - Wash Your Hands! 
Issue # 63:   15 November 192
6 - Is Reading in Bed at Night Harmful?; Mineral Water   
   Benefits** 
Issue # 64:   15 
December 1926 - Public Health and Dairy Consumption 
Issue # 65:   15 January 1927 - Preparations that Need to Be Taken - The Danger of a Kiss;  
  The Threat Inherent in Animal Kisses**  
Issue # 67:   15 
March 1927 - Public Health and Vitamin Deficiency 
Issue # 74:   15 October 1927 - Proper Body Position and Posture; What are Life and   
   Death
; War Against Noise** 
22Issue # 76.   15
 December 1927 - Fruit (Consumption) Instead of Toothpaste 
Issue # 77:   15 
January 1928 - Vegetables 
Issue # 78:   15 
February 1928 - The Importance of Medical Examinations; To Our Young  
   Ladies: How Should Food Be Prepared for Our Sick?; The Death of a   
   Drunkard** 
Issue # 79:   15 
March 1928 - Regarding Tobacco 
 This topic was continued the following month
21A series of these medical and philosophical treatises appeared throughout the journal. The title is evocative in the 
22context of FoucaultÕs recognition of shifting conceptions of state power with respect to the meaning of life and 
death; i.e. from the sovereignÕs ability to punish via death and the stateÕs interest in enforcing life.
!214Table 11 (contÕd) 
Issue # 80:   15 
April 1928 - Treatment via Artificial Sunlight; A Patriotic Turk; Proper   
   Respiration 
Issue # 82:   15 
June 1928 - To Those Who Smoke 
Issue # 84:   15 August 
1928 - The Illness of Obesity 
Issue # 88/9 12 December 1928 - Training of Women that Care for Children (German   
   Publication) 
Issue # 90:   15 February 1929 - How Shall We Overcome Ignorance?
 Issue # 92:   15 April 1929 - Against Charlatanism; Scientific Experts** 
Issue # 94:   15
 June 1929 - The Negative Effect of Alcohol on the National Economy 
Issue # 102: 15 February 1930 - The Danger Posed by the Phlegmatic to the Nation 
Issue # 106:  15 June 1930 - Adulterated Food
 23Issue # 107:  15 July 1930 - Fashion and Hygiene
 Issue # 120: 15 September 1931 - Be Cheerful!; Let Us Breath from the Nose; Nutritious  
   Vegetables; The Public Danger Posed by the Coughing of the Elderly; DonÕt  
   Expose Your Feet to the Cold** 
Issue # 134:  15 February 1934 - What is Vitamin D?
 Issue # 137: 15 August 1934 - A Noteworthy Example Regarding Village Hygiene; The Family 
   Pharmacy** 
Issue # 139: 15 December 1934 - Inappropriate Uses of Sedative Drugs 
Issue # 155:  15 August 1937 - Dust is Our Biggest Enemy; Research on Nutrition** 
 Concerns with the quality of foodstuffs and the places in which they are being produced continue to appear in 
23subsequent issues.
!215 As in the previous section on population politics, I draw attention to several interesting 
trends in the articles that appeared in publication.  Above all is a general concern with the overall 
proper constitution of a vibrant, healthful, and attractive Turkish body.  The reduction of diet to 
its nutrient components, demonstrations of proper posture and methods of breathing, the 
rejection of drug and alcohol consumption, the promotion of clean, well-aired, and well-light 
environments, beauty, and fashion are all elements of this narrative.  In addition, an emphasis is 
placed on avoiding diseased bodies (human an animal) and spaces and a deference to scientific 
expertise in combatting not only these defective locales at both the macro and micro scale but 
also against defective (rendered ignorant or non-expert/traditionalist) mindsets (e.g. 
How Shall 
we Overcome Ignorance? 
and 
Against Charlatanism
).  The regulated body is frequently rendered as a necessary and patriotic duty whereas the 
deficient, hedonistic, diseased body is constructed as both a personal failure and a preventable 
societal menace; it is preventable so long as a rational, scientific, and hygiene oriented mind is 
deployed against the menace.  For example, in the article entitled 
The Sin of Drunkenness and 
Opposition to Alcohol Consumption
 which appeared in issue #52 (1925), after noting that 
alcoholism is seen as the root of most social depravity (crime in particular), any Òsilence 
regarding the plight of the alcoholic is insufficient.  Therefore, in order for the impending 
campaign against alcoholism to be both effective and persuasive, the roles that alcohol plays in 
the trials and tribulations of humanity needs to be demonstrated through both facts and 
demonstrative effectsÓ (p. 257).  The author then details a list of the evils of alcohol 
consumption.  Accordingly, alcohol: decreases skill and motivation; increases accidents or 
accident prone conditions; increases disease susceptibility; negatively impacts sperm production; 
!216increases criminal activity; corrupts the race; leads to material damage and the destruction of 
capital.  Notably, the Òplight of the alcoholicÓ is really the plight of the nation. More personal 
detriments to the alcoholic themselves (happiness and personal well-being for example) are not 
included in the list of primary ÒevilsÓ.  Evidence of the socially corrupting nature of alcohol is 
backed up by evidence from foreign countries.  The audience is presented with a 1924 report 
from the Swedish Social and Economic Ministry on families who were seeking social assistance 
and welfare.  One example from the report indicated that nearly 17 percent of individuals in the 
6,913 families requesting support were found to be drunk, resulting in the stateÕs breaking up of 
these families and moving many children into foster care (p. 258). 
 Many mundane pieces of medical advice also appear throughout the RCS journal; 
however, they are often discursively rendered as part and parcel of larger public health concerns.  
A noteworthy example appears in the article entitled 
Wash Your Hands!
 in issue # 62 (1926).  At 
first glance, the article read as a straightforward example of disseminating bacteriological 
knowledge to a broader audience.  The author even notes at the beginning of the article that the 
topic may not seem like a major concern; however, in a sensationalist fashion that rivals even 
modern tabloid hysteria, he warns that  Òhis years of medical expertise and experienceÓ 
demonstrate that any failure to obey this rudimentary task can have deadly consequences (p. 51). 
 At this point the article veers a bit strangely.  The doctor and author relays to the audience 
several cautionary tales based on his own prior encounters with patients.  The first such story 
revolves around a young Turkish man (described as 18 year old Mr. 
$
 in the article) who worked 
as a barber in Bulgaria.  No year is given, though we are lead to believe this may have been in 
the former Ottoman Empire.   According to the doctorÕs narrative, despite suffering for five days 
!217from a painful burning sensation when he urinated, Mr. 
$
 failed to report to a doctor out of fear 
(we are not made privy to the source of this fear, whether it pertained to the thought of visiting a 
doctor or concern with the source of the ailment).  When he finally did report to the doctor, after 
microscopic analysis of a secretion, it was confirmed that the young was suffering from 
Gonorrhea.  Despite treatment (this was prior to the age of Penicillin) the man suffered painfully 
from his ailment and his condition progressed until he developed acute proctitis (inflammation of 
the lining of the rectum).  His final fate is not revealed to us.  
 It is not within my realm of expertise nor interest within this chapter to present a detailed 
depiction of the modes of transmission with respect to Gonorrhea nor to explicate how it spreads 
and at what rate throughout the body (genital, anal, and oral forms of Gonorrhea are common).
 24Suffice to say that simple hand to hand transmission would be relatively unlikely. Since 
Gonorrhea was widely known to be a venereal disease at this time it seems perplexing for the 
doctor to use this as an example of the benefits of hand-washing given the range of other 
illnesses that would be equally useful examples, especially considering widespread concern with 
digestive ailments and diarrhea.  Moreover, of the three case studies he presents, two of them 
involve Gonorrhea (the second Gonorrhea case is a middle aged man, the third case is a woman 
suffering from Typhus).  As such, this particular article seems to attempt a fusing of several 
preoccupations at once: promoting better bodily hygiene and constantly presenting venereal 
diseases like Gonorrhea as ever-present menaces to the future of the Turkish state regardless of 
how the facts regarding their mode of transmission are presented. 
 The politics of sexuality during this time, as previously reflected upon regarding the lack of reference to such 
24topics as sexual education for children, could also be deployed in this case.  
!218 Campaigns against drunkeness and in favor of proper hand sanitation cannot easily be 
separated from campaigns promoting demography, population management, and the care and 
well-being of infants and small children.  The anatamo-politics of the body (sanitary citizenship) 
and the biopolitics of population are two sides of the same discursive coin.  Micro-scalar issues 
pertaining to posture, oral hygiene, and avoidance of contact with animal saliva are drawn into 
the realm of the macro-scalar promotion of nationwide strength and vitality.  The articles of the 
Turkish Red Crescent Society Journal demonstrate this fusion as it was constructed, albeit 
sometimes incompletely or haphazardly conceptualized, and promoted as a basis for 
disseminating proper tactics and strategies throughout the population.  Gender remained one of 
the prominent means for conceptualizing this tactics and strategies via an emphasis on 
traditionally gendered spaces (the domestic) and responsibilities (care for the sick, children, etc).  
Finally, I close this section by noting that an historical analysis of population and population-
related arguments and pro-natalist discourse is especially relevant given the resurgence of 
pronatalism in contemporary Turkey today as per the public pronouncements of the ruling Justice 
and Development Party.  Understanding the historical arguments that undergird the present 
population debate is crucial. 
 In the final section I will present a short overview of the four substantive chapters and a 
brief discussion of their interrelation and relevance to future research regarding gendered body-
politics and spaces in Turkey.  
!219APPENDIX 
!220!221Figure 39:  
Types of mosquitos perched on the wall:  Picture 1 and 2 - Anopheles, 
Picture 3 - Culex 
(Tye Hilal-
" Ahmer Mecmuasi, Issue 43, p. 258, Turkish National 
Library).
 Articles appearing in the Red Crescent Journal that were concerned with campaigns against 
contagious disease emphasized the landscapes, populations, and environments that were 
particularly susceptible.  They often incorporated discussions of symptoms as well as 
scientific explanations of the causes e.g. mosquitos as vectors for the spread of malaria.
!222Figure 40:  
Vital Statistics 
(Tye Hilal-
" Ahmer Mecmuasi, Issue 55. p. 346, Turkish 
National Library).
   Child Mortality According to Type of Residence; Child Deaths During Birth; Child 
Deaths According to (Foreign) MothersÕ Level of Education.  
The b
iopolitical 
imperatives of the state as realized in arguments about population management typically 
emphasized an overarching concern with child and/or infant mortality. Frequently this 
included a detailed critique of the practice of motherhood.  Domestic spaces were 
assessed (noting, for example, the negative impact that unsanitary homes had on child 
health and well-being) alongside the education of mothers (educated women with a 
knowledge of English were noted to have fewer miscarriages or to experience an infant/
child death).  The importance of having trained medical professionals was also present.  
!223Figure 41:  
Proper Body Posture and Position
 (Tye Hilal-
" Ahmer Mecmuasi, Issue 
74, p. 47, Turkish National Library).
 The Red Crescent Journal was also replete with examples of anatomo-political concerns 
pertaining to the micro-regulation and production of the idealized body in service of the 
Turkish state.
!224Figure 42:  
The Death of a Drunk 
(Tye Hilal-
" Ahmer, Issue 78, p. 272, 
Turkish National Library)
. In the gendered categorizations 
of unsanitary and unhealthful practices, while 
women were more typically characterized by their ignorance, men were 
usually presented as vice-prone.
!225Figure 43:  
The WorldÕs Fattest Woman
  (Tye 
Hilal-
" Ahmer Mecmuasi, Issue 82, p. 581, Turkish 
National Library). 
 The Red Crescent Journal was also replete with 
examples of anatomo-political concerns pertaining to 
the micro-regulation and production of the idealized 
body in service of the Turkish state. Interestingly, even 
at a time where concerns about malnutrition were 
widespread, the more ÔWesternÕ disease of obesity was 
referenced as a concern for the young Turkish state.
Chapter 6 
Concluding 
remarks 
 In the preceding pages I attended to the spaces of inquiry that FoucaultÕs archaeological 
and genealogical methods and modes of analysis have opened up in historical geography. I 
presented the primary historical-geographic arguments about and uses of FoucaultÕs methods, 
ranging from earlier critical spatial assessments of the middle-period archaeological works 
(Discipline & Punish, Madness & Civilization, the Birth of the Clinic)
 to the emergence of 
governmentality and biopolitics in the genealogical works 
(The History of Sexuality, ÒSociety 
Must Be Defended!Ó, Security, Territory, Population).  
The analysis of FoucaultÕs methods and 
insights as they pertain to geography served the purpose of situating this study in the historical 
geography of governmentality and biopolitics.   
 Following Matthew HannahÕs insights in 
Governmentality and the Mastery of Territory in 
19th Century America
 (2000), I also argued that this dissertation adhered to a tradition of 
Foucauldian inspired Òclose readingsÓ of archival materials and the promotion of situated and 
contextualized ÒgeneralÓ as opposed to ÒtotalÓ historical accounts.  Morever, I sought to attend to 
FoucaultÕs feminist and post-colonial critics by situating this study of power/knowledge in early 
republican era Turkey and by emphasizing the gendered dimensions of the production and 
deployment of governmental discourses.  
 With these fundamental historiographical and methodological arguments in place, I 
asked: 
!226 How were discourses of health (disease and sanitary citizenship), place (Anatolia, 
the infertile wasteland), and gender (ignorant vs. scientific motherhood) central 
components of authoritarian governmentality in the transitional period of the early 
Turkish republic (from roughly the early 1920s until the late 1930s)?
  Furthermore, using FoucaultÕs methodological comments regarding archaeological and 
genealogical considerations of history and geography: 
 What sorts of surfaces of emergence, authorities of delimitation, and grids of 
specification were bound up in the production of gendered governmental objects and 
subjects, namely Òsanitary citizenshipÓ and Òscientific motherhoodÓ? 
 Taking Òsanitary citizenshipÓ and Òscientific motherhoodÓ as discursive formations 
comprised of a host of statements and practices that bound up gender, space, and health in 
constellations of historically and geographically specific constellations of power, I attended to a 
few nodes within this constellation by assessing aspects of their surfaces of emergence, 
authorities of delimitation, and grids of specification in the early Turkish republic.  I considered:  
 1. The Turkish Ministry of Health and Social Welfare and the Turkish Red Crescent Society as 
(sample) surfaces of emergence which, due to their temporal and spatial context in early 20th 
century, post-war, central Anatolia, diagnosed and diagrammed bodies, environments, and 
diseases in ways that privileged nation and modern medicine; 
 !2272. How affiliations within and amongst these surfaces of emergence exalted particular 
individuals as authorities of delimitation (i.e. Besim –mer, and to a lesser extent Yakup Kadrõ 
Karaosmano
"lu)
, figures who not only had medical and developmental imperatives in mind for 
the diagnosis and treatment of social, environmental, and national disease and depravation, but 
who articulated these imperatives from an especially gender-oriented position;  
3. That these gendered and medically-oriented positions established unique grids of 
specifications that mapped disease and ignorance onto bodies and landscapes in such a way as to 
establish them as sites of reform and regulation for the good of the nation. Ignorant mothers and 
infertile wastelands were merely some of the objects of analysis that emerged.  Moreover, these 
reports reveal an often times unidirectional gendered lens: men (as medical experts) were 
diagnosing and calling for the treatment and improvement of primarily women. 
  The anatomo- and biopolitical concerns of the Turkish state were undergirded by a host 
of rationalities and were enacted in myriad ways, of which this dissertation is only able to 
provide a snapshot. Archaeological and genealogical approaches recognize this seeming 
limitation as not a constraint, but rather an opportunity to write against linear-progressive 
histories that uphold unidirectional continuity at the expense of rupture, disjuncture, anomaly, 
and a host of other outcomes often glorified in the search for generalizable theories and 
applications.
   This dissertation is situated squarely within the historical geographic literature 
concerning the health, medical, and sanitary regimes of nation states on a global scale.  While 
!228critical inquiries into the health, medical, and sanitary regimes of European and American spaces 
and temporalities have been a primary focus of historians and geographers for decades, only 
within the last few decades have similar histories been written about comparable processes in 
Latin America, Southwest Asia, South Asia and other regions.  
 While I remain cautious of attempts to all to neatly impose the past onto the future, the 
health, medical, and sanitary spatialities and governmentalities of the past have something to 
offer to a critical understanding of present circumstances regarding the regulation of bodies and 
bodies in space. With respect to Turkey, this is made all the more salient when one considers a 
host of recent interventions by the Turkish government and its circle of supporters into the space 
of body politics.  In the past few years alone, high ranking officials and clerics have made several 
controversial remarks about the place and visibility of womenÕs bodies in public that often times 
revolve around politicized ideas of cultural norms regarding the proper role of women and their 
biological capacity in society.  These include condemnations of pregnant women in public as 
immorally flaunting their bodies while simultaneously wasting government resources (maternity) 
when they should be at home.
  These and other condemnations have not been tacitly acquiesced to as women and men 
alike have staged a variety of protests against such statements in an already tumultuous political 
environment.  The history of gendered and medicalized spaces in the early Turkish republic has 
much to offer to an understanding of the shifting condition of body politics; additionally, 
womenÕs increasingly visible protest of and backlash against such criticisms in contemporary 
Turkey proposes the question for future research as to how women reacted to and thought about 
health and sanitary reforms in the early republic.   
!229 I close this dissertation by reminding readers of Sandra HardingÕs (1991) feminist appeal 
for Òstrong objectivityÓ by recognizing oneÕs inherent ÔbiasesÕ and their impact on the flow and 
direction of oneÕs scholarship. While I recognize the desire for, appeal, and value of scientific 
generalizability and academic rigor, I argue that the idiographic, particular, and distinct case 
study still provides great value to the field of geography; moreover, as a queer scholar and 
member of the LGBTQI community who tends to gravitate toward less totalizing and 
homogenizing accounts of place, experience, and existence, these accounts resonate with me on a 
personal and practical level as well.  I hope that my readers have found some value in the 
particularities of a story about governmental regulation of bodies and environments in early 
republican Turkey as well. 
David Lee. Baylis        April 28th, 2015 
!230BIBLIOGRAPHY 
!231BIBLIOGRAPHY 
Ada, H. (2004). The First Ottoman Civil Society Organization in the Service of the Ottoman  
 State: The Case of the Ottoman Red Crescent (Osmanlõ Hilal-i Ahmer Cemiyeti). 
Sabincõ  
 ƒniversitesi, 
!stanbul
, (Thesis).
 A. K., & Ulu
"tekin, M. (2001). 
Hilal-i Ahmer'den Kõzõlay'a
. Istanbul, Turkey: Kõzõlay.
 Apple, R. D. (1987). 
Mothers and medicine: A social history of infant feeding, 1890-1950. 
  Madison, WS: University of Wisconsin Press       
                                                         
                                                                                                                       Arnold, D. (2013). Pollution, toxicity and public health in metropolitan India, 1850Ð1939.  
 Journal of Historical Geography
, 42, 124-133.     
                                                       
                                                                                                                       Bah“ecik, N., & Alpar, 
#
. (2009). Nursing education in Turkey: From past to present. 
Nurse  
 education today,
 29(7): pp. 698-703.        
                                                                       
                                                                                                                       Balsoy, G. (2013). 
The Politics of Reproduction in Ottoman Society, 1838-1900. 
London, UK:  
 Pickering and Chatto.          
                                                                                              
                                                                                                                       Barkey, K. (2008). 
Empire of difference
. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.  
           
                                                                                                                       Benthall, J. (1997). The Red Cross and Red Crescent movement and Islamic societies, with  
 special reference to Jordan. 
British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies
, 24(2), pp.157-177.                       
                                                                                                                       Berkes, Niyazi. (1942). 
Bazõ Ankara kıylerierinde bir ara
"
tõrma
. Ankara, Turkey: Dil ve  
 Tarih-Co
"rafya Fatesi Felsefe Enstit     
                                                             
                                                                                                                       ÔBesim –mer AkalõnÕ. (2012). In 
The Album of the Turkish National Assembly. 
Retrieved from  
 http://www.tbmm.gov.tr/TBMM_Album/Cilt1/index.html
     
                                      
                                                                                                                       Biehler, D. D. (2010). Flies, manure, and window screens: medical entomology and   
 environmental reform in early-twentieth-century US cities. 
Journal of Historical   
             Geography
, 36(1), 68-78.          
                                                                                         
                                                                                                                        (2013). Pests in the city: flies, bedbugs, cockroaches, and rats. University of   
             Washington Press.          
                                                                                                     
                                                                                                                       Bozdo
"an, S. (2001). 
Modernism and nation building: Turkish architectural culture in the early  
 Republic.
 Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.    
                                           
                                                                                                                       !232Bozdo
"an, S., & Kasaba, R., Ed. (1997). 
Rethinking modernity and national identity in Turkey.  
 Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.  
            Brown, M., & Knopp, L. (2010). Between anatamo- and bio-politics: geographies of sexual  
 health in wartime Seattle. 
Politial Geography, 
(29), 392-403.     
                                 
                                                                                                                        (2006). Places or polygons? Governmentality, scale, and the census in the Gay and  
             Lesbian Atlas. 
Population, Space and Place
, 12(4), 223-242.     
                                  
                                                                                                                       Brown, T. (2013). The making of urban ÔhealtheriesÕ: The transformation of cemeteries and  
 burial grounds in late-Victorian East London. 
Journal of historical geography
, 42, 12-23.                        
                                                                                                                       Brown, T., & Duncan, C. (2002). Placing geographies of public health. 
Area, 34
(4), 361-369.             
                                                                                                                       Brown, T., McLafferty, S., & Moon, G. (2010). 
A companion to health and medical geography. 
  Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.       
                                                                  
                                                                                                                       Buell, L. (1995). 
The Environmental Imagination: Thoreau, Nature Writing, and the Formation  
 of American Culture. 
Cambridge, MA:
 Harvard University Press.    
                            
                                                                                                                       Bynum, H. (2012). 
Spitting blood: The history of tuberculosis
. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 
           
                                                                                                                       Carter, E. D. (2014). Malaria control in the Tennessee Valley Authority: health, ecology, and  
 metanarratives of development. 
Journal of Historical Geography
, 43, 111-127.  
                       
                                                                                                                        (2012). Enemy in the Blood: Malaria, Environment, and Development in Argentina.  
             University of Alabama Press.         
                                                                                   
                                                                                                                       Cohen, E. (2009). 
A body worth defending: immunity, biopolitics, and the apotheosis of the  
 modern body.
 Durham, NC: Duke University Press.     
                                                
                                                                                                                       Craddock, S. (2000). 
City of plagues:  disease, poverty, and deviance in San Francisco.
   
 Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.     
                                                   
                                                                                                                       Crampton, J. W., & Elden, S. (Eds.). (2008). 
Space, knowledge, and power: Foucault and  
 Geography.
 Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Ltd.     
                                               
                                                                                                                       Dal, U., & Kiti
$
, Y. (2008). The historical development and current status of nursing in Turkey.  
 OJIN: The Online Journal of Issues in Nursing
, 13(2).  http://www.nursingworld.org/
              MainMenuCategories/ANAMarketplace/ANAPeriodicals/OJIN/TableofContents/  
             vol132008/No2May08/ArticlePreviousTopic/NursinginTurkey.aspxThe    
                       
                                                                                                                       !233Dean, M. (2010). 
Governmentality: power and rule in modern society.
 London: Sage   
 Publications Ltd., 2nd Ed.          
                                                                                        
                                                                                                                        (2002). Liberal government and authoritarianism. 
Economy and society 31
(1), 37-61.                       
                                                                                                                       DeLoughrey, E. & Handley, G.B. (eds.). (2011). Postcolonial Ecologies: Literatures of the  
 Environment. Oxford University Press.        
                                                                   
                                                                                                                       Deringil, S. (2003). ÒThey live in a state of nomadism and savageryÓ: the late Ottoman Empire  
 and the post-colonial debate. 
Comparative Studies in Society and History
, 45(02),   
             311-342.          
                                                                                                                   
                                                                                                                        (1998). The well-protected domains: ideology and the legitimation of power in the  
             Ottoman Empire, 1876-1909. London, UK: IB Tauris.     
                                             
                                                                                                                       Driver, F. (1985). Power, space and the body: a critical assessment of FoucaultÕs 
Discipline and  
 Punish. Environment and Planning D:  Society and Space, 
(3), 425-446.   
                       
                                                                                                                       Dubos, R. J., & Dubos, J. (1987). 
The white plague: tuberculosis, man, and society
. New   
 Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.       
                                                               
                                                                                                                       Eissenstat, H. (2003). History and Historiography: Politics and Memory in the Turkish Republic. 
 Contemporary European History
 12(1): pp. 93-105.      
                                               
                                                                                                                       Eldem, E. (2010). Ottoman and Turkish Orientalism. 
Architectural Design
, 80(1),  26-31.  
           
                                                                                                                       Elden, S. (2007). Rethinking governmentality.  
Political Geography, 
(26), 29-33.  
            
                                                                                                                       Evered, E. –., & Evered, K. (Forthcoming). A geopolitics of drinking:  Debating the place  
 of alcohol in early republican Turkey. 
Political Geography.
     
                                    
                                                                                                                        (2013). ÔProtecting the national bodyÕ: regulating the practice and  the place of   
                prostitution in early republican Turkey. 
Gender, Place & Culture
, 20(7), 839-857.   
                       
                                                                                                                        (2011). Sex and the capital city: the political framing of syphilis and prostitution in early  
             republican Ankara. 
Journal of the history of medicine and allied sciences
, 266-299.                        
                                                                                                                       Evered, K. T. (Forthcoming). From rakõ to ayran: regulating the place and practice of   
 drinking in Turkey. 
Space and Polity.
        
                                                                      
                                                                                                                        (2014). Draining an Anatolian desert: overcoming water, wetlands, and malaria in   
             early republican Ankara. 
cultural geographies
, 21(3), 475-496.    
                               
                                                                                                                       !234 (2008). Symbolizing a Modern Anatolia: Ankara as Capital in Turkey's Early   
             Republican Landscape. 
Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East
               28(2): pp. 326-341.
          
                                                                                                  
                                                                                                                       Evered, K. T., & Evered, E. –. (2012a). State, peasant, mosquito: the biopolitics of public  
 health education and malaria in early republican Turkey. 
Political Geography
, 31(5),               311-323.          
                                                                                                                   
                                                                                                                        (2012b). Syphilis and prostitution in the socio-medical geographies of Turkey's early  
             republican provinces. 
Health & place
, 18(3), 528-535.     
                                            
                                                                                                                        (2011). Governing population, public health, and malaria in the early Turkish republic.  
             Journal of Historical Geography, 
(37), 470-482.     
                                                      
                                                                                                                       Findley, C.V. (2010). 
Turkey, Islam, nationalism, and modernity: a history, 1789-2007.
 New  
 Haven, CT: Yale University Press.        
                                                                           
                                                                                                                       Foucault, M. (2009). 
Security, territory, population: lectures at the Coll‘ge de France   
 1977--1978 (Vol. 4). 
Senellart, M., Ewald, F., & Fontana, A. (Eds.). New York, NY:  
             Palgrave Macmillan.          
                                                                                                
                                                                                                                        (2008). The meshes of power; The forces of flight; Questions on geography. In J.   
             Crampton & S. Elden  (Eds.), 
Space, Knowledge, and Power 
(pp. 141-182).   
                      Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Limited.      
                                                           
                                                                                                                        (2003). 
"Society must be defended": lectures at the Coll‘ge de France, 1975-1976  
             (Vol. 1). 
Ewald, F. (Ed). New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.    
                                  
                                                                                                                        (2000). 
Essential works of Foucault 1954-1984, volume 3: power.
 Faubion, J.D. (Ed.).  
             New York, NY: New Press.          
                                                                                      
                                                                                                                        (1995). 
Discipline & punish: the birth of the prison. 
Sheridan, A. (Trans.). New York,  
             NY: Vintage Books, 2nd Ed.         
                                                                                    
                                                                                                                        (1991). 
The Foucault effect: studies in governmentality. 
Burchell, G., Gordon, C., &  
             Miller, P. (Eds.). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.    
                                      
                                                                                                                        (1990). 
The history of sexuality, volume 1: an introduction.
 New York, New York:   
             Vintage Books Edition.          
                                                                                            
                                                                                                                        (1980). 
Power-knowledge: selected interviews and other writings, 1972-1977.
 Gordon, C. 
             (Ed.). New York, NY: Pantheon Books.       
                                                                    
                                                                                                                       !235 (1973). 
Madness & civilization: a history of insanity in the age of reason. 
Howard, R.  
             (Trans.). New York, NY: Vintage Books.        
                                                                 
                                                                                                                        (1972). The archaeology of knowledge:  an archaeology of the human sciences.   
             Sheridan, A. (Trans.). New York, NY: Pantheon Books.    
                                            
                                                                                                                       Galip, R. (1929). Dırt Azgõn Canavar. Istanbul, Turkey: Devlet Matbaasi.     
             
                                                                                                                       Gandy, M. (2006). Zones of indistinction: bio-political contestations in the urban arena.   
 Cultural Geographies
 13(4), 497-516.        
                                                                     
                                                                                                                       Giladi, A. (2010). Liminal Craft, Exceptional Law: Preliminary Notes on Midwives in Medieval  
 Islamic Writings. International Journal of Middle East Studies, 42(02), 185-202.  
                       
                                                                                                                       Glotfelty, C., & Fromm, H. (eds.). (1996). The ecocriticism reader: Landmarks in literary   
 ecology. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press.      
                                                  
                                                                                                                       Grove, R. H. (1995). Green imperialism: colonial expansion, tropical island Edens and the  
 origins of environmentalism, 1600-1860. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. 
                       
                                                                                                                       Hannah, M. G. (2008). Formations of ÔFoucaultÕ in Anglo-American geography: an   
 archaeological sketch. In J. Crampton & S. Elden (Eds.), 
Space, Knowledge, and Power  
             (pp. 83-105). Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Limited.    
                                      
                                                                                                                        (2000). Governmentality and the mastery of territory in nineteenth century America.  
             Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press      
                                                          
                                                                                                                       Harding, S. G. (1991). Whose science? Whose knowledge?: Thinking from women's lives.  
 Cornell University Press.          
                                                                                         
                                                                                                                       Harley, J. B. (2002). The new nature of maps: essays in the history of cartography. Baltimore,  
 MD: JHU Press.          
                                                                                                       
                                                                                                                       Harvey, D. (2003). Paris, capital of modernity. London, UK: Psychology Press.   
           
                                                                                                                       Hattox, R. S. (1985). Coffee and coffeehouses: the origins of a social beverage in the Medieval  
 Near East. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.    
                                          
                                                                                                                       Henderson, G. L. (2003). California and the Fictions of Capital. Philadelphia, PA: Temple  
 University Press
.             !236Herbert, S. (1996). The geopolitics of the police: Foucault, disciplinary power and the tactics of  
 the Los Angeles Police Department. 
Political Geography, 15
(1), 47-57.    
            Huxley, M. (2008). Space and government: governmentality and geography. 
Geography   
 Compass, 
(2/5), 1635-1688.         
             Inhorn, M. C. (1996). Infertility and patriarchy: the cultural politics of gender and    
 family life in Egypt. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.   
             Ipsen, C. (1996). Dictating demography: the problem of population in fascist Italy. Cambridge,  
 UK: Cambridge University Press.         
             Ismail, S. (2011). Authoritarian government, neoliberalism and everyday civilities in   
 Egypt." 
Third World Quarterly
 32(5), 845-862.       
             Jessop, B. (2007). From micro-powers to governmentality: FoucaultÕs work on statehood, state  
 formation, statecraft, and state power. 
Political Geography, 
(26), 34-40.   
             Kaika, M. (2005). City of flows: modernity, nature, and the city. London, UK: Psychology Press.
             Kalpakli, M. (2005). The age of beloveds: love and the beloved in early-modern Ottoman  
 and European culture and society. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.   
             Kamil, I. (1933). ‡ocuk Veremi. Istanbul, Turkey: 
#
irketi Mttibiye Matbaasõ.
 Karaımerlioglu, A. (2002). The peasants in early Turkish literature. 
East European Quarterly
   36(2): pp. 127-154.
 Karaosmano
"lu, Y. K. (1972). Ankara. 
%stanbul: Remzi.      
              (1942). Y
aban. Istanbul, Turkey: Remzi Kitabevi, ƒ“sõlõ
$ (3rd). Karateke, H. T. (2013). How distant is gurbet? Refik HalidÕs representation of Arabs in Gurbet  
 HikayeleriÑwith a note on Ottoman and Turkish Orientalisms. 
Turkish Historical  
 Review
, 4(2), 153-173. Kashani-Sabet, F. (2011). 
Conceiving citizens: women and the politics of motherhood in Iran. 
  Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
 Korkut, H. (2013). AnadoluÕda Harp Yõllarõ, Hilal-i Ahmer Mecmuasõ ve Dınemin Toplumsal  
 Sorunlarõ/War Years in Anatolia, Red Crescent Society and Social Problems of that  
 Period. 
Tarit ve Sanat Ara
"
tõrmalarõ Dergisi
, 2(3), 90-99. !237Kucukalioglu, E. G. (2007). The representation of women as gendered national subjects in  
 OttomanÐTurkish novels (1908Ð1923). 
Journal of Gender Studies
 16(1): pp. 3-15.
 Lafi, N. (2014). Early Republican Turkish Orientalism? In N. Maksudyan (Ed.), 
Women and the  
 City, Women in the City: A Gendered Perspective on Ottoman Urban History
 (pp.  
 139
-148). Berghahn Books. 
Legg, S. (2014). 
Prostitution and the ends of empire: scale, governmentalities, and interwar  
 India.
 Durham, NC: Duke University Press. 
 (2007). 
Spaces of colonialism: Delhi's urban governmentalities.
 Malden, MA:   
 Blackwell Pub.
  (2005). FoucaultÕs population geographies: classifications, biopolitics, and governmental  
 spaces. 
Population, Space, and Place, 
(11), 137-156. 
Lerner, D. (1966). 
The passing of traditional society:  modernizing the Middle East
. Toronto,  
 Ontario: Collier-Macmillan Canada, Ltd., 3rd printing. 
Lewis, B. (2002). 
The emergence of modern Turkey.
 New York, NY: Oxford    
 University Press, 3rd printing. 
Li, Tania Murray. (2007). 
The will to improve: governmentality, development, and the practice of 
 politics.
 Durham, NC: Duke University Press
. Livingstone, D. N. (2010). 
Putting science in its place: geographies of scientific knowledge. 
  Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. 
 Makdisi, U. (2002). Ottoman orientalism. 
The American Historical Review
, 107(3), 768-796. Marx, J. (2011). Literature and Governmentality. 
Literature Compass
, 8(1), 66-79. Marx, L. (2000). 
The machine in the garden: technology and the pastoral ideal in America
.   Oxford University Press
. Matthee, R. P. (2005). 
The pursuit of pleasure: drugs and stimulants in Iranian history,   
 1500-1900. 
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
 Meeker, M. E. (2002). 
A nation of empire: The Ottoman legacy of Turkish modernity
. University 
 of California Press.
 Mills, S. (2008). Geography, gender and power. In J. Crampton & S. Elden (Eds.), 
Space,  
 Knowledge, and Power 
(pp. 83-105). Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Limited.
 !238Mol, A. (2002). 
The body multiple: Ontology in medical practice
. Durham, NC: Duke University 
 Press.
 Moore, F. (2013). Governmentality and the maternal body: infant mortality in early twentieth- 
 century Lancashire. 
Journal of Historical Geography, 
(39), 54-68.  Morrissey, J., Nally, D. P., Strohmayer, U., & Whelan, Y. (2014). Key concepts in historical  
 geography.
 Najmabadi, A. (2005). 
Women with mustaches and men without beards: gender and sexual  
 anxieties of Iranian modernity. 
Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
 Nash, C., & Graham, B. J. (2000). Modern historical geographies. Harlow, Essex, England:  
 Longman.
 Nash, L. L. (2006). 
Inescapable ecologies: a history of environment, disease, and knowledge. 
  Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
 Ozbek, N. (2007). Defining the public sphere during the late Ottoman Empire: War, mass   
 mobilization and the young Turk regime (1908Ð18). 
Middle Eastern Studies
, 43(5),   pp. 795-809.
   (1999).  The Politics of Poor Relief in the late Ottoman Empire. 
New perspectives on  
 Turkey
, 21, pp. 1-33. –mer (Akalõn), B. (1938). 
Tk “ocu
#unu nasõl ya
"
atmalõus siyasetinde “ocuk
: Sa#lam  
 nesil - ıjenizm
 - sa#lam õrk.
 Istanbul: Ahmet 
%hsan Basõmevi Limited.
  (1936). 
Tk “ocu
#u ya
"
amalõdõr:  k “ocuklara bakõm ve sosyal yardõm
. Istanbul:   
 Ahmed 
%hsan Basõmevi Limited.
  (1341/1925). 
‡ocukmek.
 Istanbul: Yeni Matbaasõ.
  (1340/1924). 
Fen ve izdiva“.
 Istanbul: Yeni Matbaasõ.
            (1340/1924). 
Gebelik ve gebelikte tedabir. 
Istanbul: Yeni Matbaasõ.
  (1339/1923). 
us mes'elesi ve k “ocuklarda vefey›t
. Istanbul: Kanaat Matbaasõ.
  (1305/1888). 
eyyifat ve mkirattan:  afyon, kahve, “ay, esrar
. Istanbul: Mahmud  
 Bey Matbaasõ.
 !239 (1305/1888). 
eyyifat ve mkirattan: mkirat.
 Istanbul: Mahmud Bey Matbaasõ.
  (1304/1888). 
eyyifat ve mkirattan: t
. Istanbul: Maviyan 
#
irket-i    
 Mttebiye Matbaasõ.   
–zaydin, Z. (2005). Upper social strata women in nursing in Turkey. 
Nursing History Review
,   14(1), pp. 161-174. –zkan, B. (2012). 
From the abode of Islam to the Turkish vatan: the making of a national  
 homeland in Turkey. 
New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
 –zt. 
 (2007). Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
#luÕnun Metinleri ‡er“evesinde Milliadelenin 
 Yorumlanmasõ.  
Ankara ƒniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler EnstitYek Lisans Tezi
   (Thesis). 
Philo, C. (2005). Sex, life, death, geography: fragmentary remarks inspired by ÔFoucaultÕs  
 population geographiesÕ. 
Population, Space, and Place, 
(11), 325-333.  
 (2000). The birth of the clinic: an unknown work of medical geography. 
Area
, 32(1),   11-19.
   
 (1992). FoucaultÕs geography. 
Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, (10),  
 137-161.  
Pickles, J. (2004). 
A history of spaces: cartographic reason, mapping and the geo-coded World
. Routledge
 Press.
Pike, D. (2005). 
Subterranean cities: the world beneath Paris and London, 1800-1945
. Cornell  
 University Press.
 Pollard, L. (2005). 
Nurturing the nation: the family politics of modernizing, colonizing and  
 liberating Egypt (1805-1923)
. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
 Porteous, J. D. (1985). Literature and humanist geography. 
Area, 17
(2): pp. 117-122.
 Prieto, E. L. (2012). Geocriticism meets ecocriticism:  Bertrand Westphal and environmental  
 thinking.  
Epistemocritique (Online Resource). 
Prince, R., Kearns, R., & Craig, D. (2006). Governmentality, discourse and space in the New  
 Zealand health care system, 1991-2003. 
Health & Place, 
(12), 253-266. !240Rabinow, P. (1995). 
French modern: norms and forms of the social environment.  
   Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
 Rose-Redwood, R. (2006). Governmentality and the geo-coded world. 
Progress in Human  
 Geography, 30
(4), 469-486. Rosenberg, C. E., & Golden, J. L. (Eds.). (1992). 
Framing disease: studies in cultural history
.   New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
 Ross, K. (1996). 
Fast cars, clean bodies: Decolonization and the reordering of French culture.
   Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
 Safvet, M. (1341/1925). 
TkiyeÕnin Sõhhi I“timai  Co
#rafyasõ: Ankara Vilayeti.  
Istanbul: 
 Hilal Matbaasõ
. Saunders, A. (2010). Literary geography: reforging the connections. 
Progress in Human   
 Geography
 34(4): pp. 436-452.
 Schafer, S. (1997). 
Children in moral danger and the problem of government in Third Republic  
 France. 
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
 Scott, J. C. (1998). 
Seeing like a state: How certain schemes to improve the human condition  
 have failed.
 New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
 Serdar, A. (2002). 
Yakup Kadri Karaosmano
#luÕnun Romanlarõnda Cinsellik.
 Bilkent University 
 (Thesis) 
Sharp, J. P. (2000). Towards a critical analysis of fictive geographies. 
Area
 32(3): pp. 327-334.
  (1996). Locating imaginary homelands: literature, geography, and Salman Rushdie.  
 GeoJournal
 38(1): pp. 119-127.
 Sigley, Gary. (2006), Chinese governmentalities: government, governance and the socialist  
 market economy." 
Economy and Society
 35(4), 487-508. Sufian, S. M. (2008). 
Healing the land and the Nation: Malaria and the Zionist Project in  
 Palestine, 1920-1947
. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
 Tally, R.T. (2008). Geocriticism and classic American literature. 
Faculty Publications-English.
   https://digital.library.txstate.edu/handle/10877/3923
 Taylor, D., & Vintges, K. (Eds.). (2004). 
Feminism and the Final Foucault.
 Chicago, IL:   
 University of Chicago Press. 
!241Tezcan, B. (2010). 
The second Ottoman Empire: political and social transformation in the early 
modern world. 
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press
. Tuan, Y. (1976). Humanistic geography. 
Annals of the Association of American Geographers
 66(2): pp. 266-276.
Tuttle, L. (2010). 
Conceiving the old regime: pronatalism and the politics of reproduction in  
 early modern France.
 New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
 T
$
, M. (1998). The ideology of the Kadro [cadre] movement: a patriotic leftist movement in 
 Turkey. 
Middle Eastern Studies
 34(4): pp. 92-119.
 Tye Hilal-
% Ahmer. (1928). Is Child Mortality In Our Country Quite High? 
Tkiye Hilal-i  
 Ahmer Mecmuasi, 7
(84), pp. 575-578.  (1925). Dr. Besim –mer Pa
$
aÕs Important Conference Regarding  ÔPopulation PoliticsÕ - 
 ÔLet Us Not Deceive OurselvesÕ.  
Tkiye Hilal-i Ahmer Mecmuasi, 5(50), 
pp. 197-203.   Uyer, G. (1984). Nursing education in Turkey: past and present. 
International journal of nursing 
 studies
, 21(3), pp. 209-219. Walls, L. D. (2011). Literature, Geography, and the Spaces of Interdisciplinarity. 
American  
 Literary History
 23(4): pp. 860-872.
 Watts, M. (2004). Resource curse? Governmentality, oil and power in the Niger Delta, Nigeria.  
 Geopolitics
, 9(1), 50-80. Weber, E. (1976). 
Peasants into Frenchmen: the modernization of rural France, 1870-1914
.   Stanford University Press.
 Westphal, B.  (2011). 
Geocriticism. Real and Fictional Spaces
. (R. Tally, trans.). London, UK:  
 Palgrave-Macmillan.  
Wood, D & Fels, J. (1992). 
The power of maps
. New York, NY: Guilford Press
.Wyers, M. D. (2013). 
"Wicked" Istanbul: the regulation of prostitution in the early Turkish  
 republic
. Istanbul, Turkey: Libra Kitap“õlõk ve Yayõncõlõk.
 Yeoh, B. (2003). 
Contesting space in colonial Singapore: power relations and the urban built  
 environment.
 Singapore: Singapore University Press.
 !242Yõlmaz, H. (2013). 
Becoming Turkish:  nationalist reforms and cultural negotiations in early  
 republican Turkey, 1923-1945.
 Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press. 
Ze'evi, D. (2006). 
Producing desire: changing sexual discourse in the Ottoman Middle East,  
 1500-1900
 (Vol. 52). Univ of California Press.
 Zher, E. J. (2014). 
The young Turk legacy and nation building: from the Ottoman Empire to  
 Atatk's Turkey
 (Vol. 87). IB Tauris.        
              (2004).
 Turkey: A modern history. New York, NY: I.B. Taurus & Co Ltd., 3rd Printing. 
(1965). Yassõhıy: bir kıy incelemesi. 
U.S. A.I.D./Tye Haberle
$
me ve Tanõtma   
 Laboratuvarõ. 
Ankara, Turkey: Middle East Technical University Press. 
(1953). Verem –nlenebilir (Tuberculosis is Preventable). 
Ankara, Turkey: Do
"us Ltd. Matbaasõ.
 (1948). !nsanlarõ
"
manõ verem! (Tuberculosis is the enemy of man!). 
Ankara, Turkey:  Hilal  
 Matbaacõlõk Koll. Sti.
 Primary Sources Consulted 
Journal of the Red Crescent Society 
Issue # 26:   15 October 1923 - Public Health and Tuberculosis 
Issue # 27:   15 November 1923
 - Public Health and Syphilis 
Issue # 28:   15 December 1923
 - Public Health and Smallpox 
Issue # 29:   15 January 1924 - Public Health and Baldness 
Issue # 30:   15 February 1925
 - Public Health and Scabies 
Issue # 31:   15 March 1924
 - Flies and Nursing 
Issue # 32:  15 April 1924 - Public Health and Roundworm 
Issue # 33:   15 May 1924 - Public Health and Infant Mortality 
Issue # 35:   15 July 1924
 - The Population Issue 
!243Issue # 36:   15 August 1924 - Population Politics; the Science of Marriage**
 1Issue # 37:   15 September 1924 - Public Health and Marriage 
Issue # 39:   15 November 1924
 - Benefits of Improvements to Public and Military Health 
Issue # 42:   15 February 1925
 - Malaria Education in School; Public Health and Malaria** 
Issue # 50.   15 October 1925
 - Public Health and Fresh Air; Population Politics** 
Issue # 52:   15 December 1925
 - Comparative Statistics Regarding Child Birth in America;   
   Public Health and Sun Bathing; The Sin of Drunkenness and Opposition to  
   Alcohol Consumption** 
Issue # 53:   15 January 1926
 - Public Health and the Protection of Children; Miscarriage** 
Issue # 54:   15 February 1926
 - Public Health and Typhus; Programs for the Protection of  
              Woman and Children in America; ChildrenÕs Proper Nutrition** 
Issue # 55:   15 Mart 1926
 - Vital Demographic Statistics; Syphilis and its Impact on   
   Bloodline; Public Health and Trachoma; The Matter of Digestion/Physiology of  
   Digestion** 
Issue # 57:   15 May 1926
 - Health in Schools; General Medical Precautions; the Impact of       
   Venereal Diseases; The Cleanliness of Money** 
Issue # 58:  15 June 1926 - Public Health and Proper Oral Hygiene 
Issue # 60:   15 August 1926
 - Impact of Excessive Heat on Infant Mortality 
Issue # 62:   15 October 1926 - Wash Your Hands! 
Issue # 63:   15 November 192
6 - Is Reading in Bed at Night Harmful?; Mineral Water   
   Benefits** 
Issue # 64:   15 
December 1926 - Public Health and Dairy Consumption 
Issue # 65:   15 January 1927 - Preparations that Need to Be Taken - The Danger of a Kiss;  
  The Threat Inherent in Animal Kisses** 
Issue # 66:   15 February 1927
 - The Role of Milk in ChildrenÕs Proper Bodily Development 
 ** indicates separate articles.
1!244Issue # 67:   15 
March 1927 - Public Health and Vitamin Deficiency 
Issue # 69:   15 May 1927
 - Public Health and Infant Mortality 
Issue # 70:   15 June 1927 - The Detrimental Social Impact of Abortion and Miscarriage 
Issue # 72:   15 August 1927
 - Medical Advice to Young Turkish Women 
Issue # 74:   15 
October 1927 - Proper Body Position and Posture; What are Life and   
   Death; War Against Noise** 
Issue # 76.   15
 December 1927 - Fruit (Consumption) Instead of Toothpaste 
Issue # 77:   15 
January 1928 - Vegetables 
Issue # 78:   15 
February 1928 - The Importance of Medical Examinations; To Our Young  
   Ladies: How Should Food Be Prepared for Our Sick?; The Death of a   
   Drunk** 
Issue # 79:   15 March 1928
 - Assistance for Pregnant Women; Regarding Tobacco** 
Issue # 80:   15 
April 1928 - Treatment via Artificial Sunlight; A Patriotic Turk; Proper   
   Respiration 
Issue # 82:   15 
June 1928 - To Those Who Smoke 
Issue # 83:   15 July 1928
 - Infant Mortality 
Issue # 84:   15 August 
1928 - The Illness of Obesity; Is Child Mortality in Our Country High? 
Issue # 88/9 12 December 1928 - Training of Women that Care for Children (German   
   Publication) 
Issue # 90:   15 
February 1929 - How Shall We Overcome Ignorance? 
Issue # 92:   15 April 1929 - Against Charlatanism; Scientific Experts** 
Issue # 94:   15
 June 1929 - The Negative Effect of Alcohol on the National Economy 
Issue # 102: 15 February 1930 - Our Children DonÕt Want to Eat!; The Danger Posed by the  
   Phlegmatic to the Nation 
Issue # 104: 15 April 1930 - Very Busy Fathers 
!245Issue # 124: 15 May 1932 - How Shall We Nourish Our Children? 
Issue # 136: 15 June 1934 - Providing Lunches to Malnourished Students 
Issue # 135:  15 April 1934
 - The Importance of Child Protection; The Politics of National  
   Population
!246