Transcript: imagining Turkey from the Balkans: a conversation with Prof Maria Todorova

Welcome to the Imagining Turkey podcast series co organised by Hazal Aydin, Meryem Zisan Koker and Sertac Sehlikoglu. It is part of the Takhayyul Project funded by the European Research Council and hosted at UCL’s Institute for Global Prosperity.

Sertaç Sehlikoglu  0:04 
Hello, everyone. We are very excited to be hosting Professor Maria Todorova today, from University of Illinois Urbana Champaign. Professor Todorova is specialised in the Eastern Europe, specifically the Balkans in the modern period. Her research focuses on historical demography, nationalism, socialism and post communism. 

Professor Todorova, your work has been a major influence to the way Balkans and Orientalism are studied as interconnected matters and product, and considering how imagination shapes contemporary global brightened populism. We are very much interested in starting a conversation with you today, on your scholarship ability to reflect on and guide certain questions on contemporary politics. Welcome. 

Prof. Maria Todorova  1:14 
Thank you. Thank you so much. 

Sertaç Sehlikoglu  1:16 
I’d like to start with the first question. We are specifically interested in speaking a little bit about European imagination of the Balkans. In your book, you say, and I’ll do the kind of regular thing and quote you against the abstract imagination of the East. “The Balkans have a concrete, historical and geographical reality, unquote, which refers to a number of things, but also their Ottoman past the past that makes the Balkans almost like the dark side of Europe, as the East within the West. So, I think it’d be good to start with this angle. And let us ask you, would you tell us a little bit where you offer the term Balkanism and, and maybe a little bit on why did you need to offer new terminologies on this page? 

Prof. Maria Todorova  2:08 
So I will begin by saying that some readers of Imagining the Balkans, and you seem to be among them, are interpreting Balkanism as a subspecies or subdivision or a subset of Orientalism, and I contend that this is wrong, and I will explain why, and that will, of course, answer the question why we need a new terminology. Of course, both Balkanism and Orientalism are subspecies of stigmatisation or stereotypisation and so on both are discursive formations which are imposed from the outside, but stigmatisation and stereotypization are general concepts without without a link to correct concrete list and to specificity. Whereas Orientalism and Balkananism are in certain measures, and I will explain how. So, Edward Said’s orientalism was inspired by his predicament as a Palestinian, but as a literary scholar, he elaborated it in very general terms, in very generalising terms, and therefore, his theory became also generalizable, and it was applied elsewhere to the point where orientalism became almost synonymous with post colonialism, and he did not agree with that. So, after all, everyone has (inaudible), right. And, in fact, Orientalism had been applied to the Balkans during the Yugoslav wars, of disintegration by Milica Bakić-Hayden to explain these internal ways that ethnic component was played against each other, she was calling it nesting orientalism in the former Yugoslavia. But Balkanism it’s not simply I contend that it is not a subspecies, but it rhymes with Orientalism, and I did that on purpose. So, I did that for two reasons. First of all, I wanted to acknowledge the inspiration of Edward Said, particularly in the 1990s when I wrote the book, and when he was very severely accousted, you might remember these disputes with Bernard. So, people did not like and in fact, my editor at Oxford University Press bid me to call the book Balkanism. It was the title Balkanism was the title in Bulgarian, but the Imagining the Balkans was imposed precisely to disengage it from Orientalism. So I chose it first of all, to acknowledge the inspiration of Said, but also I am a historian, unlike Said who is a literary critic, and while I very much like and respect you know, grand theories grant variations in theory. You know, my instinct is to celebrate specificity and concreteness and rebelled against flattening generalisations. So not everything in the world is Orientalism, right? So, the fundamental, and  I’ve written a great extent, but the fundamental difference/contrast between Orientalism and Balkanism is that Orientalism describes or analyses, differences between different types, distinctions between two separate types. Whereas Balkanism, in my view, describes difference within the same type. So, this is the major structural, if you like, difference. For Said there has always been a chasm between East and West and this is a trope that a lot of people are supporting East and East, West and West. Rudyard Kipling— and you have it in Andrić  and Orhan Pamuk right? The East is separate the West is separate. And I don’t agree with that. For Said, the East is the other. This is of course, premised on a very old age opposition between Christianity and Islam. But in the Balkans, what we have is, the Balkans have always been described as a crossroads, or as a bridge between these types, their predicament, and again, I want to use those general concepts, not the specific ones are marginality, liminality, incomplete part, but of one type, and this one type is Europe or the West. And the reason is, two vectors, race and religion.

Hazal Aydin:
Thank you for your answer. Today’s populist and right wing movements are trying to revive ancien régimes and Ottomans being one of them. We wanted to ask what are your reflections on the contemporary populist political movements in the Balkans? And about the Balkans vis-a-vis ancien régimes?

Prof. Maria Todorova:
First of all, the notion of populism, I have to say that I’m very, very uneasy about this blanket use of the notion of populism and particularly the ascription of populism only to right wing movements. And here, of course, it’s not my discovery, but I have to, quote Ernesto Laclau and the Chateau Mouffe in like most populist reason. He contends that populis/ populism is not an ideology, it is not a programme. It is a strategy. It’s a political strategy, which can be used by anyone, right? So,  it depends on when it takes place in, in space or in time. So, what populism does? It essentially constructs a frontier between us and them and elevates the underdog, but then any, any struggle can be populist, anything which is done in the name of the people is populism. Democracy is populist, the French Revolution was populist, it was emancipating  the underdog. Describing populism as a right thing is wrong. But why is it so? It is so because in our societies, and it’s I’m talking not about the Balkans, I’m talking about everywhere, particularly in the United States, where people are saying, you know, populism is on the rise. You know, Trump has hardest populism and so on and so forth. What you have is the mixing and the obliteration of the boundary between left and right. Why? Because there was a tacit, kind of tacit agreement, that there is no alternative to this neoliberal globalism, which was imposed after the fall of the Berlin Wall and after 1989. But after the crisis, first the financial crisis of 2008 and now the increasing financial and economic crisis, and of course, the wars/. This this agreement, and this, in fact, I would say, covenant, that there is no offer alternative has been broken. And nowadays, you have this reaction, what happened with this covenant, the state was emaciated, you don’t have redistribution, you have only this accumulation of capital, which creates internal contradictions. So now, you see it is by the new liberal elites, that they are hurling this accusation to the people who are rebelling and they’re telling them you’re populist and you’re a fascist and so on. And particularly the irony is because you were mentioning, you know, the ancient regime of communism, for example, in the communist countries, Bulgaria, Romania and whatnot. The new elites was saying there was no fascism in the interwar period. It was communism which was totalitarian, but now they’re using the word fascist for these populists. Right?  There was no fascism when there was fascism all over the world, but now these people are fascists. So I would say that what what should be done? First of all, it should be understood that populism can have a left wing agenda, not only a right wing agenda, but it still doesn’t have the thinkers and leaders to to push this agenda at this point we have, we have only what we call right wing leaders, but they often are elaborating the genuine grievances of people. So, that’s that’s my question. I don’t see any specific in the so called populism of the Balkans compared to other populations elsewhere. In fact, in the Balkans, I would say that this populism is far less limited than in Central Europe or in Western Europe or in the States.

Sertaç Sehlikoglu  11:01
I think one of the elements of this question, if I may intervene, is also about like the Turkey’s specific populist agenda, and I’m understanding from Hazal’s question, as ancien regime she refers to, actually the Ottoman rules is kind of the dream of reviving the Ottomans, and its reflections on the Balkan.

Prof. Maria Todorova  11:25 
I understand that, but I would describe it as is this strategy of nationalism, I mean, you consolidate your base by going to a narrative, which is appealing, and they will alternate Ottomanism is this type of narrative. I don’t see anything different in this Neo Otto () any kind of huge ideology is populist nationalism is a populist thing. Communism is a populist, any ideology can be populist, the redistribution of capital is a populist ideology. You know, people, the rich people were saying, why would you distribute my money? Right? It’s populism, right? Equality is populism. If you if you believe in social justice and equality, this also is populism. The moment you use the word people, I work for the people, everybody works for the people. 

Meryem Zisan   12:17 
I think we’ve touched upon a little bit of our next question. We also were curious about like, what are the historical dynamics that are lingering today makes Ottoman past specifically difficult, if not problematic, across the Balkans? Like, how does that shape the contemporary political relationship between Turkey and the Balkans now?

Prof. Maria Todorova  12:38 
What I would say is that, of course, the historical dynamics of the Ottoman past were very, very important. But mostly ,at the end of the 19th century, or throughout the 20th century, because the Ottoman legacy was still lingering on, people were remembering this part. I don’t think that it is the historical dynamics of the Ottoman past, which are lingering today. What is lingering today, our demographic, political and economic dimensions. Turkey is the biggest country, it is bigger than all of the Balkans taken together. It is a very powerful country, economically, it is very powerful as a military force. Look at the, you know, the constant hostilities with Greece, it actually manages to manoeuvre pretty gently in the new geopolitical world. So, I would say that what is lingering on is the hugeness, the bigness of Turkey at visiting the Balkans. On the other hand, it is it is true that as long as Turkey is not in the European Union, it has difficulties in in playing a huge role in the Balkans, which are now part of the European Union, so in terms of investments and things like this, what we’re we’re Turkey does play an interesting role is in the so called Western Balkans nowadays, especially in the Muslim parts in Kosovo, in Bosnia, in Albania, I just came back from Albania and from Sarajevo, and you can see this capital but it is competing very much with Saudi capital. So you have here a competition between two Islamic, the Saudis original, by the way, so they are hugely investing in Sarajevo. You can see party in Macedonia, in Bulgaria, you have a Turkish minority, and you have a Turkish party, which is unique, but the Turkish population in Bulgaria and the Turkish party are very, very rational and very smart. And they are playing in fact, a constructive role. They are not playing the Trojan horse of Turkey. So, they are part of the of the political conjuncture sometimes you can see of course a nationalist accusations but in general, it’s more and more or less harmonic situation. So, I would again.. I would repeat that the history does not bear that strongly at this point yes. You do have textbooks, you still would have, you know, the Ottoman..  500 years of Ottoman rule, you would have that in children, but it is moderated, it is not as acute as it used to be generations ago, and especially in scholarship, people are saying, I mean, “just forget it” and this is ridiculous, we should see, you know, the Ottoman Empire as a unifying thing and not only see it as you know, these things as slavery or subordination, that etc, etc. 

Sertaç Sehlikoglu  15:52 
Okay, and so  Professor Todorova, when we follow both the media and a number of scholarly literature, we see that Western Europe tends to mark the Balkans, particularly inferior and somehow even backward ontology. I wonder if you think you still must have been subjected to any level of change since you published your book 20 years ago? And what do you think about the contemporary troops that are about the Balkans? And maybe how they, like how do you think they might be shaping contemporary practices of belonging and othering? I know you’re a historian, but we are genuinely interested in, you know, how you have changed the contemporary scene politics, media, social sciences, in the way their attitudes, whether they have shifted?

Prof. Maria Todorova   16:50 
Lovely question about the ontology. So I will give actually a long answer because it involves several questions here. So, all that is correct, that the Balkans have been marked as backward, violent rural, in the rational prone to rage and barbaric. Although this is correct, first of all, these stereotypes or characteristics are historical, they will not always impose on the Balkans. They come mostly they’re fairly recent. For a historian, 19th  century is very recent. So they come from the 19th century  when the Balkans was marked as this unruly territory. This is sessioning of these small unmodern states from the Ottoman Empire. These stereotypes come historically very recently. Again, mind you, stereotypes are usually based on true characteristics, and then they are elevated into huge generalisations. So, it is true that when, when these Balkan states were coming out in the 19th  century, and they were bickering between each other, you have a declining Ottoman Empire. Yes, they were… At this time, Europe had the illusion that it was peaceful and stable, and it is seeing a region of Europe of itself, which is violent, which is backward, it doesn’t happen industry and which is rural. So all of that changes, right? That rurality is no longer hurled even backward is no longer hurled that much. Barbaric and irrational, prone to rage were hurled but mostly during the time of the Yugoslav crises, no longer. So,  first let me let me go a little bit a stride and tell you why characteristics are… Why is it wrong to look at to distil characteristics of a region. So here we have, in fact, a tradition which is scholarly but also an intellectual tradition of structuralism. And I’m not speaking of the structuralism, of course, of Saussure or (inaudible), or Levy Strauss or Lacan, whatever. I’m talking about the structural functionalism of Weber of, of Durkheim or Marx the idea that you explain the world as a system. So, it comes in the 19th and 20th century, and it has huge remarked, not only historical, but any kind of writing, sociology and whatnot. So, the idea is that human life is unintelligible except through interrelations within a system. You have a system constitutes a structure. So, behind the surface phenomenon, you know that for Marxism very well, you have abstract laws and they are the ones that we should analyse right now. Not the superficial events, these are the real the laws other real things behind this surface appearance of meaning. The one problem with structural laws and they are very powerful and we cannot avoid thinking in these terms. But the one problem with these structural laws is they’re, they’re exceedingly binary and they are dealing with, with coexistence between these different laws, but they’re not dealing with historical change. They’re not dealing with transformation. So, when you distil characteristics of a region of a structure, by paying little attention or no attention to historical change to temporal transformations, you create a stereotype clearly during the Yugoslav Wars, you see barbarity and you tend to say, well, let us see the origins of this barbaric and sudden historians were looking back in time and they were saying, “Oh, yes, you always have that”.  This distillation of characteristics is very typical, typical for structuralism. What I prefer is the notion of post structuralism, which embraces this structuralist thing,  but also takes takes account of the systems of knowledge and power that produced them. Why do we approach the world in such a way through this structuralism? If we have to question that, that will allow us to be more flexible, and therefore, as far as I was concerned, I proposed the concept of historical legacy rather than the distilling of characteristics. Why ? Because the legacy allows you to see this malleability this transformation in time. So very concretely now, to your question, what is left right? Nowadays, these accusations towards the Balkans have subsided, you don’t hear hear them any longer? How many times 2004, 2007,  2013 Balkan states became part of Europe, right? And even the Western Balkans are now candidates and they will, they will eventually, they was lost splinters are potential candidates. So you have this subsiding of the Balkanist rhetoric, which embraces all those characteristics that you mentioned, it is still encountered in journalism, much more rarely in, in scholarship. But look, even the vocal and very spiteful objections to Caucus accession are not using Balkanist rhetoric. They are  speaking about Middle Eastern culture, women’s or human rights, and they focus on Islam. But they are not using these notions that are part of the Balkanist rhetoric, partly because the Ottoman Empire was subjected to a pure orientalism rather than simply the Balkanism that I’m describing. So, in the general geopolitical rhetoric, the Balkans have given way to other dominant categories, Europe, the Near East, the Middle East, China, Asia, now to Ukraine. So nobody speaks very much about the Balkans, except this oxymoron, the Western Balkans. We do have stereotypes, what is hurled to the Balkans nowadays, and in fact, I will quote here this is what I jotted down. There is this journalist from a radio  of  Europe, who was saying the “Flash points that you should be looking at, we’re watching in the Balkans are religious and ethnic strife, EU membership, roughened, influence and corruption” So these are the four things that are being used. And I would add something which is also used is the poverty, the criminalization of poverty. Nowadays, when they speak about the new, newly accessed members of the European Union, they always say Romania and Bulgaria, the poorest country in the European Union, is that the most important characteristics of the country that it is of course, but that for the people there is very much important. So nowadays, you have these other elements that are being used for the Balkans, and corruption is one of the of the foremost ones. If you look at the theoretical literature on corruption, there is no consensus what is corruption. In fact, the best thing that I’ve  found is James Scott’s treatment of corruption is the an institutionalised influence of wealth in a political system. So, in the Balkans, maybe this corruption has not been legalised or institutionalised, but it is everywhere. So again, the stereotypes vis-a vis, the Balkans are there, but they don’t they don’t play around this Balkanist rhetoric anymore for obvious reasons, right?  At this point, there is no war although there are clashes, like in Kosovo, some.. There are no longer rural. Rurality was a big thing. Oh, these peasants, you don’t have them any longer. So,  they are changing, but corruption is a big one, and of course, a Russian influence ,anywhere you turn it is Putin and the Russians that are guilty for anything. I mean, it’s a very nice explanation, right? But it doesn’t work. And of course, there is continuous armies of the Balkans because of their complexity. You have too many religions, you have too many ethnicities, you have too many languages, right? And too many small countries. But now, with the accession to the European Union, and giving away of sovereignty, that is not so much on the agenda, although that gives rise to this populism that you were talking about.

Hazal Aydin 25:40 
Thank you for this detailed answer. Professor Todorova, it was really illuminating for all of us. We also wanted to discuss some of the broader questions your book raises. And this brings me to the discussion of liminality. So, you mentioned in your book that Balkans are not the other of a dichotomy per se, like the east but a state of liminality, which creates a feeling of disorientation and uneasiness both for the Balkan and for the Western European self. So, we were wondering, what makes liminality a state of inadequacy and the discomfort in the Western European imaginary? What kind of ontological insecurity does the existence of Balkans cause Western Europe that Balkans become pejorative word?

Prof. Maria Todorova  26:28 
So remember, I started the previous question with the fact that the Balkans are, metaphorically, they are described as crossroads, or as a bridge between incomplete… between completed others, that suggests a kind of transitionary character, or in between this. And so here, I think, I’ve used mostly, groundbreaking concept of liminality. So liminality presupposes a kind of significant change in the dominant self image. So you are the self, and this is part of what you want to limit, right? It’s part of you, but it is liminal. And then, marginality defines the qualities on the same plane as the self image, right? It’s and then you have the lowermost, which of course, suggests the shadow the the despised alter ego, but it is still alter ego. And for the Balkans, you do have it, and it can be documented very well, through travelogues and to through diplomats who have been visiting the Balkans all throughout these ages, mostly from the 15th century on, they will looking at the Balkans as, as their child or their historical childhood, right? Ancient Greece and all that. So it’s a kind of incomplete self, the self which has not yet been raised to the proper idea. But the way I’ve accepted this liminality is because of two elements, which are not in Said’s Orientalism, and this is race and, and religion. Now, the religion is easier to see, while a Said’s premise, definitely, as I said, on this opposition between Christianity and Islam, the Balkans are again a medley, but they are mostly Christian. They’ve always been mostly Christian, although Christian in the not the proper sense. There are some Catholics and some prophets sent but mostly this Orthodox Christianity. Nonetheless, it is Christianity. So, they were seen as heretics, but eventually, this was overcome. And you might remember when the Pope was coming and apologising to the patriarch, for the Fourth Crusade, when they sacked Constantinople, so there is a kind of new brotherhood between the Christian churches. Race is more difficult. The West, and when I speak of the West, I never speak of a unitary West, I mean, Western elites who are the creators of this type of discourse. So, they were uneasy with this medley- too many races, too many races in terms of groups, too many ethnicities, too many languages. One of them was saying What is this? My grandfather knew only two countries, right? We know the Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire, all of us all of a sudden as a child, I have to study 12 new countries, right? People are uneasy with that. So, they want simplicity. So, they are uneasy with that. But in the end, white against color, and especially Indo-European versus the West, not linguistically. So, there are always limits which allow the Balkans to be embraced, although they’re seen as, you know, the poorest, and there is the class component. The attitudes, especially in the 18th - 19th century, toward the Ottoman Empire were, this is an enemy, this is a different entity, but there was, because the elites are describing them, there was a kind of recognition that this is an empire, they liked to be accepted in the Sultans, in the sarays etcetera, etcetera. The Balkans were seen as, I use this metaphor, you know, the east side of London, the east side of Europe, right? They are the underdogs, they are the poor ones, right?  (inaudible) the uncivilised one. So, there is also this class component, which looks down upon them. And therefore, nowadays, you see this element of poverty that is the stigma against the Balkans. So, this is what I would say about liminality. And I think that liminality and marginality or peripherality, I use periphery very often in my work, I think these are very appropriate concepts because they are general, they can describe any kind of relationship, you know, outside of any kind of concrete context

Meryem Zisan 2  31:35 
You mentioned in the book that were seeing Rob generates counter arguments to ideologies such as feminism and fascism, but they did not generate a counter argument for Balkanism yet. So, how we see it now?

Prof. Maria Todorova   31:50 
Well, I see it, you know, the, it’s beginning to generate, but look, misogyny was countered by suffragettes and by active women, right? Fascism was countered by anti-fascists. So, you know, we have to fight for it. We have to create a discourse, which emancipates the Balkans, and I think I’ve done it with my book. I’m always surprised that, it’s what? More than 25 years after the book is, is still being read, it is precisely because it emancipates us, it shows how we can counter this rhetoric. But eventually, what I will see, I think that eventually, Balkanism and balkanization will become empty signifiers. Look at the word Byzantine, right? The Byzantine Empire is dead, you know, since the middle of the 15th century, and the notion of the Byzantine Empire was created only in the 16th century by Turkish, but I’m sorry by German scholars. Why?  In order to describe for them the difference between the Eastern and Western Roman Empire, just for the sake of neatness, and it was used very neutrally to describe  an art style, which was elaborate, you know, baroque and whatnot. And eventually, it became an offensive thing to describe hypocritical overcomplex, right? When you say oh, this one is a Byzantine person, right? Who is trying to (inaudible)… so, but you use the word Byzantine without ever thinking that you might, you know, offend anyone. It is an empty signifier. I will give you another drastic example that you would never know, the word (inaudible) is an offensive word, right? Meaning sodomite in English, comes from Bulgaria. The Bulgarians in the middle ages in the, from the 9th, 10th, 11th century, they had an orthodox sect, which was Manichaean. And all these… You all read Umberto Eco, the Name of the Rose, right? So, he describes those heretical things. Well, they come from the Bulgarians, from the Bogomils, they all began shins, and the Cathars in France, and they were wiped out by the Catholic Church. There were several crusades against these heretics. By the 12th 13th century, they were wiped out. But in Provence, they were called (vulgar-inaudible). Because this sect, this heresy came from Bulgaria. And from (vulgar-inaudible) which we get, which was an offensive thing. You have butter. So whenever someone somebody says vulgar, people might be offended, but not because they’re called Bulgarians, right?  So balkanization, also, people nowadays who are using the word Balkanization, they probably don’t even know where the Balkans are. They mix it with Baltics and Balkans, right?  But they use Balkanization for anything which is being percalized people is take up the Balkanization of the internet, the Balkanization of politics. It just means division, percalization in small units. So eventually I think that, you know, it will become an empty signifier, but not quite yet. So, at this point, we have to react, and we have to create this counter narrative about the Balkans, and there are plenty of things where the Balkans could be proud of

Sertaç Sehlikoglu  35:28 
Thank you. That’s a great note, Professor.  In the project, we also discussed Turkey’s influence the region, you know, a number of things, trade organisations agreements, apart from, you know, media representations. How are these interactions you think, instrumental in both producing and reproducing the connection between the Balkans in Turkey and the Balkans in Europe? And maybe you can help us to think a little bit on the implications, like what implications does this have for shaping the contemporary imagining of the Balkans at a broader level?

Prof. Maria Todorova  36:06 
Look, as long as the barrier is stopped on Turkey’s accession in the European Union, which is a scandal as far as I’m concerned, as long as that is in place, and Turkey is not allowed. I think that the links between the Balkans and Turkey, and I consider Turkey to be a Balkan country, but but the links are going to be diminishing, and Turkey will look more and more to the East. And the same thing happens with Russia. Russia has always had a traditional, very important role in the Balkans. And now especially with this war, you see how Russia is turning its back as it’s looking to the East, so as long as this huge geopolitical game is in place, I don’t see a real networking, economic… But you’re right, that the weakening of the stereotype against the Ottoman Empire in Turkey makes people curious about what’s going on in Turkey. So, tourism is going on the cultural level, things are going on. And you asked me a question, which is very smart about period dramas. Unfortunately, I have not seen them. But I know that they are extremely popular, not only in the Arab world, where in Egypt, because they are number one, but also in the Balkans people love to look at these series, partly because they fracture, this not simply fracture, they obliterate the stereotype that people would have from textbooks of the Turk, right? You know, the Turkey slavery and whatnot. And they see themselves, typically, they see themselves playing out in these very sweet, middle class, love dramas and whatnot. So, I mean, here you have populism in action, this kind of, so they have an appeal, and that raises the curiosity of people toward Turkey. On the other hand, of course, when you have all the mosques that are being built in the Balkans with Turkish or Saudi money, that doesn’t create a very positive reaction, as you might imagine. So  it’s a complex thing. But I think that, again, as long as the geopolitics are in place, I cannot explain a encounter.

Sertaç Sehlikoglu  38:48 
One of the things that I had the chance to kind of explore was exactly this, you know, how people were seeing these various movements, Ottoman time period, period drama, specifically sitting together with people and talking about them, but also I have observed something that was very, very tangible, very kind of like shouting out at me, across the Albanians, and both Kosovo and Macedonia, which was looking at those period dramas and looking at the Ottoman legacy as something that they’ve owned, but not the Turks did, if that makes sense. Like they are… We were those Padishahs, we were those Sultans not the Anotolians. Yes, which is historically quite accurate, actually, when you think about of course, it’s taking a particularly cost of an art, Albanian nationalism, it turns into other conversations.

Prof. Maria Todorova  39:54 
You’re absolutely right. But this this is among the Muslim population. You can see them insulted here in Bosnia also we are the partials, we are the base and you have all those names, of course. So, you can see it sometimes in the others. Well, the Janissaries were from our ranks, mostly from the Slavic and Greek ranks but but less so. So, you rightly observed it among the Albanians in Macedonia and in Albania proper, and among the Kosovans and in the Bosnian Bosniaks known as the Bosnian Muslims, the historical period dramas are more difficult to swallow, except these elements that we say. the others that are very easily accepted and admired are the present day ones, I might have thought here are ,what I did my Ottoman course, I’ve shown them the, what is it, the Suleiman the Magnificent, I forgot … Hurrem and all that. And that was also, of course, you could see the stereotypes that are… Mehmet the  Conqueror, Mehmet Fatih, it was terrible—it was terrible. It was so demeaning against the Byzantine Empire that I had to show them. In fact, the other side how neo Ottomanism construct itself against the other,  diminished other, that would not have a good reception. So, some are having good receptions, but mostly the non-historical ones, except these guys. And for good reasons in Albania, obviously, I mean, Albanian nationalism was not created as a secessionist nationalism. It wanted to have the umbrella of the Ottoman Empire, and it took the Balkan Wars and then the appetites of the neighboring countries when they decided to go for independence. They just wanted cultural autonomy within the Ottoman Empire. That’s natural.

Sertaç Sehlikoglu  41:59 
Thank you. Thank you very much.

Meryem ZIsan  42:01 
Thank you for joining us today. We are very happy to have you with us today in the Imagining Turkey podcast series second episode.

Hazal Aydin 42:09 
Thank you very much for joining us today.

Sertaç Sehlikoglu  42:16 
You have listened to imagining Turkey Podcast Series hosted at UCL Institute for Global Prosperity, funded by the European Research Council.