Essay On Turkey Culture

BIBLOGRAPHY OF TURKISH CULTURE

“One day my mortal body will turn to dust, but the Turkish Republic will stand forever.” - Mustafa Kemal Ataturk The English word "Turkish" comes from the ancient Turkish word Türk , which can be used as an adjective or a proper noun. In Turkish the name of the country is Türkiye . After decades of nationalistic indoctrination most citizens self-identify as Turks regardless of ethnic background. Known number of the major non-Turkish ethnic groups like the Kurds in the southeast, and the Arabs in the south, and the Laz of the western Black Sea coast, and the Georgians in the northeast and northwest—express dual identities.

Turkey population is believed to be 99.8% Muslim. Sunnis make up around 80% of this and Shias around 20%. There are very small Christian and Jewish populations though these were bigger before the turn of the century. When Attaturk, the founder of modern Turkey wrote up the constitution he ensured it was a strongly worldly one. However since the 1980s the role of religion in the state has been much debated. The profane nature of the state is sometimes dubious in practice. The remainder of the population belongs to other faiths,

Its area is 301,382 square miles (814,578 square kilometers). It is bounded on the west by the Aegean Sea; on the northwest by the Sea of Marmara, Bulgaria and Greece; on the north by the Black Sea; on the east by Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Iran; and on the south by Iraq, Syria, and the Mediterranean. While Istanbul (formerly Constantinople) is the major city and was the capital of the Ottoman Empire, the first president—Mustafa Kemal Atatürk—selected Ankara, an interior Anatolian city, as the capital in 1923. Militarily Ankara was less vulnerable and more easily defended than Istanbul. The choice also symbolized Attaturk's policy of nationalism that is because Ankara was more Turkish and less cosmopolitan than the old