This study, which aims to portray the circumstances of Ottoman women&rsquo / s movement during the first years of Second Constitutional Era from the eyes of the writers of Kadinlar D&uuml / nyasi Periodical, makes an analysis of the meanings ascribed to the efforts for the restoration of women&rsquo / s position in social life and the roles claimed for women during Ottoman modernization period. This research intends to confirm the fact that the basis for the mentality of defenders voicing women&rsquo / s rights was the progressive outlook which chose the &ldquo / women question&rdquo / as the focus on the way of securing not only social progress but also social integration, solidarity, national consciousness and progressiveness. Thus, the ideas expressed in the articles all written by women writers of Kadinlar D&uuml / nyasi are evaluated with the question in mind that whether the boundaries of Ottoman women&rsquo / s movement and the social role granted for them in the modernization process were wholly determined by the women themselves or theorized predominantly by the policymakers of the state who were all men. Deducing from the self-evaluation of women in Kadinlar D&uuml / nyasi of 1913, this thesis consequently underlines the fact that the struggle for women rights, which were carried out on behalf of patriotic and nationalist claims in accordance with the socio-political conditions of the time, could not overcome their invariable position of being &ldquo / historical objects&rdquo / despite of the fact that women held a considerable progress in their status during the Second Constitutional Era which laid the parameters of the &ldquo / women question&rdquo / during the early Republican Era.

Dans la présente étude intitulée « Une approche transnationale des écritures des femmes ottomanes et françaises (européennes) au 19ème et au début du 20ème siècle » nous avons étudié les ouvrages et œuvres de femmes ottomanes et européennes autour de l’image du « harem » avec une approche transnationale féministe. La revendication de la thèse est que l’on ne peut ni parler d’une seule image du harem ni d’un type de récit de harem de femme ottomane, anglaise ou française. En replaçant ces ouvrages, classés dans la catégorie de « littérature de harem » au rang de la littérature mondiale, nous avons observé les différentes manières d’appréhender la lutte pour la libération de la condition féminine des femmes ottomanes comme autant de témoignages différents. D’autre part, nous avons mis en évidence, les interactions et la solidarité que les femmes féministes ottomanes et européennes ont mis en place, malgré les différences, de race, langue et religion pour leur lutte pour la condition féminine, dans un commun état d’esprit lié aux revendications de leur genre, du 19ème siècle au début du 20ème siècle. / In this manuscript titled « A Transnational Approach to Literatures of Ottoman and French (European) Women Writers of 19th and Early 20th Centuries » works of Ottoman and European women writers gathered around the image of « harem » are explored with a comparative and transnational feminist method. Their work is analyzed in a non-Eurocentric, transnational, multi-cultural and multi- lingual, global and systematic perspective divorced from discourses of male hegemony. The central argument of this manuscript is that there are multiple images for the East and hardly any type of European women’s narrative can serve as a prototype. In this study, narratives piled under the category « harem literature » are evaluated as part of the greater World Literature and arenas for contrasting testmonies of Ottoman Women’s Liberation Movement. Moreover, solidarity and interaction developed among Ottoman and European women are noted who had common gender-related problems next to differences due ethnicity, language and religion, in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Cette thèse de doctorat examine l’impact social de la Première Guerre mondiale dans l’Empire ottoman sur les femmes turques défavorisées et la réaction quotidienne de ces femmes aux conditions négatives de la guerre et aux mesures de l’État concernant les femmes. Elle utilise l’approche de l’histoire populaire et des nouvelles sources des archives ottomanes pour démontrer les voix et les expériences des femmes ordinaires, surtout leur lutte contre l’appauvrissement à cause de la guerre et les politiques sociales insuffisantes. Par conséquent, elle contribue à combler une grande lacune dans l’historiographie sur l’Empire ottomane et les études sur les femmes qui examinent rarement les femmes turques ordinaires. Elle renforce l’idée que les femmes ottomanes ont eu des grandes difficultés à cause de la guerre contrairement aux comptes de modernisation soulignant seulement les développements positifs concernant les libertés et les droits des femmes après la guerre. Elle réfute les comptes acceptant la guerre comme une période pendant laquelle toutes les femmes turques ont vécu une « émancipation. » D’ailleurs, elle met en lumière les formes et les aspects des points de vue critiques des femmes et de la politique quotidienne des femmes pour survivre les conditions négatives de la guerre, pour faire entendre leurs voix, pour protéger leurs droits et pour recevoir des aides sociales. / This dissertation examines the social impact of World War I in the Ottoman Empire on ordinary poor Turkish women and their everyday response to the adverse wartime conditions and the state policies concerning them. Based on new archival sources giving detailed information about the voice, experience and agency of these women and based on the history from below approach, this study focuses on poor, underprivileged and working Turkish women’s everyday experiences, especially their struggle against and perception of wartime conditions, mobilization and state policies about them. By doing so, it contributes to filling the great gap in late Ottoman historiography and women’s studies, which rarely examine ordinary women and their everyday problems and struggles for survival and rights. First, it scrutinizes how ordinary women experienced the war and argues that, in contrast to the modernization accounts that overlook women’s sufferings at the cost of post-war developments in women’s rights and liberties, ordinary Turkish women had great difficulties during the war years. It presents a major caveat to the accounts accepting the war years as a period during which Turkish women monolithically experienced a gradual liberty and « emancipation. » Second, it brings the unexamined forms and aspects of women’s critical and subjective views, their everyday politics to circumvent the adverse conditions and state policies, to make their voices heard, to pursue their rights, and to receive government support into the light. / Bu doktora tezi Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nda Birinci Dünya Savaşı’nın sıradan yoksul Türk kadınları üzerindeki sosyal etkilerini ve kadınların olumsuz savaş koşullarına ve kendileriyle ilgili devlet politikalarına yönelik tavırlarını incelemektedir. Kadınların sesleri, deneyimleri ve tarihsel rolleri hakkında detaylı bilgiler veren yeni arşiv kaynaklarına ve aşağıdan tarih yaklaşımına dayanan bu tez yoksul, temel sosyal haklardan yoksun ve çalışan Türk kadınlarının gündelik deneyimlerine, özellikle de savaş koşulları, seferberlik ve devlet politikalarını algılayış ve bunlarla mücadele biçimlerine odaklanmaktadır. Dolayısıyla, bu tez, sıradan kadınları ve onların gündelik problemleriyle hayatta kalma ve hak mücadelelerini çok az inceleyen Osmanlı tarihçiliği ve kadın araştırmalarındaki büyük bir boşluğu doldurmaya katkıda bulunmaktadır. Bu tez, bu anlamda, iki temel temaya odaklanmaktadır. Öncelikle, sıradan kadınların savaşı nasıl deneyimlediklerini mercek altına almakta ve onların çektikleri acıları savaş sonrası kadın hak ve özgürlüklerindeki ve üst ve orta sınıf eğitimli kadınların etkinlik ve deneyimlerindeki gelişmelerin bir bedeli olarak algılayıp gözden kaçıran modernleşmeanlatılarının tersine sıradan kadınların savaş yıllarında büyük güçlükler çektiğini savunmaktadır. Bu bağlamda, bu çalışma, Türk kadınlarının savaş yıllarında bütün olarak görece bir “özgürleşme” yaşadıklarını kabul eden anlatılara önemli bir uyarıdır. İkincil olarak, bu tez, kadınların zorluklarla gündelik mücadelelerine odaklanarak kadınların eleştirel ve öznel tutumlarının ve olumsuz koşullar ve devlet politikalarından kaçmak, seslerini duyurmak, haklarının peşine düşmek ve destek görebilmek amaçlı gündelik politikalarının keşfedilmemiş biçim ve yönlerini gün ışığına çıkarmaktadır.