MODERNİZMİN HAYALETLERİ: TÜRKÇE ROMANLARDA LOGOS-MERKEZCİLİK

Abstract

This study will examine the traces of logocentric thought in the process of Turkish modernization. Jacques Derrida used the concept of logocentrism to describe the metaphysical tendencies in Western philosophy that stem from a search for origins. According to Derrida, Western thought has created hierarchical oppositions such as speech-writing and being-absence by defining foundational concepts in opposition to what they exclude. These dualities have constituted the fundamental building blocks of Western philosophy since Ancient Greece and have profoundly influenced modern thought. This study will address how these hierarchical structures have shaped Turkish modernization discourses through literary works. In this context, Derrida’s method of deconstruction, which questions the metaphysical assumptions of Western philosophy, will serve as a key tool in analyzing the dualities in texts about Turkish modernization. Ahmet Mithat’s Felatun Bey ile Rakım Efendi, Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu’s Sodom ve Gomore, and Oğuz Atay’s Tutunamayanlar will play a significant role in this analysis. These novels, each belonging to different periods of Turkish modernization, will be comparatively analyzed to reveal how opposing dualities were used throughout the modernization process and how they transformed over time. The study will explore how the conceptual frameworks of modernization changed and evolved in historical and social contexts through literary works. These structures, where the first term of a hierarchical opposition suppresses and excludes the second term, also open the door to the analysis of power relations. The deconstructive approach shows that the assumptions underlying these hierarchies are not natural or universal but rather socially constructed. Therefore, the dynamics of power shaped through these structures in the processes of modernization will be understood.