Melih Kökcü | University of Duisburg-Essen (original) (raw)
Papers by Melih Kökcü
Ausstellung der Universitätsbibliothek Erfurt 15. April - 27. Mai 2016, Oct 12, 2016
Eurasian Journal of English Language and Literature, Dec 25, 2020
In contemporary literature, cosmopolitanism has become more significant for fiction as it narrate... more In contemporary literature, cosmopolitanism has become more significant for fiction as it narrates today's crucial nonhomogeneous political, social, and cultural issues. In a cosmopolitan context, authors respond to the needs of contemporary readerships by writing beyond nation, border, and topicality. Approaching otherness, migration, and mobility with a positive attitude, cosmopolitanism allegedly offers tools to negotiate with "the other" that transcend xenophobia and parochialism. This positive approach to "the other'' is presented in Elif Shafak's 2010 novel, The Forty Rules of Love through the binary of localismsupralocalism and particularism-universalism. The book merges the fictionalized biography of the Persian-Turkish Sufi poet known to the West as Rumi, and the story of a Jewish-American housewife seeking spiritual renaissance in her monotonous life. Shafak managed to place her novel on the Turkish, American, and global literary markets due to her weaving of particular and universal narratives in the novel, but she creates her own notion of cosmopolitanism by appropriating vernacular stories and building transnational narratives out of them. Shafak's decontextualization of Rumi's biography in the novel is problematic since it distorts indigenous stories to meet the demands of global readerships and their cosmopolitan imaginaries. In her novel, Shafak does not offer co-evolution of the global and local actors; rather, the novel revolves around inextricable cosmopolitanism. This paper focuses on cosmopolitanism in Shafak's The Forty Rules of Love not only as positive mode but also as generative of disruptive misrepresentations of Rumi.
The Journal of Social Science, 2020
Academia Letters, 2021
The Internet has revolutionized the way we interact globally. As the world turned out to be a 'gl... more The Internet has revolutionized the way we interact globally. As the world turned out to be a 'global village' marked by the economic, cultural and political interconnectedness of people across the world by using digital social platforms as public spheres, it is a fundamental necessity to redefine the term of the Public Sphere coined by Jürgen Habermas, on which public opinion can be formed after public discussions dealing with social and political affairs (Habermas, 1974). The Public Sphere (Öffentlichkeit) is a confidential space which is sterilized from authorities and enables the bourgeois society to hold political debates. Yet, participation in these debates extends beyond the bourgeoisie to all kinds of citizens, who can now access social platforms along with the World Wide Web and find their voices within these spaces. It is, however, inevitable to question whether digital public spheres are becoming less democratic as users today are surveilled and controlled with sophisticated technologies. Citizens who are gravitating to online social platforms as alternative public spheres are concerned about the future of democracy as authorities enforce surveillance policies, especially during Covid-19. Especially social media users complain about their continuous watching by authorities to gather data on online platforms. However, this statement is objected by governments and law enforcement agencies since the surveillance is implemented for the purpose of security and public peace. This paper focuses on how democratic and efficient digital platforms as public spheres are for each citizen to express their views and shape public opinion whilst advanced surveillance technologies are misemployed by such authorities as governments, policymakers, intelligence agencies, etc. This paper relies on fundamentally qualitative methods to explore concepts and theories in depth. This is an interdisciplinary paper within the scope of Sociology, Media Studies and Surveillance Studies. In this research, social platforms as global public spheres are evaluated
Eurasian Journal of English Language and Literature, 2020
In contemporary literature, cosmopolitanism has become more significant for fiction as it narrate... more In contemporary literature, cosmopolitanism has become more significant for fiction as it narrates today's crucial nonhomogeneous political, social, and cultural issues. In a cosmopolitan context, authors respond to the needs of contemporary readerships by writing beyond nation, border, and topicality. Approaching otherness, migration, and mobility with a positive attitude, cosmopolitanism allegedly offers tools to negotiate with "the other" that transcend xenophobia and parochialism. This positive approach to "the other'' is presented in Elif Shafak's 2010 novel, The Forty Rules of Love through the binary of localismsupralocalism and particularism-universalism. The book merges the fictionalized biography of the Persian-Turkish Sufi poet known to the West as Rumi, and the story of a Jewish-American housewife seeking spiritual renaissance in her monotonous life. Shafak managed to place her novel on the Turkish, American, and global literary markets due to her weaving of particular and universal narratives in the novel, but she creates her own notion of cosmopolitanism by appropriating vernacular stories and building transnational narratives out of them. Shafak's decontextualization of Rumi's biography in the novel is problematic since it distorts indigenous stories to meet the demands of global readerships and their cosmopolitan imaginaries. In her novel, Shafak does not offer co-evolution of the global and local actors; rather, the novel revolves around inextricable cosmopolitanism. This paper focuses on cosmopolitanism in Shafak's The Forty Rules of Love not only as positive mode but also as generative of disruptive misrepresentations of Rumi.
The Journal of Social Science, 2020
As of today, the teachings of Rumi, Ibn al-Arabi and other Sufi mystics are enjoying a considerab... more As of today, the teachings of Rumi, Ibn al-Arabi and other Sufi mystics are enjoying a considerable revival in the United States. Especially ecstatic poems of Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi have sold hundreds of thousands of copies recently, making him a best-selling poet not only in the United States but also in other many countries. The roots of American fascination for Sufism, however, reach as deep as the nineteenth century when American transcendentalism appeared as an expression within Romanticism as a literary movement. This paper aims to compare the concept of the Divine Unity in both seemingly unrelated philosophical movements in terms of how the ecstatic poems of Walt Whitman and Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi transcend physical existence in nature to see the truth of the universe, which means, for all of them, the unity with God. Some studies, albeit clear differences between two traditions, show evidence to commentate that their mystical and transcendental tenets share a basic understanding of human desire leading to the Divine Unity. Two religious and philosophical movements argue about omnipresence and omnipotence of God and in this point nature plays a crucial role as God's perfect manifestation. The ascetic poems of Rumi, the thirteenth-century Sufi Muslim philosopher born in today's Afghanistan, and the transcendental poems of Whitman, the nineteenthcentury Christian transcendentalist from New York, are bedecked with similar natural elements to see what lays beyond form in compossible nature.
Ausstellung der Universitätsbibliothek Erfurt 15. April - 27. Mai 2016, Oct 12, 2016
Eurasian Journal of English Language and Literature, Dec 25, 2020
In contemporary literature, cosmopolitanism has become more significant for fiction as it narrate... more In contemporary literature, cosmopolitanism has become more significant for fiction as it narrates today's crucial nonhomogeneous political, social, and cultural issues. In a cosmopolitan context, authors respond to the needs of contemporary readerships by writing beyond nation, border, and topicality. Approaching otherness, migration, and mobility with a positive attitude, cosmopolitanism allegedly offers tools to negotiate with "the other" that transcend xenophobia and parochialism. This positive approach to "the other'' is presented in Elif Shafak's 2010 novel, The Forty Rules of Love through the binary of localismsupralocalism and particularism-universalism. The book merges the fictionalized biography of the Persian-Turkish Sufi poet known to the West as Rumi, and the story of a Jewish-American housewife seeking spiritual renaissance in her monotonous life. Shafak managed to place her novel on the Turkish, American, and global literary markets due to her weaving of particular and universal narratives in the novel, but she creates her own notion of cosmopolitanism by appropriating vernacular stories and building transnational narratives out of them. Shafak's decontextualization of Rumi's biography in the novel is problematic since it distorts indigenous stories to meet the demands of global readerships and their cosmopolitan imaginaries. In her novel, Shafak does not offer co-evolution of the global and local actors; rather, the novel revolves around inextricable cosmopolitanism. This paper focuses on cosmopolitanism in Shafak's The Forty Rules of Love not only as positive mode but also as generative of disruptive misrepresentations of Rumi.
The Journal of Social Science, 2020
Academia Letters, 2021
The Internet has revolutionized the way we interact globally. As the world turned out to be a 'gl... more The Internet has revolutionized the way we interact globally. As the world turned out to be a 'global village' marked by the economic, cultural and political interconnectedness of people across the world by using digital social platforms as public spheres, it is a fundamental necessity to redefine the term of the Public Sphere coined by Jürgen Habermas, on which public opinion can be formed after public discussions dealing with social and political affairs (Habermas, 1974). The Public Sphere (Öffentlichkeit) is a confidential space which is sterilized from authorities and enables the bourgeois society to hold political debates. Yet, participation in these debates extends beyond the bourgeoisie to all kinds of citizens, who can now access social platforms along with the World Wide Web and find their voices within these spaces. It is, however, inevitable to question whether digital public spheres are becoming less democratic as users today are surveilled and controlled with sophisticated technologies. Citizens who are gravitating to online social platforms as alternative public spheres are concerned about the future of democracy as authorities enforce surveillance policies, especially during Covid-19. Especially social media users complain about their continuous watching by authorities to gather data on online platforms. However, this statement is objected by governments and law enforcement agencies since the surveillance is implemented for the purpose of security and public peace. This paper focuses on how democratic and efficient digital platforms as public spheres are for each citizen to express their views and shape public opinion whilst advanced surveillance technologies are misemployed by such authorities as governments, policymakers, intelligence agencies, etc. This paper relies on fundamentally qualitative methods to explore concepts and theories in depth. This is an interdisciplinary paper within the scope of Sociology, Media Studies and Surveillance Studies. In this research, social platforms as global public spheres are evaluated
Eurasian Journal of English Language and Literature, 2020
In contemporary literature, cosmopolitanism has become more significant for fiction as it narrate... more In contemporary literature, cosmopolitanism has become more significant for fiction as it narrates today's crucial nonhomogeneous political, social, and cultural issues. In a cosmopolitan context, authors respond to the needs of contemporary readerships by writing beyond nation, border, and topicality. Approaching otherness, migration, and mobility with a positive attitude, cosmopolitanism allegedly offers tools to negotiate with "the other" that transcend xenophobia and parochialism. This positive approach to "the other'' is presented in Elif Shafak's 2010 novel, The Forty Rules of Love through the binary of localismsupralocalism and particularism-universalism. The book merges the fictionalized biography of the Persian-Turkish Sufi poet known to the West as Rumi, and the story of a Jewish-American housewife seeking spiritual renaissance in her monotonous life. Shafak managed to place her novel on the Turkish, American, and global literary markets due to her weaving of particular and universal narratives in the novel, but she creates her own notion of cosmopolitanism by appropriating vernacular stories and building transnational narratives out of them. Shafak's decontextualization of Rumi's biography in the novel is problematic since it distorts indigenous stories to meet the demands of global readerships and their cosmopolitan imaginaries. In her novel, Shafak does not offer co-evolution of the global and local actors; rather, the novel revolves around inextricable cosmopolitanism. This paper focuses on cosmopolitanism in Shafak's The Forty Rules of Love not only as positive mode but also as generative of disruptive misrepresentations of Rumi.
The Journal of Social Science, 2020
As of today, the teachings of Rumi, Ibn al-Arabi and other Sufi mystics are enjoying a considerab... more As of today, the teachings of Rumi, Ibn al-Arabi and other Sufi mystics are enjoying a considerable revival in the United States. Especially ecstatic poems of Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi have sold hundreds of thousands of copies recently, making him a best-selling poet not only in the United States but also in other many countries. The roots of American fascination for Sufism, however, reach as deep as the nineteenth century when American transcendentalism appeared as an expression within Romanticism as a literary movement. This paper aims to compare the concept of the Divine Unity in both seemingly unrelated philosophical movements in terms of how the ecstatic poems of Walt Whitman and Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi transcend physical existence in nature to see the truth of the universe, which means, for all of them, the unity with God. Some studies, albeit clear differences between two traditions, show evidence to commentate that their mystical and transcendental tenets share a basic understanding of human desire leading to the Divine Unity. Two religious and philosophical movements argue about omnipresence and omnipotence of God and in this point nature plays a crucial role as God's perfect manifestation. The ascetic poems of Rumi, the thirteenth-century Sufi Muslim philosopher born in today's Afghanistan, and the transcendental poems of Whitman, the nineteenthcentury Christian transcendentalist from New York, are bedecked with similar natural elements to see what lays beyond form in compossible nature.