Scholarly Publications - Urban Design and Landscape Architecture

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/11693/115621

Browse

Browsing Scholarly Publications - Urban Design and Landscape Architecture by Author "Batuman, Bülent"

Filter results by typing the first few letters
Now showing 1 - 9 of 9
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    70’ler: Siyasetin odağındaki kent, kentin odağındaki siyaset
    (İletişim Yayınları, 2013) Batuman, Bülent
    70’lerin ortalarında Türkiye kentlerine bakıldığında görülen şey, kentin özgül bir siyaset odağı haline gelmiş olduğudur. Bir yanda –hem politik bir aktör hem de toplumsal bir çevre olarak– gecekondu, diğer yanda MC hükümetleriyle çatışan CHP’li belediyeler eliyle gelişen yerel yönetim modeli çerçevesinde hızla politikleşen kentsel hizmetler bulunmaktadır. Bu dönüşüm, sadece on yıl öncesi düşünüldüğünde bile çarpıcıdır. Zira, 60’ların ortalarında gecekondu, himayecilik ilişkileriyle yeniden üretilen ucuz bir kentleşme yöntemi, kentsel toplu tüketim hizmetleri ise, devletin yerel uzantıları olarak görünen belediyelerin doğal işlevleri olarak kavranmaktadır. Bu makale, işte bu dönüşümü, yani 70’lere damgasını vuran bir boyut olarak kentsel politikanın özgül bir siyasal mücadele alanı biçiminde ortaya çıkışını tartışmaktadır. Makalenin temel argümanı, bu dönüşümün özellikle mimar ve kent plancılarından oluşan mekân tasarımcılarının mesleki faaliyetlerini toplumcu siyasal eğilimleriyle buluşturan pratikleri dolayımıyla gerçekleştiğidir. Bu çerçevede makale, mekân tasarımcılarının kentsel siyaseti kuran iki temel alandaki etkinliklerini inceler: konut sorunu ve kentsel siyasetin kurumsal bağlamı olan yerel yönetimler.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Appropriating the masculine sacred islamism, gender, and mosque architecture in contemporary Turkey
    (Routledge, 2018) Batuman, Bülent; Staub, A.
    Religious duties for men and women differ in Islam, and they determine how the two appear in public. While men are required to perform Friday and Eid prayers in the mosque with the congregation, women are not. This has historically led to the formation of the mosque as a masculine space, in which men use the main prayer hall and women occupy a secondary and separate women’s section. The 1990s witnessed a global tide in women’s demand for equal mosque space, contesting gendered conventions. In Turkey, this tide coincided with the rise of the Islamist Justice and Development Party to power in 2002. After this, women came to the foreground not only as users but also as designers of mosque spaces. This chapter analyzes two recent mosques built in Ankara and Istanbul, both of which embody significance in terms of long-lasting tensions between modernity and tradition in mosque architecture.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Architectural mimicry and the politics of mosque building: negotiating Islam and Nation in Turkey
    (Routledge, 2016) Batuman, Bülent
    This paper discusses the politics of mosque architecture in modern Turkey. The classical Ottoman mosque image has been reproduced in state-sponsored mosques throughout the second half of the twentieth century. Defining this particular design strategy as architectural mimicry, I discuss the emergence of this image through the negotiation between the nation-state and the ‘nationalist conservative’ discourse within the context of Cold War geopolitics. Comparing the Turkish case with the Islamic post-colonial world, I argue that the prevalence of architectural mimicry is related to the nostalgia it generates. Nostalgia is a discursive effect of architectural mimicry which is in tune with the nationalist conservative worldview in its relationship to the state's anti-communism. This particular image was taken up by the Islamist AKP in the 2000s, within the context of the global rise of political Islam. In this instance, the same representation took on a different meaning. It functioned as a simulacrum representing the ‘nation in Islam’ with a claim to authenticity amongst the competing Islamic representations.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Claiming the Neo-Ottoman mosque: Islamism, gender, architecture
    (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023) Batuman, Bülent; Raudvere, Catharina; Petek, Onur
    This chapter focuses on the gender politics of mosque architecture within the current context of Turkey in which the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has encouraged the neo-Ottoman idiom. This particular idiom produced distinct ideological meanings within different political contexts. Currently, it serves the absorption of nationalism and the remoulding of the nation-state by the AKP’s Islamism and the making of the Islamic nation—millet. The AKP has also been promoting the mosque as a social space. A significant aspect of this process has been the gradual increase in women’s involvement as users and designers of space, demanding to have a say in the spatial organization of women’s sections in the mosques. The overlap between women’s demands and the governments agenda to endorse mosques also played role in the promotion of neo-Ottoman mosque architecture. The chapter discusses the instrumentalisation of gender politics to legitimise the government’s approach to mosque architecture. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Dis-placed: space, settlement, and agency
    (Intellect Ltd., 2021-07-01) Batuman, Bülent
    This article introduces the special issue ‘Dis-placed’. Questioning the term ‘refugee’ as an identity marker and pointing at the problematic connotations it embodies, the article explores the spatial forms of refugee experience. The knowledge of space, as produced within disciplines such as geography, urban planning, and architecture, is deployed by states to limit the movements of forced migrants across and within national borders. In response, the article calls for social/spatial justice, arguing that this can only be achieved through the blurring of the boundaries between host and refugee identities. The contributions in this special issue present investigations on different facets of the spatiality of forced migration through various disciplinary approaches and methodologies. Taken together, they underline the importance of the link between space and refugee agency in tackling forced migration.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Kentsel politikada yeni biçim arayışları: 2009 yerel seçimleri ve Ankara’da “Belediye Yönetimlerinde Saltanata Son” kampanyası
    (Dipnot Basın Yayın Pazarlama Ltd. Şti., 2010) Batuman, Bülent; Karakuş-Candan, T.
    55 yıllık tarihi boyunca kentsel politika süreçlerinin önemli bir aktörü olmuş bulunan Mimarlar Odası’nın kentsel mücadele alanındaki etkinliği genel olarak kurumsal ve hukuki süreçler içinde tariflidir. Yerel yönetimlerin keyfi ve anti-demokratik uygulamalarının en yoğun deneylendiği kentlerden olan Ankara’da faaliyet gösteren Mimarlar Odası Ankara Şubesi, 2009 Yerel Seçimleri sürecinde mevcut etkinlik çerçevesinin dışına çıkan aktivist bir kentsel mücadele yöntemi arayışına girmiştir. Bu doğrultuda, Oda’nın çağrıştırdığı kurumsal sınırlamaları aşmak ve yeni bir kentsel mücadele dili üretmek hedefiyle “Saltanata Son” adlı bir kampanya düzenlemiştir. Kampanyanın dikkat çekici özelliği, son yıllarda özellikle internet üzerinden örgütlenen ve kent mekânının anlık, hızlı ve çarpıcı kullanımları ile karakterize olan ve literatürde “flash-mob” ve “smart-mob” gibi kavramlarla tanımlanan eylem türlerinden ilham almış olmasıdır. Kampanya, yerel yönetim seçimlerinin sonuçları açısından başarısızlığa uğramış olsa da, örgütlediği katılımcı süreç ve öne sürdüğü kentsel taleplerin gördüğü genel kabul, kampanyanın dikkate değer bir kentsel mücadele deneyimi olduğunu göstermektedir.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    “Night Hawks” watching over the city: redeployment of night watchmen and the politics of public space in Turkey
    (Sage Publications, 2019-11) Batuman, Bülent; Erkip, Feyzan
    Technological advances have enormously increased surveillance techniques in the last three decades. In this article, we scrutinize the re-instatement of bekçi, the traditional night watchmen patrolling the residential neighborhoods in Turkey, which was obsolete for decades. We analyze the re-emergence of the bekçi in relation to the dynamics of urbanization, and with a perspective of power and surveillance. Our discussion bridges the Foucauldian notion of “visibility,” equating it with being subject to surveillance, and the Arendtian emphasis on “appearance” as the precondition for a claim to public space (hence, citizenship) in order the uncover the role of visibility within the mechanisms of power in public space. We argue that although the bekçi seems outmoded, especially within the context of ever-increasing advancement of surveillance technologies; its recent deployment in the public spaces of Turkish metropolises brings about new modes of politics of visibility parallel to the changing modality of the urban environment.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Objects of hate? Architectural symbols of the rich in Turkey in the 1960s
    (De Gruyter, 2020) Batuman, Bülent; Pekesen, Berna
    It is unfortunately true that there is social injustice in our country. A fortunate class exploits housing potentials and acquires houses which would be considered luxurious even in rich countries; resources are seized to the disadvantage of other classes.This quotation is from the Chamber of Architects’ declaration published a few months after the military intervention in 1960. Although it did not attack the military regime, the text openly criticized the failure of the military to implement effective regulations regarding housing and urbanization. As the quotation reflects, the Chamber’s declaration represents the urgency of the housing question as well as the Chamber’s position with respect to it. Yet, it was none other than architects, who were designing the houses, which “would be considered luxurious even in rich countries.” The tension between the client-dependent nature of the architectural profession and the Chamber’s opposition to urbanization led by the private sector would prevail throughout the following decades. Nonetheless, this tension allows us to consider the multifaceted character of architecture which is simultaneously a service to be bought and a social product to be consumed. I would like to use this intrinsic conflict between the private ownership of buildings and their social use as a starting point for my discussion on the cultural politics of the housing question in Turkey in the 1960s. I will argue that a key mode of consuming architecture is through vision: the visual experience of the built environment establishes the foundation for the social meanings of architecture. Therefore, my aim here is to scrutinize the political role of architectural representations of home in popular culture in the 1960s. As scrutinized by the chapters in this collection, the period witnessed radical changes in almost all facets of social life. Urban life transformed under pressure of multiple factors and led to the emergence of new social practices. Social change encompassed all sorts of domains and cultural production was no exception. New trends and lifestyles displayed social distinction, which triggered conflicting visions regarding the city and its built environment. Within this framework, I will show how cultural representations were not merely reflections of wealth and poverty, but rather components in the making of the imaginations of the rich and the poor.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Toplumcu bir belediyecilik modeli: "yeni belediyecilik hareketi" 1973–1977
    (Mülkiyeliler Birliği Genel Merkezi, 2010) Batuman, Bülent
    1973 ve 1980 yılları arasında CHP’nin yönetimi altında bulunan belediyelerde üretilen ve söz konusu dönemde “yeni”, “devrimci” veya “toplumcu” belediyecilik hareketi olarak isimlendirilen program karşı-hegemonik bir kentsel politika sürecinin bileşeni olarak ortaya çıkmış ve birkaç açıdan dikkate değer özgüllükler barındırmıştır. Her şeyden önce bu programın oluşumu çeşitli disiplinlere mensup kentleşme uzmanlarının katkısıyla ve emekçi sınıfların henüz formüle edilmemiş taleplerine karşılık olarak ortaya çıkmıştır. İkinci olarak, bu hareket Türkiye’de ilk kez yerel yönetimin özerkliği yönünde bir talebin ortaya çıkmasına sebep olmuştur. Üçüncü olarak ise, yeni belediyecilik hareketinin gündemine aldığı uygulamalar kentsel emekçi sınıfların toplumsal bir özne olarak ortaya çıkmasına katkıda bulunmuştur. Makale, Türkiye’deki yerel yönetim geleneğine kısa bir bakışın ardından, 1973–1977 döneminin belediyecilik pratiklerini incelemekte ve son olarak yeni belediyecilik hareketinin uygulamalarını bir üst ölçekte toplumcu bir belediyecilik modeli için geçerli olabilecek boyutlarıyla değerlendirmektedir.