Religious and Nationalistic Discourses in Turkey’s Primary Education Religion Textbooks

• In Event: Strenghening global competencies and transformative practices

Proposal

My study analyzes the nationalistic and religious discourses in Religious Culture and Ethics primary school textbooks in Turkey, in order to discover what kind of national and religious identities are being promoted through textbooks, and whether promoting such identities is in line with the principles of human rights and democratic citizenship. Religious Culture and Ethics course is mandatory as per the constitution of Turkey, and its textbooks are published and distributed by the Ministry of National Education.
Turkey has a highly centralized education system and all schools in the country follow the same state-developed curriculum. For every course in each grade level, there is a single state-produced textbook, published and distributed by the state free of charge, and used as the primary learning material in all classrooms. Having a relatively inflexible, unified curriculum and a single mandatory textbook gives the state complete authority on what is taught and how it is taught all over the country (Cayir & Gurkaynak, 2008). Textbooks are ‘reliable documents of the political and ideological choices of whatever political party happens to be in power’ (Faas, 2011). Through textbooks, it is possible to uncover the political and social norms, rules and patterns of behavior that a society aims to imbue in younger generations (Foster, 1999). This is why, textbooks are valuable sources for exploring ‘the construction, manipulation and reproduction of power and ideology’ (Issitt, 2004). Especially, for countries like Turkey, where textbooks are directly published and distributed by the state, textbooks are direct reflections of the official state ideology. With increasing awareness on education’s role in promoting human rights and democracy, number of studies that analyzed textbooks increased in many countries. Even though there have been major initiatives to analyze textbooks from a human rights-based perspective in Turkey, a study that specifically focuses on the discourses in Religious Culture and Ethics textbooks does not exist. One of the aims of my study is fulfilling this gap.
I analyzed religious and nationalistic discourses in all state-published Religious Culture and Ethics course primary education textbooks (Grades 4-8) through content and critical discourse analysis. I found out that textbooks indoctrinate a particular understanding of citizenship based on a religiously Sunni-Muslim and ethnically Turkish identity, and that some discourses in textbooks violate the principles of human rights and democratic citizenship.
Religious Culture and Ethics textbooks define religion not from a universal perspective, but from a denominationally Sunni-Muslim point of view. The textbooks focus mainly on the Islamic culture and belief system, and offer an isolationist viewpoint to religion. They represent Qur’an as the main source for religious knowledge, containing universal truth. By theologically arguing that Qur’an is the last holy book, and by claiming it is universal, textbooks try to legitimize the superiority of Qur’an. By giving quotes from the Qur’an more than 450 times in total, textbooks show Qur’an as reference for many different types of knowledge. Additionally, they attribute the positive values that are common in almost any religion only to Islam. By doing so, they discourage any interest or empathy to different cultures and belief systems, and they reinforce contempt over other religions.
Textbooks presuppose that Islam is the most superior religion, and that belief systems other than Islam are mainly based on ‘superstition’. They presume a hierarchy between different belief systems and present some beliefs as if they are less true or less developed than others. For example, they reflect monotheistic religions as superior to polytheistic religions; and celestial religions as superior to non-celestial religions. According to textbooks, not believing in God is at the bottom of the hierarchy. Textbooks create prejudices against non-believers, by implying that they are unintelligent or evil.
Religious discourses in textbooks also exclude non-Muslim minorities and non-Sunni minorities by ignoring their presence. Phrases such as ‘our religion’ and ‘our prophet,’ used more than 200 times each, presume that everybody living in the country believes in Islam. Similarly, textbooks give an impression that all Muslims living in Turkey practice the Sunni interpretation of Islam (by performing salaat, fasting during Ramadan, or worshipping in a mosque), which is highly exclusionary for non-Sunni Muslim minorities, such as Alevis, who practice Islam in a different way than Sunnis.
Similarly, nationalistic discourses in textbooks promote national and local values and interests over universal and global values and interests. They portray concepts such as citizenship, patriotism, nationalism and national values from an ethnically Turkish point of view rather than from a universal perspective. They attribute certain positive qualities such as heroism and tolerance only to Turks, and portray Turks as superior to other nations.
In general, nationalistic discourses are excluding towards non-Turkish groups. Textbooks neglect the ‘different’, including minorities. For example, when defining the term nation, textbooks emphasize unity in language and religion; citizens who speak languages other than Turkish, and practice religions other than Islam, are not considered as belonging to the nation. Likewise, the ethnic and religious diversity in Turkey, and the existence of Kurdish, Arabic, Armenian, Laze, Roman, Christian or Jewish citizens in Turkey are completely omitted.
Militaristic discourses are also prominent in textbooks. Culturalization of militaristic elements, portrayal of war as an inevitable concept, and glorification of death are frequently encountered. The ideas of ‘dying for the nation,’ ‘sacrificing life for the nation,’ and ‘becoming a martyr’ are praised both through religious and nationalistic discourses. There is a general promotion of prioritizing the state over the individual, to an extreme extent that one should die for the nation.
The ones listed above are only some of the findings of my study. In general, there are many discourses in Religion and Ethics Course textbooks that are problematic in terms of international human rights and democratic citizenship principles. The discourses are far from strengthening respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, or promoting understanding, tolerance and friendship among nations and racial, ethnic or religious groups. When taking into account that this course is mandatory as per the constitution of Turkey the need to urgently reexamine and revise the content of these textbooks becomes even more critical.

Author

• Yesim Hanci, Student