The women’s movement in Turkey fights back
November 12, 2012 5:21 pm
International, Turkey
Feminism, as a modern social movement, is not a new political phenomenon for in Turkey writes Ecehan Balta. At the end of the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century women began organising themselves as feminists and published dozens of newspapers and journals, organised demonstrations like their sisters did in 19th century Europe for their political and social rights. They fought to increase women’s access to education and paid work, to abolish polygamy, and the peçe, an Islamic veil. The first women’s association in Turkey, The Ottoman Welfare Organisation of Women was founded in 1908 and became partially involved in the Young Turks Movement which was a driving force in the founding of the Turkish Republic. The women’s revolution accomplished by the young Turkish Republic was in fact the result of these 50 years of activism by Ottoman women.
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