Our latest episode is now on Facebook, Twitter, and most podcast platforms. If you need a transcript or prefer to read it, you can also go to our Youtube channel.
Prof. Yiğit Akın delved into the topic of World War One as a major part of Turkish history and world history. He shed light on fact that the map we see today when we look at the political borders of the Middle East is a direct result of world war one, the single most important political event in the history of the modern Middle East. He also shed light on the important role the Ottoman Empire played in the Great War, and what it meant to the Turkish Republic that emerged after the war. One of the unique aspects of his work is that he includes civilian experience, not just battles, in his history. We talked about the importance of including women’s perspectives for gaining an understanding of how the battles affected the whole society. We talked about so much more. Please do check out the podcast or the video on Youtube. Ohio State Students, check out the courses he offers below! As well as videos he recorded for the WWI Museum in Kansas City.
Related courses and resources:
Dr. Akın offers a history course, “The Middle East Since 1940,” and a course on the broader history of Islam, History 2350.
Also check out his seminars, such as “WWI and the Making of the Modern Middle East,” History 4375
Currently, he is investigating the memory of ww1 in the Middle East, mostly Ottoman Turkey. The discrepancy between what he calls, “official oblivion and local memory the memory of the Great War” is of particular interest to him. His second monograph, a sequel to When the War Came Home: The Ottomans’ Great War and the Devastation of an Empire (Stanford, 2018), will focus on the twilight of the Ottoman Empire, 1918-1922. The time period of this work is basically after the empire, before the nation. Please also check out his presentations on the WWI Museum Youtube Channel