2025/11/01 by Avner Wishnitzer · 2 voices
Social Sciences · #Islamic Studies and History #Ottoman Empire History and Society #Turkey's Politics and Society
paper · doi:10.1093/pastj/gtaf033
openalex publication_date 2025/11/01 · openalex created_date 2026/01/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
Abstract Drawing on Ottoman official correspondence, an informer’s report, and palace-sponsored tracts and chronicles, this article challenges the widely-held notion that print is inherently linked to diversification, liberalization, and Enlightenment ideals. Against the background of rising tensions between the authorities and the Janissary army, Ottoman officials viewed rumours and political discussions in coffeehouses and other social hubs as threatening to their efforts towards centralization. To counter these perceived dangers, they sought to capture oral communication in written records and invalidate its credibility, relying on written and, later, printed texts. Government-sponsored tracts that targeted the Janissaries linked the supposedly unrestrained tongues of the common people with their unruly imagination, portraying both as antithetical to truth, reason, religion, and order. The Calendar of Events, the government gazette launched in 1831, was the culmination of this process. Rather than marking the emergence of an Ottoman ‘public sphere’, it reflected an effort to subjugate an already-existing realm of popular public opinion.