RESEARCH
I investigate how different media forms actively produce, circulate, and contest inequalities, drawing on ethnography and historical anthropology. I have two complementary research strands: The first strand examines class and gender inequalities through the history and politics of new media technologies from the1920s to the current era, drawing on my Marie SkÅ‚odowska-Curie funded History of New Media in Turkey project. This project traces the historical meanings of “new media” beyond its association with today’s digital media by comparatively examining the formative years of radio (1920-30), television (1950-60), and digital media (2000s).
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The second strand investigates the media visibility of religious inequalities from the 1940s to the present, focusing on journalism, secularism, and Alevis in Turkey. Supported by a Wenner-Gren Hunt Fellowship, the book manuscript traces the trajectory of secularism in Turkey and examines how this history has shaped journalists’ representations of religious inequalities, both in earlier periods and in the present.
Together, these two strands address a central question: How are contemporary inequalities rooted in the shifting configurations of mass media and politics that have taken shape and transformed over the course of history? My interests span a wide range of media forms, from radio and television to news media and social media platforms.
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Currently, I am developing a third project that builds on my findings from the history of new media, examining repair practices from the 1950s radio era to the present landscape of digital technologies. This project recently advanced to the interview stage of the ERC Starting Grant competition.
