Rhetorical Contrast Between Turkey and the Ottoman Empire: ‘Modern’ Turkey Versus ‘Unmodern’ Ottoman Empire

Abstract

In its first decades, the Turkish Republic attempted to create a new national identity that differed from the identity of the Ottoman Empire in socio-cultural, bureaucratic, administrative and legal terms. This attempt led to the creation of a rhetoric of difference between Turkey and the Ottoman Empire. This article argues that the rhetorical rupture between Turkey and the Ottoman Empire was reflected in the Turkish press discourse of the early republican years. Applying the Vienna School of Discourse-Historical Approach (Reisigl & Wodak 2001; Wodak 1990, 1994), this article will analyze the discursive and rhetorical strategies of the editorial published by M. Nermi in Cumhuriyet newspaper in 1931 to show that the editorialist M. Nermi strove to explain the administrative and perspective difference of Turkey from the Ottoman Empire. This article will show what kind of persuasive techniques the editorialist used to make the readers agree with his arguments.