Bilgi, Sabiha2021-06-232021-06-2320140030-92301477-674Xhttps://doi.org/10.1080/00309230.2013.833272https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12491/7888This article examines the cultural construction of the school in Turkey in relation to the construction of Turkish nation-ness. By looking at how the modern school was fit together with a network of interrelated discourses available in early twentieth-century Turkey, the article investigates the ways in which the school became an object of thought in support of narrating and imagining Turkish nation-ness. In the article, I argue that the school was pivotal in the imagination and institution of Turkey not only literally but also symbolically. Juxtaposed with a radically contrasting image of the traditional educational establishment of the Ottoman dynastic past called mahalle mektebi, the school was appropriated by the Republican elite as a statement of modernity, national character and a total break from the Ottoman past. Giving a visual expression to the new regime's aspirations for the society, the school, with its very architecture, layout and disciplinary and hierarchical organisation, functioned as a clear symbol of enlightenment, civility, order and progress.eninfo:eu-repo/semantics/closedAccessSchoolNationModernisationOttoman PastTurkeyArticle10.1080/00309230.2013.8332725033563702-s2.0-84901591743Q2WOS:000337560600007Q2