Girls’ Education in Turkey: Three Generations

I wrote this the same day I wrote the blog post for Mustang so writing the previous post was the inspiration for this one. This post is for my grandmother and mom, the two kick-ass Black Sea women in my life.

When my grandmother reached school age, her father really wanted her to go to school, but he was working at another city at that time, so her mother took her to the only school in their village. The school was full of boys, she would be the only girl in her classroom if she joined. My grandmother's father was a very open-minded person, so he was OK with this despite his family living in a conservative village. He thought if there was a girl in the classroom, other parents might be more enthusiastic about sending their daughters to school as well, so there would be a lot more girls in school in the end. He bought my grandmother's uniform, pencils, notebooks, etc. and sent them all to his wife beforehand. However, the teacher at the school said he couldn’t take the responsibility of a girl in a classroom full of boys and didn’t let my grandmother join his classroom. My grandmother's mother didn't want my grandmother to go to school anyway so she didn't inform her husband about this situation. In the end, my grandmother couldn’t go to school at all. Today whenever this issue comes up, you can feel my grandmother's frustration. In fact, I think my grandmother swears wonderfully (she should be giving swearing lessons to teenagers in high school), and the times she talks about this situation is one of the times she swears the most.

When my mom reached school age, things were a little bit different. They were living in Istanbul. There were still a lot of parents who didn’t want their daughters to go to school, but there were many girls in school. So my mom started school. She finished primary school with very good grades. Her teachers were looking forward to seeing her in junior high. However, my grandfather initially didn’t let my mom continue her education after primary school. My grandmother rebelled against this situation immediately. She told my grandfather “If you don’t let this girl go to school, I will leave you and take her with me. I don’t care what I end up doing to make my living, I will make sure this girl goes to school.” She also asked for help from one of the open-minded elder males in the family thinking that he might be more effective in changing my grandfather’s mind. Getting courage from my grandmother’s actions, my two uncles also decided to rebel and told my grandfather that “If you don’t let her go to school, we aren’t going either.”

Thankfully, my grandfather was a giant emotional fella (he cried in every old Turkish film we watched together, I didn’t). He was just acting according to the rules of the conservative society he grew up in. In the end, he changed his mind and let my mom continue her education.

(Ironically, later in life my grandfather got shot by a conservative Turkish nationalist for not being “conservative enough”. The details of that incident are beyond the scope of this post. The only thing I will tell is that he survived that incident thanks to being a big guy. He died years later of heart attack.)

If it wasn’t for my grandmother, maybe my mom wouldn’t be able to go to school after primary school at all. However, if you think all the women would act like my grandmother did in this situation, you are wrong. The biggest opponents of my mom going to school were my grandfather's mother and two of my grandfather’s sisters.

My mom ended up being a university professor. So once they let her go to school, she never left schools.

When I reached school age, I was already going to school for as long as I knew myself. Both of my parents worked full-time, so I was in pre-school when I was three months old. And from three months old to December 2014, I stayed in schools and loved them. So my story isn’t as interesting as my mom’s or my grandmother’s.

I felt extremely privileged for receiving so much support from my family when it came to my education even though this was one of my basic human rights. On the one hand, this was natural for a girl of my generation based on how things evolved in Turkey. On the other hand, there were still a lot of parents who didn’t send their daughters to school either due to conservatism or their economic situation. The latter is usually hand-in-hand with the former because some parents prefer paying school expenses for a son rather than a daughter if they feel like they don’t have enough funds.

Is the situation still getting better in Turkey on this issue? I don’t know. I feel like nothing is getting better in Turkey right now. I really wish that I am wrong in this statement.


P.S. Some corrections were made to the original version based on my mom's comments.



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Turkiye’de Kiz Cocuklarinin Egitimi: Uc Kusak

Bunu Mustang yazisini yazdigim gun yazdim. Dolayisiyla bir onceki blog yazisi bu yazi icin ilham kaynagiydi. Bu yaziyi ananem ve anneme (hayatimdaki guclu iki Karadeniz kadinina) adiyorum.

Ananem okul yasina eristiginde, babasi okula gitmesini cok istemis, ama o donem sehir disinda calistigindan, ananemin annesi onu koydeki tek okula goturmus. Okulda okuyanlar arasinda hic kiz cocuk yokmus. Ananemin babasi aydin bir insanmis, muhafazakar bir bolgede yasamalarina ragmen bunu pek onemsememis. Eger ananem okula baslarsa baska aileler de kiz cocuklarini okula gondermeye daha cok meyilli olur diye dusunmus. Ananemin onluk, kalem, defter gibi ihtiyaclarini onceden alip annanemin annesine gondermis. Ama okuldaki ogretmen erkek ogrencilerle dolu bir sinifta tek kiz ogrencinin sorumlulugunu alamayacagini soyleyip ananemi okula kabul etmemis. Ananemin annesi de zaten ananemin okula gitmesini cok istemediginden, bu durumu esine bildirmemis. Bunun uzerine ananem hic okula gidememis. Bugun ne zaman bu mesele acilsa, ananemin hayal kirikligini gorebilirsiniz. Hatta ananem hayatimda tanidigim en guzel kufur eden insandir (keske lisedeki genclere kufretme dersleri verse), ve bu durumdan bahsettigi zamanlar en cok kufur ettigi zamanlardan biridir genelde.

Annem okul yasina eristiginde, durum biraz daha farkliymis. Istanbul'da yasiyorlarmis. Hala pek cok ebeveyn kiz cocuklarini okula gondermemesine ragmen, okullarda pek cok kiz ogrenci varmis. Annem ilkokula baslamis ve iyi bir dereceyle ilkokulu bitirmis. Okuldaki ogretmenler annemi seviyormus ve onun okula devam etmesini dort gozle bekliyorlarmis. Ancak basta dedem annemin okula devam etmesine izin vermemis. Bu duruma ananem ayaklanmis. Dedeme eger annemin okula gitmesine izin vermezse, onu terk edecegini, annemi yanina alacagini, ve gecimini nasil saglarsa saglasin annemi bir sekilde okula gonderecegini soylemis. Ailenin acik-goruslu buyuklerinden biriyle de konusmus belki dedemin fikrini degistirmekte daha etkili olur diye. Bu durumdan cesaretlenen amcamlar da dedeme eger annemi okula gondermezse kendilerinin de okula gitmeyi birakacaklarini soylemisler.
Eger dedem duygusal ve yumusak kalpli bir insan olmasa, evdeki herkesi sira dayagina dizip bu isyani bastirabilirdi. Bu annemin okul hikayesinin sonu olurdu ve yasadiklari yerin kosullarinda bilinmedik bir son olmazdi. Ama dedem duygusal bir devdi (beraber izledigimiz her eski Turk filmi sirasinda aglardi, ben aglamazdim hic). O buyudugu toplumun kurallarina gore hareket ediyordu kendince. Sonunda fikrini degistirdi ve annemin okula devam etmesine razi oldu.
(Isin ironic tarafi, daha sonra dedem muhafazakar bir Turk milliyetcisi tarafindan “yeteri kadar muhafazakar” olmadigi icin vurulacakti. Bu olayin detaylari bu yazinin konusu degil. Ama dedem o olaydan iri yari bir adam olmasi sayesinde kurtuldu. Yillar sonra kalp krizinden vefat etti.)
Belki ananem olmasa annem de okula gidemeyebilirdi. Ama ananemin durumundaki her kadin olaya bu sekilde yaklasirdi diye dusunuyorsaniz yaniliyorsunuz. Annemin okumasina en cok karsi cikan insanlar annemin babanesi ve halalariydi.
Annem ilerde universitede hoca oldu. Baska bir deyisle, bir kere okula gitmeye basladiktan sonra hep okulda kaldi.

Ben okul yasina geldigimde, zaten kendimi bildim bileli okula gidiyordum. Hem annem hem babam butun gun calistiklari icin beni uc aylikken krese vermislerdi. Uc ayliktan Aralik 2014’e kadar okullarda kaldim ve okulda bulunmayi hep cok sevdim. Dolayisiyla benim hikayem annem ve ananeminki kadar ilginc degil.

Egitimimi destekleyen bir ailem oldugu icin hep ayricalikti hissettim, oysaki zaten bu benim temel insani haklarimdan biriydi. Turkiye’denin eristigi noktada benim okula gitmem dogal bir durumdu. Ote yandan hala pek cok aile kiz cocuklarini okula gondermiyordu ya muhafazarliklarindan ya da ekonomik durumlarindan oturu. Ekonomik durum sebebi de genelde muhafazakarlikla ic iceydi. Cunku aileler bir erkek cocugun egitimi icin para harcamayi bir kiz cocugunun egitimi icin para harcamaya tercih ediyorlardi eger ekonomik durumlari cok iyi degilse.

Peki su an Turkiye’de bu durumla ilgili hala ilerlemeye devam ediyor mu? Bilmiyorum. Sanmiyorum. Su an Turkiye’de hicbir seyin iyiye gittigini dusunmuyorum. Umarim bu dedigimde yaniliyorumdur.


Dipnot: Annemin yorumlarina dayanarak bir kac duzeltme yapilmistir ilk halinden sonra.

 

Mustang for the win!!!

Mustang is one of the “Best Foreign Language Film” nominees this year in Academy Awards. Despite being a nominee for France, Mustang is directed by a Turkish woman who grew up in France and tells the story of a group of Turkish girls (sisters) from a conservative village at Turkey’s Black Sea coast. Whenever a Turkish film gets this much support from a European country, a non-negligible group of Turkish people always tend to say “They support this film since it shows Turkey as a bad country”. Mustang had its fair-share of such comments. I think these people instead should thank France for supporting this really well-done Turkish film.   

Almost three days passed since I watched Mustang and I feel like it is probably the Turkish film I liked the most since Ozcan Alper’s Autumn (and before that there was Fatih Akin’s The Edge of Heaven – well, I know all of these films have a Black Sea connection, but it is not the entire reason :P). I am aware that Mustang isn't as good as the other two films I mentioned here. In fact, it has a lot of mistakes trying to fit too many events in one movie (as many first-time film directors tend to do). However, the pieces of this film will stay with me longer. What I liked the most about Mustang was that despite having an extremely tragic topic at hand and the possibility of turning into an extremely depressing film, its tone was light, funny, and hopeful without being insensitive. In other words, since the issues of women in conservative regions is a sensitive topic for me personally, this could easily have been a film that feels like thousand knife twists in my stomach. My stomach stayed fine both during the film and afterward.

I come from a small city at the Black Sea coast that was mostly full of leftist people back when I was a kid, and I was raised by two feminists. In fact, in our nuclear family, my dad would be the one to hold the crown for “toughest feminist bitch in the family”. Therefore, I never had to face the kind of pressure the girls in Mustang had to go through. However, I also grew up being aware of the fact that I lived in a mostly conservative society and I sometimes felt freer at my parent’s house than I felt outside. Plus, both my mom and my grandmother come from a conservative Black Sea coast village in Turkey; so I can assure you that nothing in Mustang is exaggeration. The only problem I had with Mustang was that despite the story taking place in the Black Sea coast, there wasn’t a single drop of rain during the entire film. This is not very realistic. :)

I know that Son of Saul is kind of a front-runner for the awards season in the category of “Foreign Language Films”, but I really really want Mustang to win the Oscar.