Note: Parts 0 and 1 of these
posts are here
and here,
respectively. The only connection among the three is
they are all inspired by the Danish language classes I took during my first
three years in Denmark. This one was the hardest to write, just like the
Danish homework that inspired it. I made the first attempt in October 2022,
before writing Part 1. This was my third attempt.
We start a new book chapter
titled “Dansk Frisind” in Danish class.
The literal translation of
“frisind” would be “free mind”, a more nuanced translation could be
“tolerance”. “Dansk Frisind” is usually translated as “Danish liberal way of
thinking”. The first page of the chapter gives the following as supporting
examples of Dansk Frisind: Danes don’t mind hanging out naked at the beach and
allow teenagers to drink alcohol. Based on these facts, we are asked to discuss
with our classmates how our home countries compare to Denmark in terms of frisind.
Giving over-generalized
statements about my country, where almost 85 million people live, is something
I dislike very much. When I moved abroad back in 2009, I didn’t know that I
would have to be a representative for that many million people at various
language classes and work events. To me, this is a burden that I didn’t sign up
for. On the one hand, if I go ahead with stereotypes for the sake of keeping
things uncomplicated, I risk erasing my own identity and the identities of many
others that are dear to me. On the other hand, especially in a language class,
I neither have the time nor the vocabulary to explain things in a
non-black-and-white manner.
I know this challenge isn’t
unique to me. Based on the stereotypes of our countries and the initial examples
given for “Dansk Frisind” in the book, none of us in the classroom come from
places that have “Dansk Frisind”.
To give credit to Danes, they
have more meaningful (at least to me) examples to support their frisind. In
Denmark, women earned the right to vote in 1915, abortion became legal in 1973,
same-sex couples were given the right to be recognized as domestic partners in
1989 ... While not the first except for the last example, Danes were relatively
ahead of many other countries in the world. The book mentions these facts later
in the same chapter, but first we have to discuss the nude people and drunk
teenagers.
During the discussions, to my
non-surprise, a couple of my classmates express surprise after learning that I
come from a family where the majority are Muslims.
Their reactions remind me of the
questions I sometimes have to answer as the unintentional representative of a
religion in the Western world.
“Do you (have to) cover your head
when you go back home?”
No, unless I visit a mosque. When
it comes to my hair, the only religion I follow is the Hair musical.
Among the women of my close
family, my grandmother (mom’s mom) was the only one who wore a headscarf based
on her religious beliefs and personal choice. In my extended family, there are
others who wear headscarves as well.
“Are you allowed to drink in
Turkey?”
Yes. The legal drinking age is
18, but my parents and bars allowed me to drink even younger. Till I was 16, I
didn’t like the taste, though. In my early teens, I sincerely believed I
wouldn’t drink as an adult. That didn’t turn out to be true.
“Are there any churches in
Turkey?”
Yes, a quick internet search says
over 300. Many Muslim-identified members of my family like to visit churches as
much as mosques when they wish to pray inside a religious house. My mom and her
sister are among them. They took me to both mosques and churches when I was a
kid. As far as I know, the synagogues in Turkey aren’t open to public; you need
a permission to enter for security reasons. They would have gone to the synagogues
as well, otherwise.
“Are there any atheists in
Turkey?”
Yes, I called one of them uncle.
He died when I was 10. I have some of his belongings with me at home in
Copenhagen today. They moved with me from place to place. One of those
belongings is his copy of The
Last Temptation of Christ. His library in general was the best source I had
in Turkey when it came to learning about religion(s).
“Why don’t you fast?”
While I am legally registered as
a Muslim in Turkey, I had a secular upbringing and don’t practice any organized
religion beyond some traditions. For example, I used to call my grandmother when
the Ramadan holiday started to acknowledge the day. This is similar to wishing
people “Merry Christmas” or “Happy Hanukkah”. On the other hand, I called my grandmother
every Sunday regardless, when she was alive.
…
My experiences are my own. They are
not representative of the entire Turkish population or Muslim families, but
neither are the stereotypes of Turkish and Muslims families. Such stereotypes trigger
questions and surprise reactions like the ones above, which in turn trigger me.
I know I am being unreasonable
when I get frustrated by having to answer these questions or facing people’s
surprise reactions. As Sister in Movies reminded me while I was venting one
such frustration, it is better that people are curious and ask questions when
they don’t know something rather than make assumptions. As someone who chose to
become a professor, I want people to feel safe when they ask me questions.
Also, I don’t know everything about every other country or culture either, so I
would like to be able to ask questions to others without frustrating them.
On the other hand, these
questions are like bullets from a loaded gun, even if they aren’t intended that
way. Religion is one of the strongest and most violent dividers of people. My
Muslim-majority family is the main reason why I am “the other” in Europe. My
secular-majority family is the main reason why I am “the other” in Turkey or
among other Muslims. I have listened and been in the middle of countless heated
political debates on alcohol, fasting, women’s hair … both in the context of
Europe’s attitude towards Islam and secular vs non-secular camps in Turkey,
both with strangers and dear friends and family members. I am not blind to the,
at times brutal, consequences of these conflicts throughout history.
The cliché Western narrative for
my case would be “stuck between two cultures”. I am not stuck; this is my
culture. I have been realizing that part of getting older is to learn how to
hold contradictions together without breaking apart. I would like to own my
culture and welcome questions on it even if the answers are not straightforward
and cause unease in me.
Let’s go back to Danish class.
One of the homework assignments
in the “Dansk Frisind” chapter is writing an essay on the alcohol consumption
in our home country in comparison to Denmark. In addition, the essay must
discuss high alcohol consumption among teens and whether harder alcohol rules
can prevent it.
Among all the homework I have done
for the Danish classes, this one gives me the hardest time.
I know, instead of torturing
myself, I can write something like “Danes drink a lot.” and “In Turkey, we like
drinking rakı with meze dishes.” and be done. The point of these Danish essay assignments
is to prepare you for the essay section of the Danish language exam, which you
have to pass if you want Danish permanent residency or citizenship. People who
grade these exams don’t care about your arguments in the essay, they only care
about whether you can create coherent and grammatically correct Danish text in
concise space (max 4-5 paragraphs).
The problem is I care. The
topic of alcohol is a loaded and political one, not just in Turkey but also
in Denmark.
Why does this chapter showcase
alcohol habits in Denmark as an example of frisind and then ask us to discuss
prevention methods for high alcohol consumption of teens? Why does alcohol
consumption pop up often in Danish news and in political debates? Why is Denmark
the country that created a film like Druk (which I must admit I don’t
like as much as it is beloved in the popular culture)?
How do I represent the attitude
of 85 million people, who are Muslim-majority and range from extreme secular to
extreme conservative and all the shades in between, toward alcohol? Rakı and
meze dishes don’t cut it, and instead of trying to find a way to represent the
85 million, my mind keeps going back to one person, my grandfather, my mom’s
dad.
My grandfather was a Muslim. He did
the prayer 5 times a day going to the mosque for it almost every day. He
fasted. He read passages from the Quran every night before going to bed. He was
a small business owner. Once he owned a restaurant, among its frequent
customers were the workers of a nearby brothel. For a long time, his primary
source of income was the liquor shop he owned in one of the most religiously
conservative districts of Istanbul called Eyüp. He got shot in
front of that shop for not supporting the district’s right-wing groups. He
survived the shooting but turned the shop into a regular market with no alcohol
sales after that. After my mom finished elementary school, he decided that she
should stop her education, but backed down after my grandmother’s fierce
resistance. He didn’t force his two daughters to cover their hair. He took them
to the beach wearing a bikini. He let them drink alcohol together with him when
they were teens. He stopped drinking alcohol after one of his grandchildren
died at the age of three. He didn’t interfere with anyone consuming alcohol at
his house even after that.
My grandfather is one person, and
hence doesn’t represent the 85 million. But the complexities in his story is to
me more representative of Turkey’s relation to alcohol and frisind than any
overly-simplistic generalization I can come up with for the essay I am supposed
to write.
In the end, I don’t include my
grandfather in the essay. My Danish isn’t good enough to do justice to his
story and I don’t have the space to elaborate. I will likely get a low grade if
I try. I know this grade doesn’t matter, but I need constructive feedback to
prepare for the big exam. So, I write something simpler about not generalizing
either Turkey or Denmark. I end it with “For at opsummere er generalisering
generelt forkert.”, which is me quoting Butler Lampson’s “Generalizations are
generally wrong.” advice from “Hints
for Computer System Design”, which I also quote several times to my
students in the courses I teach.
After completing this essay, I
promise myself to become emotionally detached from any Danish homework topic.
In Notes on a Foreign
Country: An American Abroad in a Post-American World, Suzy Hansen mentions that
James Baldwin expressed
feeling free in Istanbul as a gay black man. The city offered him the refuge he
needed in the 1960s.
Last year, a German man I
interacted with told me that the older conservative Germans like to say, “We
should be harsher like Denmark in our immigration laws.”
A place not really known for its frisind may still be capable of giving you the kind of acceptance you need, and it doesn’t mean that a place that is considered a stellar example of frisind will welcome you with open arms.
