The Afterlives of Ottoman Objects: Alternative Forms of Muslim Citizenship in Turkey

Ottoman objects, art traditions, and social practices occupy a contested place in Turkish political life, shaped by the republic’s selective rupture with its Ottoman past and more recent projects of civilisational restoration. This talk explores how contemporary practitioners of so-called ‘traditional arts’ relate to Ottoman objects in ways that exceed official narratives of heritage and repair. Drawing on object-oriented ontology and the work of Graham Harman, it examines how these practitioners attend to the pleasures, ethical resonances, and existential depths of objects themselves, cultivating personal and unofficial attachments to Ottoman-Islamic arts and places. We argue that such engagements constitute everyday practices of alternative citizenship, enabling forms of Muslim life that sit alongside, rather than within, dominant state projects of religious and historical authority.

Banu Senay is an anthropologist at Macquarie University. Her current research examines Islamic art, crafts and music traditions in contemporary Turkey, exploring how these practices generate alternative forms of Muslim authority. She is the author of two monographs, Beyond Turkey’s Borders (2013) and Musical Ethics and Islam (2020), and co-editor of the Routledge Handbook of Turkey’s Diasporas (2025).

Christopher Houston is Professor of Anthropology at Macquarie University. His research focuses on politics, Islam, nationalism, and urban activism in Turkey. His recent books include Istanbul, City of the Fearless (2020) and Theocracy, Secularism, and Islam in Turkey (2021), as well as the co-edited volume Self-Alteration: How People Change Themselves Across Cultures (2024).

Event Format
This event is an in-person event.

Image Credit
İstimlak (Expropriation), artwork by Tuğrul Yıldırım, “El-mülk-ü lillah” (Photo by Dilanur Yıldırım)