A Clean Conscience behind the Dark Bars
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4979902 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Rüstem Ertuğ Altınay (0000-0002-3612-7199) |
| Year | 2023 |
| Volume | 2023 |
| Issue | 146 |
| Pages | 59-83 |
| Publication date | 2023-05-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Radical History Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0163-6545 • E-ISSN: 1534-1453 |
| Publisher | Duke University Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1215/01636545-10302835 |
| OpenAlex | W4377969306 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 24 |
The iconification of political prisoners enhances their visibility, credibility, and power. Nevertheless, iconification may also reduce, reimagine, or otherwise distort the biographies and experiences of political prisoners. Moreover, iconicity's blurring of prisoners' views and activities may result in the recirculation of their stories in the service of political projects that do not fully align with their own. The incarceration of the Islamist icon Şule Yüksel Şenler (1938-2019) in 1971 presents an excellent vantage point from which to analyze these dynamics and how gender informs them in fundamental ways. The diverse media representations of Şule Yüksel Şenler demonstrate how historical tropes became entangled with critical references to the law, religion, and the discourses of freedom and democracy in the iconification of an Islamist political prisoner in Cold War Turkey. Şenler's legacy and the recent references to her story show how the tendency of iconification to occlude or distort prisoners' ideological investments and activities may in fact enhance their ability to integrate into new political projects. This case study of a right-wing political prisoner exposes how the histories of political incarceration, combined with the discourses of injustice and victimization, may also be used to legitimize authoritarian political regimes and new incarcerations
Authoritarianism · Conscience · Democracy · Icon · Ideology · Injustice · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Prison · Sociology · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Law · North African History and Literature · Turkey's Politics and Society
Islamic Political Identity in Turkey
The Rising Tide of Conservatism in Turkey
Troubling Vision
Working Out Desire
Political Islam in Turkey
Right-wing women
Disciples of the light the Nurju movement in Turkey
Is Turkey coming to terms with its past? Politics of memory and majoritarian conservatism
Icons of Dissent
Islamisation of Turkey under the AKP Rule
Carrying Our Country to the World
Turkey 2002
Modernity, Secularism and Islam
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 2 |
| Citation span | 2026 - 2026 (1) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |