Dr. Zeynep Tüfekcioglu

• Islam and (post-)secularism in contemporary Turkish and world literature
• modern Turkish literary and cultural history
• popular culture
• genre theory
• transnational literature
• digital literature
• cultural memory
• cultural narratology

2023-
Postdoctoral Researcher, German Research Foundation (DFG) Research Unit 2600 “Ambiguity and Distinction. Historical and Cultural Dynamics,” Technical University Dortmund

2022-
Lecturer with Tenure, Institute of Turkish Studies, University of Duisburg-Essen

2019-2023
Postdoctoral Researcher, German Research Foundation (DFG) Research Unit 2600 “Ambiguity and Distinction. Historical and Cultural Dynamics,” University of Duisburg-Essen

2015-2022
Lecturer, Institute of Turkish Studies, University of Duisburg-Essen

March- July 2011
Visiting Scholar, Near and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Washington, Seattle

Undergraduate Courses (taught at the University of Duisburg-Essen)

• Cultural Studies for Study Abroad (since 2015, in winter semester).
• Introduction to Turkish-language Literature (since 2016, in summer semester)
• Transnational Literature (Winter semester 2021/2022, 2022/2023, 2023/2024)
• Comparative Literature (Summer semester 2023, 2020, winter semester 2019/2020)
• Theories and Models of Literary Studies/Textual Analysis and Interpretation (Winter semester 2018/2019, 2016/2017)
• Literature and Other Arts (Summer semester 2016)
• Oral Communication (Winter semester 2016/2015)

Graduate Courses (taught at the University of Duisburg-Essen)

• Literature and Art Criticism (Winter semester 2022/2023)
• Literature and cultural studies seminar, accompanying the MA thesis (Winter semester 2020/2021, 2019/2020)

2019
Ph.D. in Cultural Studies (summa cum laude)
Justus-Liebig University, Gießen, Germany
Dissertation: “Nation and Identity in Turkish Crime Fiction: Reading Ahmet Ümit’s Novels as a Medium of Ideological Negotiation”

2008
M.A. in Intercultural Humanities
Jacobs University, Bremen, Germany

2006
Academy and Project Year Program
Bard College Berlin (then European College of Liberal Arts)

2004
B.A. in Translation Studies
Boğaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey

• Coordinator (with Kader Konuk and Gülbin Kıranoğlu), Online Symposium “Conversion, Assimilation and Islamization in the Ottoman Empire and Turkey.” March 2022.
• Coordinator, Public Talk and Book Reading of Mahir Ünsal Eriş and Sepin Sinanlıoğlu, University of Duisburg-Essen, January 2022.
• Coordinator, Panel “From Literary Traditions to Literary Innovations: The Transformation of Literature in Contemporary Turkey.” Turkologentag 2018, University of Bamberg, September 2018.
• Coordinator, Public Talk and Book Reading of Alper Canıgüz, University of Duisburg-Essen, June 2018.
• Coordinator, Public Talk and Reading of Ahmet Ümit, University of Duisburg-Essen, November 2017.
• Coordinator (with Kader Konuk), Panel “Neo-Ottomanism: An Investigation into Narratives, Museums, and Urban Spaces.” Turkologentag 2016, University of Hamburg, September 2016.
• 1^st and 2^nd Supervisor of BA and MA theses in literary and cultural studies, Institute of Turkish Studies, University of Duisburg Essen, 2015- present.
• Member, Appointment Committee W3-Professorship for North American Literatures, University of Duisburg Essen, 2021.
• Member, Appointment Committee W2-Professorship for Turkish Studies, University of Duisburg Essen, 2019.
• Member, American Comparative Literature Association
• Member, British Society for Middle Eastern Studies
• Member, Gesellschaft für Turkologie, Osmanistik und Türkeiforschung

2019- Postdoctoral Fellowship
DFG Research Unit “Ambiguity and Distinction”

2009-2013 Ph.D. Fellowship
The Graduate Center for the Study of Culture, Justus-Liebig University, Gießen

2011 Travel Grant
The Graduate Center for the Study of Culture, Justus-Liebig University, Gießen

2006-2008 Tuition Waiver and Housing (based on academic merit)
Jacobs University, Bremen

2004-2006 Tuition Waiver and Housing (based on academic merit)
Bard College Berlin

Nation and Identity in Turkish Crime Fiction: Reading Ahmet Ümit’s Fiction as a Medium of Ideological Negotiation. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2021

“An Overview of the Islamic Literary Field and its Recent Transformation in Contemporary Turkey.” Muslim Writing, Writing Muslimness in Europe: Transcultural Literary Approaches.  Eds. Carmen Zamorano, et. al., Routledge, Forthcoming in 2024.

“Intersectional(queer) Protest Performance Art in Contemporary Germany: The Case of Lady Bitch Ray.” Imagining an Alternative Turkey: Political Performativity, Counter-Memory, Mobilizing Publics. Eds. Pieter Verstraete, et. al. Palgrave Macmillan, Forthcoming in 2024.

“Reading Ahmet Ümit’s Patasana as a Postmodernist Historical Fiction.” Journal of  Turkish Literature (JTL), 10: 72-88, 2013.

“Sufism in Turkish Crime Fiction: The Mystery of Shams-i Tabrizi in Ahmet Ümit’s Bab-ı Esrar.” European Journal of Turkish Studies (EJTS) 13: 1-20, 2011.

“The Islamic Epistemology in a Western Genre: Ahmet Mithat Efendi’s Esrar-ı Cinayat, the First Detective Novel of Turkish Literature.” CLUES: A Journal of Detection, 29.2: 7-15, 2011.

“Konstantinopel, du frohe Botschaft des Propheten: Neo-osmanische Nostalgie in Ayşe Karas İstanbul’un Çağrısı. Istanbul in der jüngeren türkischen und deutsch-türkischen Literatur. Eds. Julian Rentzsch and Simge Yılmaz. Ergon, Forthcoming in 2024.

“The Art of Talking About Unimportant Things: Reading Nights of Plague as a Historiographic Metafiction.” Texts, Contexts, Intertexts. Eds. Julian Renztsch and Petr Kučera. Ergon, 421-437, 2022.

“Ev Dağıldığıyla mı Kalacak: Korona Günlerinde Berlin’in Nar Çiçeği’ni Yeniden Okumak.” Bahçelerinde Yaz: Füruzan Edebiyatı Üzerine. Eds. Hilmi Tezgör and Aslan Erdem. Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 141-158, 2022.

“Yeni Türk Romanının Sınır Ötesi Yolculuğu.” Edebiyat ve Coğrafyalar, Eds. Banu Öztürk, et. al., Bağlam Yayınları, 53-68, 2018.

“Let’s say a little about what’s there: Contemporary Turkish Crime Fiction and its Literary Criticism.” Crime Fiction in and around the Eastern Mediterranean. Eds. Börte Sagaster, et. al. Harrassowitz, 121-136, 2016.

“İlk Türk Romanı Esrar-ı Cinayat’taki Yazınsal Yeniliklere Anlatıbilimsel Bir Bakış.” Edebiyatın İzinde: Polisiye Edebiyat. Eds. Banu Öztürk, et. al., Bağlam Yayınları, 145-162, 2013.

(With Elena Furlanetto) “Istanbul in the Turkish Novel: Ambiguity and Resistance.” The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Urban Literary Studies. Ed. Jeremy Tambling. Palgrave Macmillan, 2021.
https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/978-3-319-62592-8_199-1.

“Ahmet Ümit.” T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Türk Edebiyatı İsimler Sözlüğü II, 20. Yüzyıldan Günümüze, 2019. http://teis.yesevi.edu.tr/madde-detay/umit-ahmet.

“Mehmet Murat Somer.” T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Türk Edebiyatı İsimler Sözlüğü, II, 20. Yüzyıldan Günümüze, 2019. http://teis.yesevi.edu.tr/madde-detay/mehmet-murat-somer.

Alkan, Burcu; Günay-Erkol, Çimen. Turkish Literature as World Literature. In Connections. A Journal for Historians and Area Specialists, 27.10.2023, www.connections.clio-online.net/publicationreview/id/reb-133690.

Sarıgöl, Pınar. Gender and Biopolitics: The Changing Patterns of Womanhood in Post-2002 Turkey. In Diyar: Zeitschrift für Osmanistik, Türkei-und Nahostforschung, Iss. 1, 2023.

Mason, David. Investigating Turkey: Detective Fiction and Turkish Nationalism 1928-1945. In Clues: A Journal of Detection. Vol. 37, Iss. 2., 2019

Marieke Krajenbrink and Kate M Quinns. Investigating Identities: Questions of Identity in Contemporary International Crime Fiction.  In Kult Online: The Interdisciplinary Review Journal for the Study of Culture, 22, 2010.

(With Jean Carpenter Efe). Short stories of Karin Karakaşlı, as part of the web-project of Translation Studies Department of Boğaziçi University, 2004.

Interview with Tanıl Bora (in German). In Unikate 58, 2022. https://www.uni-due.de/unikate/unikate_058.html#

(with Gülbin Kıranoğlu Ergüneş). Interview with Tanıl Bora (in Turkish). In Birikim 390, 2021.

(With Kader Konuk und Gülbin Kıranoğlu. Eds.) Religious Ambiguities in the Ottoman Empire and Turkey: Conversion, Islamization and Assimilation.

“Die Bedeutung(-slosigkeit) von Kämpferinnen im aktuellen islamisch-historischen Roman.” Invited Talk at the Opening of the Junior Research Group “Rechtfertigungsdiskurse” and book launch “Female Fighters”, University of Köln, December 2023.

“The intersection of Postsecularism and Islamic Feminism in Transnational Literature.” Institute of World Literature Colloquium Politics, Poetics and World Literature, Harvard University, July 2023.

“The Role of Performative Protest in Contemporary Germany in Negotiating Transcultural Feminist Discourses: The Visual and Verbal Narratives of Kübra Gümüşay and Reyhan Şahin.” Online Workshop Imagining an Alternative Turkey, July 2022.

“Political Performativity, Cultural Ambiguity and Embodied Resistance: The Case of Lady Bitch Ray.” Online Symposium Conversion, Assimilation and Islamization in the Ottoman Empire and Turkey, March 2022.

“The Local and Global Significance of Non-Violent Crimes in Contemporary Turkish Crime Fiction.” ACLA Annual Meeting 2018, University of California, April 2018.

“Ahmet Ümit Polisiyeleri.” Invited Talk in Cinai Muabbetler Sempozyumu, Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, March 2017.

“Contemporary Literary Depictions of the Ottoman Past: Neo-Ottomanism or Ottomania?” Turkologentag 2016, University of Hamburg, September 2016.

“Ahmet Ümit Polisiyelerini Direniş Edebiyatı Olarak Okumak.” Research Colloquium, Turkish Studies, University of Duisburg-Essen, December 2015.

“İlk Türk Polisiye Romanı Esrar-ı Cinayat’taki Yazınsal Yeniliklere Anlatıbilimsel Bir Bakış.” Türkçe’de Roman I: Edebiyatın Üvey Evladı Polisiye Sempozyumu, Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, November 2012.

“Sufism in Turkish Crime Fiction: The Mystery of Şems-i Tebriz in Bab-ı Esrar.” Research, Revelation & Revolution 3rd Annual International Student Conference on Near & Middle East Studies, University of Washington, May 2011.

“Reconstructing History in Contemporary Turkish Crime Fiction.” 31. Deutscher Orientalistentag, Philipps-University Marburg, September 2010.

“Sufism in Turkish Crime Fiction: The Mystery of Şems-i Tebriz in Bab-ı Esrar.” The World Congress for Middle Eastern Studies (WOCMES), Autonomous University of Barcelona, July 2010.

“Questions of Identity in Contemporary Turkish Crime Fiction.” Anything Goes?: Konferenz Literaturwissenschaft im 21. Jahrhundert, Westfälische Wilhelms- University Münster, May 2010.

“The Relational Nature of Identity and the Articulation of Space in E. S. Ozdamar’s Works.” The Inaugural Conference of the Postgraduate’s Women’s Writing Network, University of Warwick, June 2007.

“Mutterzunge and Der Hof im Spiegel: Autobiography and Identity-Construction in E. S. Özdamar’s Short Stories.” The Identity Formation Conference, University of Manchester, April 2007.