THE INVISIBLES: HIDDEN CHRISTIAN NATION(S) IN 20TH-CENTURY TÜRKIYE

Abstract

This article discusses the fate of survivors of the Young Turk and Kemalist genocide against the indigenous Christians of the Ottoman Empire (1912-1922). Although the phenomenon of Ottoman Christians converting to Sunni or Shiite Islam or Alevism has existed in the Ottoman Empire since the 17th century, the genocide in particular significantly accelerated Islamization and thus also the phenomenon of crypto-Christianity in various regions of present-day Republic of Türkiye that were previously predominantly Christian.

However, Islamization did not protect Armenian and Greek genocide survivors from further discrimination. In addition to a comparative consideration of the affected regions – Sasun, Pontos, Hamshen, Cappadocia and Dersim – the analysis focuses on the Dersim region, whose Armenian inhabitants were affected by genocide no fewer than twice: in 1915/16 and in 1938.

At the same time, I examine the effects of Kurdish tribality and the associated granting of protection at the price of serfdom. My empirical basis is the interviews conducted by Avedis Hadjian and Kazım Gündoğan in the 2010s with people of Armenian descent – defined as descendants of at least one Armenian grandparent or great-grandparent. These interviews confirm the fact, also known in other post-genocidal contexts, that the experience of genocide silences the survivors for at least two generations and socially marginalizes those affected. It was only in the generation of grandchildren that the crypto-Christians and Alevized Armenians were able to overcome their invisibility and confront the public with the demand for equal treatment and acceptance.

What price did the crypto-Christians pay for remaining in their homeland? Despite the often-praised good relations between Armenians and Dersim Alevis, the price seems to have been particularly high in this region, because the forced adaptation to regional Alevism led not only to a change of faith, but also to linguistic assimilation into the Turkish and Iranian languages of the region (Kurdish, Kırmanc(k)i or Zazaki). If we consider language and religion to be essential components of collective and individual identity, then the preservation of an Armenian consciousness in this region is all the more remarkable. In other regions examined here, especially in Pontos and Hamshen, the Islamized Greeks and Armenians at least retained their language.