Gul Ozyegin, born in Ankara, Turkey, in 1955. Ph.D. from Temple University, Philadelphia. Associate Professor in Sociology and Women’s Studies at the College of William and Mary, Williamsburg.
Fellow (1 September 2006 – 30 June 2007)
NEW SELVES IN A CHANGING NATION: GENDER AND SEX AMONG YOUNG TURKS
My research lies at the intersections of the sociology of gender and generations, and focuses on the gender and sexual identities of young Turks born amid the social transformations of the 1980s, which have radically destabilized Turkey’s republican secularism. At NIAS, I elaborated an analytical strategy for the daunting task of interpreting more than 3,000 pages of transcribed interview material which I brought with me. This methodological work allowed me to develop an in-depth elaboration of main categories of my analysis, permitting me to bridge an important divide in my discipline, between the macro and micro levels of analysis, biography of individuals and biography of a nation, and structure and agency. I have prepared, and submitted two articles in journal format. One article examines the confluence of gender and generational consciousness. Theoretically, this piece brings into sharp focus the gender limitations of Mannheim’s theory of generations and the need to enhance gendered studies of identity with a critical prism of generation. In another article, which I focus on norm of virginity, I develop a new concept, “virginal façade” to theorize the new elite woman’s sexual behaviour and practices in urban Turkey. I also contributed a chapter (with Pierette Hondagneu-Sotelo) to a volume edited by Helma Lutz, a former NIAS fellow, Domestic Work, Migration and the New Gender Order in Contemporary Europe, and wrote a book review for International Journal of Sociology.