Introduction to and Selected Bibliography of English-language Books about Turks and Turkey

Abstract

In her article Introduction to and Selected Bibliography of English-language Books about Turks and Turkey Elmas Şahín presents a selected bibliography of work by Western travelers, writers, scholars, and journalists. Fictional works — owing to the large corpus of such texts — are excluded. Focus of the Bibliography is on texts published from the sixteenth to the late nineteenth century although seminal works published later also included. From earliest times Western writers, travelers, and scholars were interested in the East and their gaze resulted in writing about it as exotic and mysterious and often negative in the context of Edward W. Said\u27s concept of Orientalism. In particular, perceptions about Turkish history, culture, customs, and traditions are reflected in negative images in the works of most English-language authors