Çorum from the Ottomans to the Republic

"Çorum, which was a slightly overgrown town until the late seventies, has transformed into a city with a trade volume of 180 million dollars, high industrial employment, a strong economy, an urban identity, and an important entrepreneur-notable class that values its lifestyle, as a result of the development process it entered from the mid-eighties onward."

Prof. Bahattin Akşit, who conducted field research in Çorum in 1974 as part of his doctoral studies at the University of Chicago Sociology Department, would say years later that this rapid development achieved by Çorum in a short time surprised him greatly. Sociological predictions at the time suggested that the small-scale industry developing in Çorum could, at best, form an establishment responding to the needs of Istanbul and Ankara industries through contract manufacturing, with no prospect of creating an independent entity. What was surprising was that Çorum eventually birthed an investor-entrepreneur class capable of operating at an international level.

The development during this period that led to the gradual revision of predictions about Çorum is actually not unique to Çorum alone. Capital mobility, entrepreneurial synergy, and the rise of cities in Central Anatolia have manifested to varying degrees in many Anatolian cities, primarily Konya, Gaziantep, Kayseri, Denizli, and Uşak.

Turkey's process of democratization and new development does not occur merely through the journey of the periphery walking toward the center; it also proceeds as the periphery strengthens within itself, becomes relatively autonomous from the center, and thereby creates its own center. In this way, while production and living centers multiply in Turkey, centers of political influence and participation also cease to be the monopoly of Ankara or Istanbul.

On the other hand, it is possible to take a broad horizon tour moving through every city in Turkey toward both the depths of its history and its sociological characteristics. Passing through Çorum, you find different traces of the Ottomans, the Seljuks, the Byzantines, and the Hittites.

I previously mentioned a different rise of Southeastern cities. The grand impact that makes cities speak occurs partly with the awakening of the entrepreneurial spirit residing within these cities. When this spirit awakens, it also tries to remember what it has gradually forgotten. It pursues its own origins. Perhaps while doing so, it rewrites history largely through retrospective readings, but even the data it gathers to rewrite unearths priceless treasures for those wishing to shed strong light on history.

Although the new entrepreneurial class emerging in these cities nowadays plays a major role in cities regaining their own memory, there is no doubt that the main credit belongs to the universities. Leaving aside the mountain of debates regarding the opening of a university in every city, there is no doubt that one of their greatest benefits lies in enabling that city to regain its memory and re-express its identity. The universities established in these cities have played a significant role in cities expressing themselves as subjects of academic interest recently. This is because the initial academic motive that mobilizes historians, sociologists, and literary scholars of almost every university is usually their own local culture.

The "International Symposium on Çorum from the Ottoman Empire to the Republic," which has been taking place in Çorum for two days, was prepared with the support and contributions of the Çorum Governorship and the Municipality; however, the academic-scientific support for such a study was provided by Çorum's newly established Hitit University. Assoc. Prof. Dr. M. Mahfuz Söylemez, one of the hyper-active historian faculty members of the university—who I know had previously organized the Bingöl Symposium—has worked tirelessly in organizing this symposium, along with his other colleagues whose names I cannot mention individually.

Truthfully, these sweat-inducing efforts were well worth it. Thanks to this, we have gained the opportunity to look at Turkey's historical, sociological, and scholarly heritage from Çorum, the hometown of Ebussuud Efendi, Ahmet Fevzi, Ali Kuşçu, İskilipli Atıf Hoca, and of course Hayrettin Karaman.

It is certainly beneficial to look at Turkey through this window opened from Çorum..