Hayat: The Ideology of a Nationalist Periodical in the Early Republican Period (1926-1929)

Hayat was one of the important periodicals in the early Republican era. The intellectuals that were seen in the Hayat pages aimed to shape the nationalist ideology of the era . They had a modernist approach to nationalism, projecting a break with past, to totally westernize by leaving the dichotomy of culture and civilization, to transform the people through state and intellectual controlled education.

To cut the relationship with the past also meant to destroy the old way of thinking. The things that must be destroyed were national culture based on history and the morals controlled by religion, which were found in Gökalp's model, according to the Hayat authors. The things that would replace it were culture that created civilization and secular moral control. The most important support of that agenda would come from the state.

The authors of Hayat were influenced by definitions of strong state that emerged after World War I, and tired to adapt this thought on their model. They also rejected Gökalp's understanding of individual and introduced a more powerful individual who could transform the society by his will.

(Approved by Prof. Dr. Zafer Toprak, Assist. Prof. Duygu Köksal. Assist. Prof. Asim Karaömerlioglu)