CINEMA EVENT” in 1960S TURKEY from the PERSPECTIVE of an AUDIENCE DISCOURSE
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
YE§IILC:AM i n l e t t e r s : a “CINEMA EVENT” IN 1960s TURKEY FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF AN AUDIENCE DISCOURSE A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF GRAPHIC DESIGN AND THE INSTITUTE OF ECONOMICS AND SOCIAL SCIENCES OF BiLKENT UNIVERSITY IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSPOHY IN ART, DESIGN AND ARCHITECTURE By Dilek Kaya Mutlu June, 2002 I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and quality, as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Prof. Dr. Bülent Özgüç (Principal Advisor) I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and quality, as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Assist. Prof. Dr. Halil ISlklfaoMu (Co-Advisor) I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and quality, as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Prof. Dr. Nilgiin Abisel I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and quality, as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Assist. Prof. Dr. Mahmut Mutman I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and quality, as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Assist. Prof. Dr. Asuman Suner I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and quality, as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. 1 Assist. Prof. Dr. İrem Balkır Approved by the Institute of Fine Arts Prof. Dr. Bülent Özgüç, Director of the Institute of Fine Arts u ABSTRACT YE§ILCAM in LETTERS: A “CINEMA EVENT” IN 1960s TURKEY FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF AN AUDIENCE DISCOURSE Dilek Kaya Mutlu Ph.D. in Art, Design, and Architecture Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Bülent Özgüç Co-Supervisor; Assist. Prof. Dr. Halil Nalçaoğlu June, 2002 This study examines “Ye§il9am event” in Turkish cinema from the perspective of an audience discourse that is reconstituted from the audience letters published in popular cinema magazines Sinema and Perde. Through a study of the letters, it is observed that neither Ye§il9am cinema that marks the 1960s can be reduced to a film industry nor the social experience of it could be evaluated in terms of a cinema-audience relation consisting merely of movie going and film viewing. The topics and the forms of expressions in the letters suggest that Ye§il9am was a “cinema event” diffused throughout everyday life especially through social images of stars and that the audiences had an important role in its (re)production and circulation outside movie theatre. Keywords: Cinema as event, Ye§il9am event. Audience, Audience letters. Stars, Cinema magazines. Ill ÖZET MEKTUPLARDAKİ YEŞİLÇAM: İZLEYİCİ SÖYLEMİ PERSPEKTİFİNDEN ALTMIŞLAR TÜRKİYE’SİNDE BİR “SİNEMA OLAYI” Dilek Kaya Mutlu Güzel Sanatlar, Tasanm ve Mimarlık Fakültesi Doktora Tez yöneticileri: Prof. Dr. Bülent Özgüç, Yard. Doç. Dr. Halü Nalçaoğlu Haziran, 2002 Bu tez, popüler sinema dergileri Sinema ve Perde’de yayınlanmış izleyici mektuplanndan yemden kurulan bir izleyici söylemi perspektifinden Türk sinemasında “Yeşilçam olayı”na bakıyor. Mektuplann incelemesi, altmışlara damgasını vuran Yeşilçam sinemasının, sadece bir film endüstrisine indirgenemeyeceğini ve bu sinemanın toplumsal deneyiniinin de, basitçe, sinemaya gitmek ve film seyretmekten ibaret bir sinema-izleyici ilişkisi olarak değerlendirilemeyeceğini gösteriyor. Mektuplann içerdiği konular ve ifade biçimleri, Yeşilçam’m, özellikle yıldızlann toplumsal imgeleri aracılığıyla, gündelik hayata yayılmış bir “sinema olayı” olduğunu ve izleyicilerin de bu olayın sinema salonu dışında (yeniden) üretiminde ve dolaşımmda önemli bir role sahip olduğunu gösteriyor. A nahtar Sözcükler: Olay olarak sinema, Yeşilçam olayı, İzleyici, İzleyici mektupları. Yıldızlar, Sinema-magazin dergileri. ıv to Haluk ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This thesis marks the end of a difficult period in my life during which I enjoyed the support, help, and friendship of many people in very different ways. Foremost, I would like to thank to my supervisors Prof. Bülent Özgüç and Dr. Halil Nalçaoğlu who contributed a lot to the progress of my study towards completion with their professionalism. I would like to thank to Prof Bülent Özgüç for encouraging and supporting not only the completion of this thesis, but also aH my other academic activities as the dean of our faculty. I would also like to express my gratitude to Dr. Halil Nalçaoğlu who not only contributed a lot to this thesis with his remarks and suggestions but also to my understanding of academic collaboration. His responsible and honest attitude towards my work and me will be among my guiding principles in my relations with my students in the future. Dr. Mahmut Mutman and Dr. Asuman Suner were two other professors who enriched my study with their productive comments on my work during the juries. I would also like to thank to Prof Nilgün Abisel and Dr. İrem Balkır for commenting on and evaluating my work in the final jury. Among my other professors I would like to thank to Prof Nezih Erdoğan who played the biggest role in my encounter with Yeşilçam cinema and my brave decision to write a research based dissertation on it, and to Zafer Aracagök, Dr. Lewis Johnson, Dr. John Groch, and Prof Mustafa Pultar for their graduate courses. Sadi Konuralp offered a serious support and contribution to this study by providing me with extra research material and sharing his knowledge and opinions relating to Turkish cinema with me. Dr. Çetin Sankartal, Kaya Özkaracalar, and Fulya Ertem read parts of my work and listened to my arguments with patience and responded with their comments and opinions. Besides these coUeagues/fiiends I would also like to thank to Dr. Zekiye Sankartal, Nur Savaşçı, Özge Ejder, and Mehmet Şıray who allowed me to feel their support by consoling and encouraging me in my most exhausted times. Bilkent University Library and Periodicals section of the National Library were the two institutions that had a very important function in this study’s actualization. Therefore I also owe thanks to the directors of both libraries and to their staff whom I know only by their faces. There have also been several people in Bilkent University Graphic Design Department who also helped me indirectly throughout my study. Among these, I would especially like to thank to our computer technicians Cemil Gülyüz and Mehmet Yıldız who were always ready to solve willingly and patiently the problems I faced while working within computer environment and to our tea room personnel Gülizar Başara and Erol Çalışkan, not simply for preparing the tea that I drank while working in my office, but also for the benevolence they exhibited towards me in several practical matters relating to my other academic duties in the department. Last, but not least, I would like to express my gratitude to my husband, Tanyel Ali Mutlu, who not only tolerated my devotion of home time mostly to the writing of this thesis, but also showed immense patience in listening to and discussing with me my ideas and sufferings relating to it. In addition to Tanyel, I would like to thank to Muzo the cat who did not leave me alone during the nights spent in front of the computer this time again. VI TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT......................................................................................................... Üİ ÖZET................................................................................................................... iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.................................................................................. v TABLE OF CONTENTS.................................................................................... vü LIST OF TABLES............................................................................................... x LIST OF FIGURES.............................................................................................. xi 1 INTRODUCTION............................................................................................ 1 1.1. The Purpose of the Study....................................................................... 3 1.2. Statement of the Problem....................................................................... 9 1.3. M ethodology............................................................................................ 16 1.4. Limitations of the Study.......................................................................... 20 1.5. Study Overview......................................................................................... 20 2 REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE................................................................ 22 2.1. Early Mass Communication Research.................................................. 22 2.1.1. Effects Model; “What Do Media Do to People?” ............... 22 2.1.2. Uses and Gratifications Model: “What Do People Do With the Media?” ............................................................................... 31 2.2. The Semiotic Intervention: From “Message” to ‘Text”, “Receivers” to “Readers”, “Communication” to “Signification”....................................... 36 2.2.1. Textualist Approach, “Screen Theory”: From “Real People” to “Spectator” as a Construct of the ‘Text”........................................41 2.2.2. Culturalist Approach, Encoding/Decoding Model: Polysemic Text, Different Interpretations..............................................................56 2.3. Ethnographic Approach: