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The Making of Conservative Habitus: the Case of an Upper- Middle Class Neighborhood in Ankara

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The Making of Conservative Habitus: the Case of an Upper- Middle Class Neighborhood in Ankara THE MAKING OF CONSERVATIVE HABITUS: THE CASE OF AN UPPER- MIDDLE CLASS NEIGHBORHOOD IN ANKARA A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES OF MIDDLE EAST TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY BY AKSU AKÇAOĞLU IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN THE DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY MARCH 2017 Approval of the Graduate School of Social Sciences Prof. Dr. Tülin Gençöz Director I certify that this thesis satisfies all the requirements as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Prof. Dr. Sibel Kalaycıoğlu Head of Department This is to certify that we have read this thesis and that in our opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and quality, as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Fatma Umut Beşpınar Supervisor Examining Committee Members Prof. Dr. Hayriye Erbaş (Ankara Uni., SOC) Assoc. Prof. Dr. Fatma Umut Beşpınar (METU, SOC) Assoc. Prof. Dr. Tahire Erman (Bilkent Uni., ADM) Assoc. Prof. Dr. Fahriye Üstüner (METU, ADM) Assoc. Prof. Dr. Mustafa Şen (METU, SOC) I hereby declare that all information in this document has been obtained and presented in accordance with academic rules and ethical conduct. I also declare that, as required by these rules and conduct, I have fully cited and referenced all material and results that are not original to this work. Name, Last name : Aksu Akçaoğlu Signature : iii ABSTRACT THE MAKING OF CONSERVATIVE HABITUS: THE CASE OF AN UPPER- MIDDLE CLASS NEIGHBORHOOD IN ANKARA Akçaoğlu, Aksu Ph.D., Department of Sociology Supervisor: Assoc. Prof. Dr. Fatma Umut Beşpınar March 2017, 233 pages This study examines the transformation of the conservative fractions of middle classes following the transformation of the Islamist conservatism in Turkey. Based on an ethnographic study which was conducted in Çukurambar, it investigates the impacts of political transformation over the everyday lives of the actually existing conservative agents. The inquiry begins with triadic break with the comonsensical definitons of conservatism. Benefiting from the relational sociology of Pierre Bourdieu, it constructs an empirical definition of the bodily conservatism. Second, it inerrogates the history of political struggles which impact on the making of bodily conservatism in Turkey, and introduces the concept of symbolic polarization. The concept habitus constitutes both topic and ethnographic tool of the study. Following Wacquant into the field, the study applies to the observant participation as the method for the production of the data. In the first analysis chapter, the study examines the socio-spatial transformation of Çukurambar. Following that, it focuses on the transformation of the conservative middlebrow taste by dissecting the emergence of the choice of elegant and religiously proper. Lastly, it investigates how conservative middle classes construct inner world and social world. Keywords: Conservatism, Habitus, Çukurambar, Life-style, Ethnography. iv ÖZ MUHAFAZAKAR HABİTUSUN OLUŞUMU: ANKARA’DA BİR ORTA-ÜST SINIF MAHALLESİ ÖRNEĞİ Akçaoğlu, Aksu Doktora, Sosyoloji Bölümü Tez Yöneticisi: Doç. Dr. Fatma Umut Beşpınar Mart 2017, 233 sayfa Bu çalışma, Türkiye’de orta sınıfların muhafazakar fraksiyonlarının, AKP’nin kurulmasıyla somutlaşan İslamcı muhafazakarlıktaki değişime paralel deneyimlediği dönüşümü konu alıyor. Çukurambar’da gerçekleştirilmiş etnografik bir araştırmayı temel alan çalışma, muhafazakarlığın siyasi dönüşümünün muhafazakar failler üzerindeki etkilerini inceliyor. Çalışma ilk olarak muhafazakarlığa dair üç yaygın kanaatten kopuyor. Pierre Bourdieu’nün ilişkisel sosyolisinden yararlanan çalışma bedensel muhafazakarlığın ampirik tanımını geliştiriyor. Bunu takiben, Türkiye’de bedensel muhafazakarlığın teşkiline etki eden siyasi mücadeleler tarihi inceleniyor ve sembolik kutuplaşma kavramı tanıtılıyor. Habitus kavramı çalışmanın hem konusunu hem de yöntemsel aracını teşkil ediyor. Wacquant’ın saha deneyimini takiben gözlemci katılımcılık veri üretme yöntemi olarak kullanılıyor. Çalışma ilk analiz bölümünde Çukurambar’ın sosyo-mekansal dönüşümünü inceliyor. Bunu takiben, zarif ve dinen makbul tercihin oluşumu tartışılarak muhafazakar orta sınıf beğenisinin geçirdiği dönüşüm tartışılıyor. Çalışma son olarak, muhafazakar orta sınıfların mevcut nesnel koşullarda içsel dünyalarını ve toplumsal dünyayı nasıl inşa ettiklerini inceliyor. Anahtar Kelimeler: Muhafazakarlık, Habitus, Çukurambar, Hayat Tarzı, Etnografi. v To My Family vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to express my deepest gratitude to my advisor, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Fatma Umut Beşpınar for her continuous guidance, advice, criticism and encouragements throughout the study. I have learned a lot from Assoc. Prof. Dr. Mustafa Şen not only about the research object but also about friendship. Prof. Dr. Hayriye Erbaş stimulated me to examine the emprical data in a detailed manner. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Tahire Erman helped me to concive the parallelism between neoliberalism and urban transformation in Ankara. I benefited from the criticism of Assoc. Prof. Dr. Fahriye Üstüner on the history of conservatism in Turkey. Loïc Wacquant helped me to deepen my research by inviting me to Berkeley. I learned a lot from his celebrated Bourdieu Boot Camp. I would like to thank to Tanıl Bora for his encouraging and stimulating e-mails. This dissertation was not written in ideal conditions. I was lucky enough to have loving people during the difficult times. I am indebted to my family for their continuous encouragement. I am grateful to my wife, Müge, for her firm belief, support and love. This study could never be completed without her patience and insigthful comments. I would like to thank to my friends Alaattin, Ersin, Serkan, Arda, and Zafer for their support throughout difficult times. I am also indebted to the research assistants of METU Sociology. This study was supported by National Scholarship Program for PhD Students (2211- A) and International Research Fellowship Program (2214-A) of The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK). vii TABLE OF CONTENTS PLAGIARISM……………………………………………………………………….iii ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................ iv ÖZ ................................................................................................................................. v DEDICATION……………………………………………….………………………vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .......................................................................................... vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ......................................................................................... .viii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS…………………………………………………..……xi LIST OF FIGURES………………………………………………………………....xii CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... 1 1.1 The Blurry Separation of Islamism and Conservatism Reconsidered ................ 5 1.2 From Ideas to Dispositions: The Conservatism of Conservative Agents ........... 9 1.3 From Center Periphery Analysis to Relational Sociology................................ 13 1.4 Plan of Chapters................................................................................................ 18 2. THEORETICAL CONSTRUCTION OF CONSERVATISM AS A RESEARCH OBJECT ..................................................... 21 2.1 The Sociology of Pierre Bourdieu and Construction of Research Object ........ 21 2.2 The Inner Logic of Pierre Bourdieu’s Sociological Theory ............................. 23 2.3 Social World Constructed: Topological Social Space and Homologous Symbolic Space ................................................................................. 27 2.3.1 The Objectivist Moment of Object Construction ....................................... 28 2.3.2 The Subjectivist Moment of Object Construction ..................................... 32 2.4 Critiques of Pierre Bourdieu’s Sociology and Critique of Critiques ................ 36 2.5 Re-Considering Conservatism with Bourdieu .................................................. 39 2.6 Walking with Bourdieu in the Streets of Çukurambar ..................................... 41 3. POLITICAL STRUGGLES AND SYMBOLIC POLARIZATION: THE SOURCES OF BODILY CONSERVATISM ................................................... 44 3.1 Introduction ...................................................................................................... 44 viii 3.2 Political Legitimacy Crisis and Transformation of Conservatism in Turkey... 45 3.3 The Properties of Political Field in Turkey and the Construction of AKP ...... 51 3.4 The Social Reproduction of the Political Divisions: The Symbolic Polarization ..................................................................................... 57 3.4.1 Islamist Conservatism and Rising Collective Orthodoxy .......................... 61 3.4.2 The Rule of AKP and the Collapse of Collective Orthodoxy.................... 64 3.5 Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 65 4. METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................. 66 4.1 Participant Objectivation: The Emergence of a Curiosity and the Selection of Research Field .............................................................................. 68 4.2 The Pains of Entering the Field and Determination of the Research Method .. 71 4.3 Conservative Habitus as a Research Topic and Tool ......................................
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