THE MUSEUMIFICATION OF PRISONS IN TEHRAN AND SULAYMANIYAH: POWER, COLLECTIVE MEMORY AND HEGEMONY A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES OF MIDDLE EAST TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY BY XAVIER GAILLARD IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF SCIENCE IN THE DEPARTMENT OF MIDDLE EAST STUDIES SEPTEMBER 2019 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: Xavier Gaillard Signature : iii ABSTRACT THE MUSEUMIFICATION OF PRISONS IN TEHRAN AND SULAYMANIYAH: POWER, COLLECTIVE MEMORY AND HEGEMONY Gaillard, Xavier M.S., Department of Middle East Studies Supervisor : Assist. Prof. Dr. Derya Göçer Akder Co-Supervisor: Assist. Prof. Dr. Esin Kömez Dağlıoğlu September 2019, 290 pages The purpose of this work is to analyze and compare from the lenses of power two former detention centers which have been turned into museums: Amna Suraka in Sulaymaniyah (Northern Iraq) and Ebrat in Tehran (Iran). These are memory sites condemning the former abuses of previous regimes’ police and intelligence apparatuses. The thesis looks at the rhetorical discourse they exhibit and combines it with distinct theories from the the social sciences – namely power relations, symbolic power, hegemony and populism- to better understand how they perceive their own national identities and pasts. To achieve this, the analysis focuses on the relationships these sites maintain with history, memory and space; and by taking into consideration specific details and over-arching traits. The resulting conclusion posits that even though these sites differ notably in terms of museographical presentation, style and content, they both share a similar fascistic investment in memory in how they attempt to fabricate a wider and permanent history. They can be observed as the result of hegemonic projects obeying to the logics of populism in regards to how they utilize trauma; and that they can be observed as nodal points in a wider urban- memorial network constructing the identity of their respective nations. Keywords: Iran, Iraqi Kurdistan, collective memory, hegemony, museums iv ÖZ TAHRAN VE SÜLEYMANİYE’DE BULUNAN HAPİSHANELERİN MÜZELEŞTİRİLMESİ: GÜÇ, KOLEKTİF BELLEK VE HEGEMONYA Gaillard, Xavier Yüksek Lısans, Orta Doğu Araştırmaları Bölümü Yöneten : Assist. Prof. Dr. Derya Göçer Akder Ortak Tez Yôneticisi : Assist. Prof. Dr. Esin Kömez Dağlıoğlu Eylül 2019, 290 sayfa Bu çalışmanın amacı, müzeye dönüştürülmüş olan iki eski gözaltı/sorgu merkezini güç bağlamında analiz etmek ve karşılaştırmaktır; Süleymaniye’de (Küzey Irak) bulunan Amna Suraka ve Tehran’da (İran) bulunan Ebrat. Bu alanlar, önceki rejimlerin polis ve istihbarat birimlerinin suiistimalleri ve tacizlerinin kınandığı bellek mekânlarına dönüştürülmüştür. Tez, milli kimliğinin birer timsali olarak davranan bu mekânları daha iyi anlamak amacıyla, bu müzeleri ve sergilenen teorik söylemi, sosyal bilimlerin ilgili teorileri ile bir araya getirmektedir. Böylelikle, bu alanların tarih, bellek ve mekân ile kurmuş olduğu ilişkilere odaklanılmıştır. Bunu yaparken, hem öznel detaylar hem de kapsayıcı özellikler göz önünde bulundurulmuş. Varılan sonuç ile müze-grafik temsil, biçim ve içerik açısından bu iki alan oldukça farklılık gösterse de, ikisi de, nasıl daha geniş ve kalıcı bir tarihin icat edilerek bellek üzerine yapılmış benzer faşizan yatırımların paylaşıldığı önerilmektedir. Buna bağlı olarak, bu iki müzenin, popülizmin travmadan istifade etmeyi şart koşan mantığına itaat edilerek geliştirilmiş hegemonyacı projelerin sonuçları olarak ve milletlerin kimliklerinin inşa edildiği daha geniş bir kentsel-bellek ağının düğüm noktaları olarak gözlemlenebileceğini savunuyorum. Anahtar Kelimeler: Iran, Irak Kürt Bölgesi, kollektif bellek, hegemonya, müzeler v To the stones of Ankara vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The author wishes to express his deepest gratitude to his supervisors Dr. Derya Göçer and Dr. Esin Kömez for their patience, academic wisdom, encouragement and instrinsic abilities to redirect and contain the research and its writing during its developing stages. The author would also like to thank several professors in METU the courses of which have, directly or indirectly, influenced the eventual blossoming of this particular text: namely, Dr. Işık Kuşçu, Dr. Meliha Altunışık and Dr. İhsan Dağı. The comments and indications of Dr. Şerif Onur Bahçecik are also gratefully acknowledged. Additonally, the author wishes to give special thanks to all the people who were of substantial help during the conducting of the fieldwork: particularly Ipek for her hospitality, readiness, conversation and priceless linguistic support in Iran; and Paula, for her conceptual guidance and valuable discussions in Iraqi Kurdistan. The author would also like to thank his parents for their continued encouragement during the thesis writing process. Last but not least, the author wishes many special thanks to his colleague Elif Kaymaz for her infinite support and tolerance during the writing process of the thesis, her continued logistic support and for her seminal guidance on the specific subjects of space and urbanism. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS PLAGIARISM...........................................................................................................iii ABSTRACT .............................................................................................................. iv ÖZ ............................................................................................................................... v DEDICATION .......................................................................................................... vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ....................................................................................... vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ........................................................................................ viii LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................... x CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................ 1 1.1. Structure and methodology of the thesis ................................................. 4 1.2. Literature review ..................................................................................... 5 1.2.1. Power and museums ....................................................................... 7 1.2.2. Collective memory, memory sites and prisons ............................ 11 1.2.3. Historical background of Iraq and Iran ........................................ 12 1.3. Definition of ‘prison museum’ as related to the aims of the thesis ....... 13 1.4. Power/knowledge versus conciliation and dark tourism ....................... 16 1.5. General Information on the Sites .......................................................... 20 1.5.1. The Amna Suraka Museum ........................................................... 20 1.5.2. The Ebrat Museum ........................................................................ 25 1.6. Power and museums: a brief theoretical introduction ........................... 29 1.6.1. The appearance of non-coercive power ........................................ 30 1.6.2. Governmentality, culture and museums ........................................ 32 2. POWER AND HISTORY .............................................................................. 41 2.1. A break with the past: the emergence of a people ................................. 41 2.3. Prison museums as ‘ontologues’ of a national history .......................... 45 2.4. Historical authenticity in the prison museums ...................................... 54 2.5. From specific memory site to macro-history ........................................ 61 viii 3. HEGEMONY AND PRISON MUSEUMS ................................................... 84 3.1.Symbolic dominance, therapeutic governance and the elite guidance .. 84 3.2. Prison museums as hegemonic enclaves ............................................... 93 3.3. The carving of truths ........................................................................... 105 3.4. The battle over epistemes and the possibility of heresy ...................... 114 4. POWER AND MEMORY ........................................................................... 129 4.1. The unitary collective memory: a necessary fabrication ..................... 129 4.2. Borrowing meanings from religious memory ..................................... 134 4.3. Memory sites: timings and usages ...................................................... 137 4.4. The affective input of testimonies ....................................................... 142 4.5. A fascistic investment of memory: silences and vilifications ............. 147 5. POWER AND SPACE ................................................................................. 158 5.1. Prison museums as the physical embodiment of memory .................. 158 5.2. Spatial techné: prosthetic memories via objects, figures and cells ..... 161 5.3. The permanency of the prison museum .............................................. 173 5.4. Readapting the space: between artificiality and ‘true being’ .............. 175 5.5. From inert physical spaces to ‘entitled’ narrators of memory ............ 177 5.6. Acts of authority espousing