The question of collaboration between secular feminists and pious feminists in Turkey

Abstract

This paper examines two seemingly opposing trends in the women's rights movement in Turkey: the first trend indicates growing numbers of feminist collaborations and alliances while the second highlights heightened levels of identity-ridden dissent and polarization. By focusing on the relationship between self-identified "pious feminists" and "secular feminists" in Turkey this paper argues that, rather than opposing ends of a continuum, these two trends are in a relational flow.Based on a rich ethnographic study and discourse analysis, I analyze secular feminist and pious feminist perceptions of a possible long-term collaboration between the two groups as equal partners and by mutual consent. I delineate the relational and affective dimensions of collaborations that may initiate as well as hinder new solidarities based on difference. I argue that the shared civil society encounters between secular and pious women's rights groups in Turkey present opportunities for "feminist iterations" that are contingent, performative, and opaque which require what Lugones calls "complex communication" in addition to the deliberative dialogue.