During the last half of the 19th century and the early 20th century, an Ottoman reading public emerged, a reading public that put lasting marks on Ottoman intellectual and cultural development. Simultaneously, the press flourished, and a wide range of periodical publications targeting varied audiences saw the light of day, despite severe censorship restrictions. The imperial capital of Istanbul was one main center of these developments. It was a city consisting of a highly diverse population, printing and publishing in different languages and scripts. The multilingual nature of Istanbul strongly affected the shaping of its print culture.
In her dissertation “The Press and the Reading Public: Literary Cultures in Late Ottoman Istanbul,” Ingeborg Fossestøl departs from a series of Ottoman Turkish periodical publications and shows how the reading public was inextricably linked to the rising popularity of new literary expressions such as the novel, satire, and the drama. Imparted through the periodical press, literature was a central building block in the formation and expansion of the reading public.
When a woman named Fatma wrote to a women’s journal in 1895 to complain about the immoral content of translated French novels, she also stepped into the public and became and actor of print culture. Similarly, when a frustrated reader complained that the periodical he subscribed to used too many complicated expressions, he also participated in the ongoing debate on language reformation and simplification. Through such examples, Fossestøl demonstrates how an engaged reading public emerged in the interstice between the multilingual Istanbul print culture, the press, literary products, and their commodification, and that this reading public gradually acquired the confidence to influence its surroundings culturally, socially, and politically.
Ingeborg Amadou Fossestøl successfully defended her dissertation on 31 January 2024.
Trial lecture
Designated topic: "The development of the press in the multilingual environment of the late Ottoman Empire."
Evaluation committee
- Associate professor Johann Strauss, Université de Strasbourg (first opponent)
- Associate professor Ilham Khuri-Makdisi, Northeastern University (second opponent)
- Professor Lucia Carminati, University of Oslo (committee administrator)
Chair of the defence
- Professor Kim Christian Priemel
Supervisors
- Associate Professor Toufoul Abou Hodeib, University of Oslo
- Associate Professor Holly Shissler, University of Chicago