Geride kalan: Sessizlik, nesneler ve Baba ve Piç'de miras alınan hafıza

Abstract

Bu çalışma, Elif Şafak’ın Baba ve Piç romanının hafıza, miras ve kimlik temalarını fenomenolojik perspektiften inceleyerek disiplinlerarası bir yazınsal çözümleme sunmaktadır. Çalışmada Şafak’ın hafızayı sembolik nesneler, izlenimler ve tamamlanmaya direnen duyusal parçalarla iç içe geçmiş geçici ve çok katmanlı bir alan olarak yeniden ele aldığı öne sürülmektedir. John Dewey’in Deneyim Olarak Sanat (Art as Experience), Jane Bennett’in Canlı Madde (Vibrant Matter) ile Ulusötesi Kuramı (Transnational Theory) ve Henry Corbin’in yaklaşımlarından hareketle bu çalışma, Ermeni diasporasının ardından ortaya çıkan kuşaklararası travmayı incelemek üzere Şafak’ın doğrusal olmayan zamansallık ve maddesel yankıları (örneğin yemek, hava durumu, sinema ve resim gibi) nasıl kullandığını ele almaktadır. Bununla birlikte, görsel ve mekansal motiflerin yakından incelenmesiyle Şafak’ın anlatı biçiminin, bir mimesis olarak tarihsel kesinlikten ziyade algının öne çıkarıldığı geçici jestler ve yinelenen biçimleri birleştiren kolaj yapısını yansıttığı öne sürülmektedir. Bu yönüyle roman, sessizlik, belirsizlik ve bedensel deneyimlerin belgelenmiş tarih kadar anlatı ağırlığına sahip olduğu bir görme etiği ortaya koymaktadır. Çalışmada Şafak’ın romanı travma çalışmaları, ekoeleştiri ve kuşaklararası hafıza gibi daha geniş tartışma alanlarına yerleştirilerek kültürel hesaplaşma aracı olarak duygu, duyusal bilgi ve estetik tamamlanmamışlığı ön plana çıkaran bir okuma pratiği önerilmektedir.

Keywords

• Maddî kültür
• Görsel anlatı
• Miras alınan hafıza

What remains: Silence, objects, and inherited memory in The Bastard of Istanbul

Abstract

This study presents a cross-disciplinary literary analysis of Elif Shafak’s The Bastard of Istanbul, exploring how the novel stages memory, inheritance, and identity through a visual and phenomenological lens. Rather than treating historical trauma as a fixed or testimonial narrative, the study argues that Shafak renders memory as an ephemeral, textured field by interweaving symbolic objects, atmospheric impressions, and sensory fragments that resist closure. Drawing on John Dewey’s Art as Experience, Jane Bennett’s Vibrant Matter, Transnational Theory, and Henry Corbin, the study examines how Shafak employs non-linear temporality and material resonances (such as food, weather, film, and painting) to explore intergenerational trauma in the aftermath of the Armenian diaspora. Through close readings of visual and spatial motifs, the essay suggests that Shafak’s narrative form, a mimesis, mirrors the structure of a collage an assemblage of fleeting gestures and recurring shapes that privilege perception over historical fixity. In doing so, the novel performs an ethics of seeing, where silence, ambiguity, and embodied experiences are granted as much narrative weight as documented history. The study situates Shafak’s novel within broader debates in trauma studies, ecocriticism, and transgenerational memory, arguing for a reading practice that foregrounds affect, sensory knowledge, and aesthetic incompletion as means of cultural reckoning.

Keywords

• material culture
• visual narrative
• inherited memory

Supporting Institution

University of North Dakota

Thanks

Sharon Carson and Javid Aliyev

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