What are the conditions of thinking about the 1915 Armenian genocide in Turkey? - Hakan Seckinelgin

This talk will examine what is publicly remembered in Turkey about the events of 1915. In particular, it focuses how people apprehend each other and the conceptual structure of this process. The mechanism of what is publicly remembered and forgotten creates a cognitive censor for what can be discussed. We will explore the way in which the political mechanism that reproduces the public memories to resist questions on the genocide has become part of the generalized public discourse, the conceptual grammar of belonging. 

Hakan Seckinelgin is a political theorist who has developed a multidisciplinary research programme by combining theoretical work with empirical studies. He is not happy to restrict looking for answers within limited disciplinary perspectives, because people do not live lives that are compartmentalized by disciplinary concerns.

His work focuses on both the epistemology and politics of international social policy by engaging with people’s lives in different contexts. He is particularly interested in understanding how we think about policy processes by first thinking about the problems as they are experienced in the everyday lives of those who are supposed to benefit from the policies targeting them. He is interested in analysing the ways in which different contexts (different ideological, social, political and cultural levels) create the conditions for policy development and how these lead to a variety of implications for people and their experiences of equalities, inequalities and their participation in their communities. More thematically he works: on HIV and AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa considering the development, implementation and implications of international AIDS policies; on nature of knowledge and evidence used by global policy actors; on contextual determinants of policy relevant knowledge; on sexualities and LGBT activism in different contexts; and theories and politics of civil society. His work provides an epistemological shift in thinking about policy processes and their outcomes from the perspective of people’s experiences. This approach aims to valorise experience based knowledge as part of our assessments of needs, policies and policy implementations.