Basiret

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Basiret
TypeDaily newspaper
Founder(s)Ali Efendi
Editor-in-chiefAli Efendi
Founded1869
Political alignment
  • Pan-Islamist
  • Pan-Turkism
LanguageOttoman Turkish
Ceased publication1879
HeadquartersConstantinople
CountryOttoman Empire

Basiret (Ottoman Turkish: Insightfulness) was an Ottoman daily newspaper which was published in Constantinople in the period 1869–1879. It was one of the most read newspapers of that period and had a pan-Islamist approach.[1]

History and profile[edit]

Basiret was established by Ali Efendi, a journalist, in 1869,[2] and the first issue appeared on 23 January 1870.[3] He was also the publisher of the paper and began to be known as Basiretçi Ali Efendi due to the popularity of the paper.[3] He was financed by German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck in getting printing machines to launch the paper.[4][5]

Basiret sold 40,000 copies in the first year.[2] Then it enjoyed both high levels of circulation and of influence among the Turks living in the Empire.[6] The readers of the paper were mostly conservative Muslims.[3] Major contributors included Ali Suavi, Namık Kemal and Ahmet Mithat.[6] Basiret covered critical articles about the bureaucratic structure of the Ottoman Empire.[3]

Basiret had links to the Young Ottomans movement.[7] During the Franco-Prussian War in 1870-1871 the paper supported the Germans.[5][8] It became a platform for the pan-Islamist and pan-Turkist figures leaving its objective approach at the beginning of the Russo-Turkish War in 1877.[2]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Kasuya Gen (2006). "The influence of al-Manar on Islamism in Turkey: The case of Mehmed Âkif" (PDF). In Stéphane A. Dudoignon; et al. (eds.). Intellectuals in the Modern Islamic World. Transmission, Transformation and Communication. London; New York: Routledge. p. 80. ISBN 9780415549790. Archived from the original (PDF) on 18 April 2021.
  2. ^ a b c Onur İşçi (2014). "Wartime Propaganda and the Legacies of Defeat: Russian and Ottoman Newspapers in the War of 1877-78". Russian History. 41 (2): 190–191. doi:10.1163/18763316-04102005.
  3. ^ a b c d Tuba Demirci; Selçuk Akşin Somel (September 2008). "Women's Bodies, Demography, and Public Health: Abortion Policy and Perspectives in the Ottoman Empire of the Nineteenth Century". Journal of the History of Sexuality. 17 (3): 410. doi:10.1353/sex.0.0025. JSTOR 20542700. PMID 19263614. S2CID 7721368.
  4. ^ M. Kayahan Özgül. "Periyodiklerin İstanbul Kültürüne Etkileri" (in Turkish). İstanbul Tarihi. Archived from the original on 5 November 2021. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  5. ^ a b Mustafa Gencer (2014). "The Congress of Berlin (1878) in Context of the Ottoman-German Relations" (PDF). Tarihin Peşinde. 12: 298. Archived from the original (PDF) on 27 November 2020.
  6. ^ a b Murat Cankara (2015). "Rethinking Ottoman Cross-Cultural Encounters: Turks and the Armenian Alphabet". Middle Eastern Studies. 51 (1): 6. doi:10.1080/00263206.2014.951038. S2CID 144548203.
  7. ^ Howard Eissenstat (2015). "Modernization, Imperial Nationalism, and the Ethnicization of Confessional Identity in the Late Ottoman Empire". In Stefan Berger; Alexei Miller (eds.). Nationalizing Empires. Budapest: Central European University Press. p. 448. ISBN 978-963-386-016-8. JSTOR 10.7829/j.ctt16rpr1r.
  8. ^ Cevat Fehmi Baskut (February 1964). "Prominent Figures in Turkish Journalism". International Communication Gazette. 10 (1): 85. doi:10.1177/001654926401000113. S2CID 144350383.