Abstract
Representations of “Terror”, “Terrorism” and “Terrorist” in the Epic World: An Anachronical Reading Attempt of Oral Culture
The present study, which has a claim that traditional narratives shape social behavior patterns and that there are significant traces in the narratives about a society's attitudes to certain phenomena, promises to analyze this claim through terrorism and in the example of the epic world. An anachronistic reading attempt has emerged in order to coherently prove such a claim because the attempt to analyze a phenomenon such as terrorism that exists in today's world through epics known to have been created in the past is inherently anachronistic. Therefore, in this article, an original method of analysis has been presented to the attention of researchers on how traditional narratives should be utilized to analyze a timeless phenomenon such as terrorism, which is constantly present in social life. The evaluations carried out in the sample of the Turkic epics have been deepened through the Oguz Kagan Epic and the Book of Dede Korkut. The presentation of terrorism in the Turkish epics is analyzed in detail through the actions of the characters and the narrative episodes by following the general principles of the structuralist method. Thus, the structural scheme of the character actions and episodes related to terrorism in epics has been revealed. The data obtained through a systematic analysis method have been discussed in the context of the fictionalization of reality and the realization of fiction; thus, it is aimed to make the present study versatile and comprehensive.
Keywords
Terror, terrorism, Turkic epics, typology