AN ENVISIONED POLITICAL UPPER IDENTITY: OTTOMANISM

Since the 18th century, the Ottoman Empire, which lost power against the West, tried to build Ottoman is midentity as a necessity in order to reestablish its power and not be influence by the nationalist movements that occurred in the West. At this point, it is important that Ottoman how an Ottoman is midentity imagined with reflex realized against the west, what kind identties bring about of these imagined identity and what kind can be make a theoretical debate in the frame of this imagined identity. Therefore, This will be examined in the study that how was tried to be built of Ottoman is midentity, how it is caused to imagining of local and religious identities of identity being built and how to read this identity in terms of modernist and ethno-symbolism approaches from national identity theories.

Keywords

Ottomanism, Local Identity, Culture and Civilization, Modernist, Ethno-Symbolism.