DAVID SHANKLAND, Islam and Society in Turkey(Hemingford Grey, U.K.: Eothen Press, 1999). Pp. 250. $55.00 cloth.

Extract

This book serves two important functions. First, it gives a comprehensive overview of the many varieties of Islamic practice and organization in contemporary Turkey and sets these into the larger national context. Second, the author shares important insights into the manner in which the culture of the political process leads inevitably to certain kinds of accommodation with religion. The survey of Turkey's religious brotherhoods, associations, and political parties, while brief, is comprehensive without being superficial. Enough history, ideology, organization, and telling details are given for each to come alive in the larger context of Turkey's complex intersection of culture and political history. The book comes alive in the description of the Alevi, a religious minority that has been the subject of the author's own research for many years. There also is a particularly interesting discussion of the presentation of Islam in children's schoolbooks and the relationship of Islamic values to moral behavior and love for the nation. Although this is not new material, it is set within a larger discussion.