TURKEY

Turkey's people, culture, value, environment, history, and religious practice

Turkey's people, culture, value, environment, history, and religious practice

People of Turkey

The majority of the people of Turkey are original inhabitants of the land. However, there are people of other ethnicities too to be found. All these people have attained citizenship of Turkey through the Treaty of Lausanne. Some of the other ethnic races are Greeks, Armenians, Jews, Abkhazians, Syriacs, Albanians, Arabs, Roma, Bosniaks, Pomaks, Chechens, Ossetians, Circassians, Levantines, Kabardin, Georgians, Laz, Hamshenis, Zazas and the Kurds.

Arts, Culture and Music of Turkey

* Art : the indigenous arts in Turkey, though influenced can be clearly seen in their kilim works, traditional Anatolian jewellery, carpet weaving, Canakkale ceramic-ware, hand made dolls, matting, metal bead works called Güherse, tiles, ceramics, making of Aydin needle lace of, Onyx sculptures, hand crafted filigree silver ware and traditional Yatagan Swords .

* Culture : the dominant traits of Turkey's culture are derived primarily from Ottoman, Islamic and Christian-European influences (Campbell, 2004). One of the chief markers of Turkey's culture is its cuisine. Turkey's cuisine has all the traits of nations that fell under the Ottoman Empire. So, there are as many Asian flavors to be deciphered as there are European.

* Music : the music of Turkey is a commingling of influences from the Arabic, classical Persian, Balkan, ancient Byzantine, Central Asian folk and modern European (Clogg, 2006).

Among the other influences in their folk music, elements and traits pertaining to Armenians, Greeks, Kurdish, Polish, Azeri and Jewish can be detected.

Flag of Turkey

Turkey has a flag that is both simple yet bold. It consists of a stark blood-red backdrop and on it, in the center-left of the flag, is superimposed a white crescent moon and in the center a white five-point star (Curtis, 2006). The color red is reminiscent of the fallen Ottoman Empire, while the moon and the star is an Islamic insignia.

Economy of Turkey

Turkey's economy is dependent on a two different aspects of its country's heritage. While the time-honored agricultural segment is a major contributor, so are the new industrial sectors of banking, transport, and communications. Together they take turkey's economy the strength it possesses. The agricultural produce that is of utmost value is tobacco, sugar beets, cotton, olives, pulse, grain and citrus. Other industries which have export value include textiles; processing and packaging of food; transport equipment; electronic goods; mining of coal, chromites, copper, boron and iron ore; steel; petroleum; construction and construction materials; lumber and paper. Aside of all these commodities, tourism is another flourishing revenue earner (Danforth, 2005).

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Islam In Turkey

Most Turks are Sunni Muslims; that is, they are among the majority of Islamic believers. There are Shiite and Alevi minorities as well. About 20% of Turkish Muslims look upon themselves as Muslims first and citizens of the Turkish Republic second; the other 80% see themselves as citizens first, and count religion as second, third or ...