The Armenians of Aintab : : The Economics of Genocide in an Ottoman Province / / Ümit Kurt.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter EBOOK PACKAGE COMPLETE 2021 English
• VerfasserIn: Kurt, Ümit,
• Place / Publishing House: Cambridge, MA : : Harvard University Press, , [2021]; ©2021
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (288 p.)

A Turk’s discovery that Armenians once thrived in his hometown leads to a groundbreaking investigation into the local dynamics of genocide. Ümit Kurt, born and raised in Gaziantep, Turkey, was astonished to learn that his hometown once had a large and active Armenian community. The Armenian presence in Aintab, the city’s name during the Ottoman period, had not only been destroyed—it had been replaced. To every appearance, Gaziantep was a typical Turkish city. Kurt digs into the details of the Armenian dispossession that produced the homogeneously Turkish city in which he grew up. In particular, he examines the population that gained from ethnic cleansing. Records of land confiscation and population transfer demonstrate just how much new wealth became available when the prosperous Armenians—who were active in manufacturing, agricultural production, and trade—were ejected. Although the official rationale for the removal of the Armenians was that the group posed a threat of rebellion, Kurt shows that the prospect of material gain was a key motivator of support for the Armenian genocide among the local Muslim gentry and the Turkish public. Those who benefited most—provincial elites, wealthy landowners, state officials, and merchants who accumulated Armenian capital—in turn financed the nationalist movement that brought the modern Turkish republic into being. The economic elite of Aintab was thus reconstituted along both ethnic and political lines. The Armenians of Aintab draws on primary sources from Armenian, Ottoman, Turkish, British, and French archives, as well as memoirs, personal papers, oral accounts, and newly discovered property-liquidation records. Together they provide an invaluable account of genocide at ground level.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Tables -- Preface -- Map 1. Cilicia region of the Late Ottoman Empire. © Ümit Kurt -- Map 2. Sites and owners of confiscated Armenian properties in Gaziantep. © Ümit Kurt -- Introduction -- 1. The 1895 Massacres in Aintab -- 2. Ethnic Politics after the Young Turk Revolution -- 3. Wartime Deportation and Destruction of the Aintab Armenians -- 4. Confiscation and Plunder under the Abandoned Properties Laws -- 5. The Flawed Restitution Process for Armenians -- 6. The End of the Armenian Community in Aintab -- Conclusion -- Appendix -- Glossary -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Acknowledgments -- Index