Reading Clocks, Alla Turca: Time and Society in the Late Ottoman Empire PDF
Preview Reading Clocks, Alla Turca: Time and Society in the Late Ottoman Empire
Reading Clocks, Alla Turca Reading CloCks, Alla Turca Time and Society in the Late Ottoman Empire Avner Wishnitzer The University of Chicago Press Chicago and London Avner Wishnitzer is senior lecturer in the Department of Middle Eastern and African History at Tel Aviv University. He resides with his family in Jerusalem. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637 The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London © 2015 by The University of Chicago All rights reserved. Published 2015. Printed in the United States of America 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 1 2 3 4 5 isBn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 25772- 3 (cloth) isBn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 25786- 0 (e- book) doi: 10.7208/chicago/9780226257860.001.0001 Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication- Data Wishnitzer, Avner, 1976– author. Reading clocks, alla Turca : time and society in the late Ottoman Empire / Avner Wishnitzer. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. isBn 978- 0- 226- 25772- 3 (cloth : alkaline paper) — isBn 0- 226- 25772- X (cloth : alkaline paper) — isBn 978- 0- 226- 25786- 0 (e- book) — isBn 0- 226- 25786- X (e- book) 1. Time— Systems and standards— Turkey— History. 2. Time— Social aspects— Turkey. I. Title. gn476.3.W57 2015 304.2′3709561— dc 3 2014039802 ♾ This paper meets the requirements of ansi/niso Z39.48- 1992 (Permanence of Paper). To Yael Kimron, who taught me history, wide and deep Contents Acknowledgments ix Note on Terms, Names, and Transliteration xi Introduction 1 ChapteR 1 Reading Clocks, Alaturka 17 ChapteR 2 Clerk Work 45 ChapteR 3 Military Time 68 ChapteR 4 On Time for School 93 ChapteR 5 Ferry Tales 124 ChapteR 6 No Time to Lose 151 ConClusion Reading Clocks, Alafranga 183 Notes 193 Bibliography 241 Index 267 Acknowledgments Over the last ten years, I often found myself thinking about Tony and Doug, the young physicists who journeyed into the past through The Time Tunnel, that television show from the sixties. As I embarked on my own little project of time travel, it often seemed as though I was going to end up like those two scientists in turtlenecks, who challenged time and got lost in it. The moment has come now to thank all the people who helped me to find the way back home. This book began its life at Tel Aviv University. I would like to begin by ex- pressing my deep gratitude to my Hoca, Ehud Toledano, who watched over and directed me as I slowly made my way between the many pitfalls of the trade. Attentive to detail and sharp in his critique, yet always supportive, Ehud en- couraged me to think harder. The backing of the Colton Foundation allowed me to focus on my research and for that I am grateful. I would also like to thank the Süleyman Demirel Program for funding my efforts to improve my language skills in Turkey. I owe a debt of gratitude to the Fulbright program, whose grant made possible my postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Washington in Seattle, and to Reşat Kasba, who served as my host, and not merely in the academic sense. It was very much owing to him that I felt at home so far away from home. I thank the Lady Davis Fellowship Trust for funding my postdoctoral research at the He- brew University of Jerusalem and Yaron Ben- Naeh for his mentorship. I am also thankful to the Kreitman School of Advanced Graduate Studies at Ben- Gurion University of the Negev for its generous backing over the last two years, and to my host there, Iris Agmon, for her continuous academic guidance and moral support. While working on this book I discussed some of my ideas with many col- leagues and friends at Tel- Aviv University, and they all contributed to this work significantly. I thank Gadi Algazi for helping me sharpen my analytic tools. I am also indebted to Amy Singer, Mira Tzoreff, Miri Shefer- Mossensohn, Ami Ayalon, and Israel Gershoni. Special thanks to my friends in Tel Aviv, Omri Paz, Tzameret Levi- Dafni, and Idan Barir, who together formed my immediate dis- cussion group, or better yet, my support group. It is pretty much thanks to them that I managed to complete this project and maintain relative sanity. During my postdoc fellowship at the University of Washington I had the { ix }
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