A lecture by Professor Dr. Ioannis N. Grigoriadis (Bilkent University, Ankara)

While Greek and Turkish nationalism emerged under different political and social conditions, both faced a common challenge: to address the role of Orthodox Christianity and Sunni Islam in Greek and Turkish national identity respectively. Early attempts of both Greek and Turkish nationalist elites to dissociate national identity from religion threatened the popular appeal of the respective nationalist movements. They were eventually replaced by synthetic approaches, which reconciled religion and national identity in a fashion that has proven resilient and relevant to contemporary Greek and Turkish politics.

Organized by the Program in Hellenic Studies and The Sakıp Sabancı Center for Turkish Studies of Columbia University