June 1: Swann Fellow's lecture on Turkish cartoonists

From Martha Kennedy at the Library of Congress -

Swann Fellow Yasemin Gencer presents her public lecture, "Cartooning Progress: Secularism and Nationalism in the Early Turkish Republic (1922-28)" at noon on Tuesday, June 1, in Dining Room A on the sixth floor of the Madison Building.

Gencer will discuss how cartoons of this era had the power to create, shape and project a new Turkish national identity based on European models. She will look at cartoons that highlight reforms initiated during the early years of the Turkish Republic. In one such image, for example, an automobile made of Latin letters speeds past a camel composed of Arabic letters, demonstrating how the cartoonist combines text with visual metaphor to underscore the benefits of changing the official alphabet. Such cartoons from 1922-28 illustrate many reforms aimed at secularizing the nation.