Malcolm X as a political symbol among Turkish Islamists

This is the thirteenth instalment in ‘Siyah’, a series which explores African Diaspora and Turkish social and cultural narratives, with journalist Adama Juldeh Munu.

In the years since Malcolm X successfully internationalised his political cause, it has been readapted and reinterpreted by Turkish Islamist newspaper columnists to make the case for their own political causes in contemporary Turkey. In this article, Jeffrey Bishku-Aykul argues that while the Turkish Islamist movement has achieved political hegemony with the rise of the Justice and Development Party (AK Party/AKP), these columnists draw from Malcolm X’s worldview to make anti-hegemonic arguments.

The below has been excerpted and readapted with permission from a draft of Jeffrey Bishku-Aykul’s 2020 master’s thesis for Bogazici University, The Diffusion of Malcolm X as a Political Symbol Among Turkish Islamists. The full and final published work can be accessed at tez.yok.gov.tr.

Malcolm X praying at the Mosque of Muhammad Ali Pasha in Cairo, Egypt. 1964

Malcolm X is Recognised in Turkey

Although I grew up in the United States, it was not until I moved to Turkey that I read The Autobiography of Malcolm X. I finally read it in 2016, upon the recommendation of a colleague at the English-language Turkish state broadcaster, TRT World. As a Turkish-American and long-time resident of Chicago who had grown up near the one-time home and mosque of Malcolm X’s mentor, I found the book to be a fascinating and multidimensional account of Islamic and American identity. Like a ‘Rorschach inkblot’, Malcolm X’s life story could mean different things to different people, depending on their own experiences, beliefs and cultures.

Almost two years later, I found Malcolm X’s face staring at me through the window of an Islamic bookstore in Istanbul’s Fatih neighbourhood. Perched atop a pile of books covering subjects such as Russia, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and Turkish-Islamic thought sat a collection of speeches by the 20th century Black nationalist leader. The store was promoting a copy of Challenging America (Amerika’ya Meydan Okurken), the first in a two-part series of speeches translated by Istanbul-based writer Bugra Ozler; through the window, I could also see Alex Haley’s Autobiography of Malcolm X. Three months after that, I found Malcolm X’s name ‘graffitied’ near the bookstore. I also found his name in the nearby Balat neighbourhood, and, farther away, in Ortaköy. It is unclear whether these names were the work of the same vandal. Yet seeing Malcolm X’s speeches displayed so prominently in a bookshop window and his name scribbled publicly in a city so distant from his native US indicated a Turkish connection to the historical figure.

It does not matter that Malcolm X never spoke Turkish nor visited Turkey. He never belonged to nor endorsed the contemporary Turkish Islamist movement himself, (but) his efforts at internationalizing and thus bridging his own movement’s frame with those of others led to the eventual diffusion of him as a symbol and his ideas by Turkish Islamist newspaper columns to their readers. Because of the key role that newspapers have played in the Turkish Islamist quest for hegemony, references to Malcolm X by columnists have been important to the diffusion of the leader as a symbol to the broader movement.

Although his name does not feature prominently in Turkish political discourse, Malcolm X has been the focus of some major headlines and politically significant events. In September 2018, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan met with Malcolm X’s daughters, Ilyasah and Qubilah Shabazz, on the side-lines of the 73rd UN General Assembly. In an interview around that time, Ilyasah Shabazz said that Erdoğan represented her father’s legacy. A month later, amid ongoing tensions between the US and Turkey, the Turkish government renamed the avenue where a new American embassy was being constructed after Malcolm X. Both events were covered extensively in Turkish language media.

One of the many graffiti on streets in Turkey of Malcolm X. This one is next to the late president Morsi of Egypt. Source: http://basirasinsights.blogspot.com

A Brief Look into Islamism and Turkey

In his 2016 book, Islamism: What it Means for the Middle East and the World, Tarek Osman writes that, “For the vast majority of Islamists, the principles of the faith entail submitting to those rules that – as a Muslim – one believes were laid down by God in a divine revelation to the Prophet Mohammed,” adding, however, that there exists a “spectrum of ‘Islamisms’: some views that strongly invoke certain interpretations of Islam in political and social life; others that have adopted a light-tough approach.” Carrie Wickham explains further that “Although the goals and strategies of Islamists differ, they are united in their conviction that the most vexing problems facing contemporary Muslim societies can be resolved through an individual and collective return to religion.” These definitions do not explicitly indicate the extent to which an Islamist might seek to apply Islamic law or customs. Islamist movements span aims, environments and methods, ranging from Sayyid Qutb’s Muslim Brotherhood, to supporters of Aliya Izetbegovic’s Islamic Declaration, to members of Necmettin Erbakan’s Milli Gorus to Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s neoliberal AK Party.

The AKP became Turkey’s ruling party in 2002, on the heels of a severe economic crisis, and by appealing to politically marginalized groups including Turkey’s Kurds and head-scarved women, a stance that fit into the Western pro-human rights consensus of the time. Tugal writes, “The ensuing global disillusionment with prospects for Islamic unity manifested itself in Turkey in the turn of the Islamists to the European Union and to the discourse of universal human rights and democracy, especially after 1997. This move discredited the Islamists in the eyes of nationalist-leaning religious people, while it gained them the sympathy of liberal intellectuals and professionals.” Thus, although the AKP was able to consolidate its power throughout the years and has established political hegemony in today’s Turkey, its roots lie in an anti-hegemonic, rights and justice-oriented discourse, one which appears in the Turkish Islamist newspaper columns this article analyses, and which draws inspiration from Malcolm X.

The Diffusion of the Symbol and Ideas of Malcolm X

The publication Yeni Safak accounts for half of all columns mentioning Malcolm X (121), with Milli Gazete coming in second place (81) and Yeni Akit in third (40). Notably, just over half of the 82 authors (42) published more than one article mentioning Malcolm X. The vast majority wrote four or fewer articles, with less than a fifth (15) writing five or more articles, most of them in Yeni Safak.

Top columnists by publication

(published five or more articles mentioning Malcolm X)

Yeni Akit

Milli Gazete

Yeni Safak

Abdurahman Dilipak Hasan Aksay

Meryem Nida

Mustafa Yildirim

Sakir Tarim

Abdulaziz Kiransal

Mahmut Toptas

Akif Emre

Ali Murat Guven

Ali Nur Kutlu

Gokhan Ozcan

Hakan Albayrak

Muhammad Berdibek

Nazif Gurdogan

Omer Lekesiz

Rasim Ozdenoren

Salih Tuna

Authors of these columns reference both to assign credibility to Malcolm X (‘Malcolm X as a Quotable Moral Authority, Symbol of the Ummah, Symbol of Martyrdom and Companion of Muhammad Ali’) and reaffirm their own beliefs (‘Malcolm X as an Internal Critic of America, Proof of Islam’s Transformative Power’). Frequently, Malcolm X is employed as a symbol and his words are used to legitimize these columnists’ political positions, regardless of whether they are directly relevant to the Black leader’s life and work.

In these columns, a major factor underpinning Malcolm X’s credibility is his Muslim identity. Malcolm X and his life story are frequently interpreted through a Pan-Islamist lens, with an emphasis on his identity as a Muslim convert, a Black/African/American member of the Ummah, an exemplary man of faith and a martyr. Authors of these columns repeatedly invoke his name alongside other high-profile Muslim figures (i.e. Necmettin Erbakan or Alija Izetbegovic).

While some articles mention Malcolm X purely in the context of racial politics, a large number of them emphasize his Muslim identity, reflecting a Turkish Pan-Islamist view in which the political leader’s religious identity is potentially more significant than his racial or ethnic identity. In a February 2016 column in Yeni Safak, for example, author Yusuf Ziya Comert evoked the memory of ‘Malcolm X’s martyrdom’,” writing, “There is no Islamist who does not know the life story of Malcolm X, one of the best Muslims of the past century.” Although he did not elaborate any further as to why this is the case, he indicated how relevant Malcolm X and his views were to Turkish Islamism by mentioning him alongside Turkish Islamist activist Metin Yuksel. In another example, a Milli Gazete column entitled ‘The Conquering of Istanbul and the Conquest Prayer’, author Abdulaziz Kiransal (who uses the very same line in several articles) quotes Malcolm X as saying that, “As a Muslim, I feel obligated to fight for the spread of Islam until all the world bows before Allah.”Ironically, he ignores the rest of Malcolm X’s remark in Cairo, in which he added “but as an Afro-American, I can never overlook the miserable plight of my people in America, so I have two fights, two struggles.”

A municipality worker hangs the road sign for “Malcolm X Avenue”, near the US embassy in Ankara, November 29, 2018.

On the other hand, when Malcolm X’s Black identity is emphasized, it is often done so to showcase the breadth of the Ummah, the global community of Muslims spanning across geography, race and ethnicity. For example, in one article entitled ‘A Pledge for our Children’ – also by Kiransal of Milli Gazete – the author mimics the tone of Turkey’s Republican student pledge. He writes, “I am a Muslim, Alhamdulillah…In America, whites knew me as Malcolm X, the child of a Black-skinned woman.”. In this case, Malcolm X is portrayed as the Muslim world’s Black American emissary. A Yeni Akit article, ‘Young Man, the Ummah Is This’, an open letter of sorts written by Ahmet Anapali in December 2015 as a response to those people who claim it is in disarray, reads: “You are as Turkish as Alparslan Gazi, as Kurdish as Selahaddin-i Eyyubi, as Arab as Omer Muhtar, as Chechen as Sheik Samil, as Albanian as Mehmet Akif, as Bosnian as Aliya Izzet Begovic, as Black and African as Malcolm X.” Although this description overlooks Malcolm X’s identity as an American citizen and portrays him as ‘African’, it nevertheless serves the purpose of expanding the concept of the Ummah to include Black Muslims and Africans.

Across all three publications, Malcolm X’s martyrdom is an especially popular topic in February, referred to by some authors as the ‘month of martyrs’. In a Yeni Akit article entitled ‘’February, month of martyrs’, Mehmet Ali Tekin lists Malcolm X among other names such as Hasan al-Banna and Esad Erbili – names that appear in other writings, too. Another author, Mahmut Toptas of Milli Gazete, went so far as to write in November 2008 (without clarifying who ‘they’ are): “Let’s just say they killed him because he was Muslim.”

Although this serves as a defining example of his Muslim identity among these columns, this is also a simplistic and problematic framing given the role that the domestic politics of the United States and internal affairs of the Nation of Islam played in his untimely death, as well as the complex role that postcolonial politics and relationships with politicians such as the secular Gamal Abdel Nasser played in his affairs.

Finally, another significant way in which Malcolm X is associated with Islam by these columnists is by mentioning him as a companion of Muhammad Ali, another world-famous Muslim convert. The passing of the champion boxer was an internationally important event, with even Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who was in the US at the time, attending an Islamic prayer event for him. In the days and years since, columns have remembered Ali and Malcolm X positively. On June 10, 2016, Yeni Safak columnist Ibrahim Karagul reflected on both men’s lives in ‘Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X and the path of upstanding men’, in which he wrote, “They offered new values, goals and identities to their own societies, besides Islam. In such an era, names like Muhammad Ali and Malcolm X expressed resistance. In the greatest poverty they stood on their feet with an identity, and with that identity they could rebel in the heart of the West.” Even a year after his death, in 2017, Milli Gazete columnist Ibrahim Halil Er wrote, “I recognized Muhammed Ali at a young age. After that, I became interested in American Muslims and got to know Malcolm X, another hero. I read his [biography]. I became consciously opposed to Western imperialism.” In the aftermath of the 2018 currency crisis, Milli Gazete columnist Mahmut Toptas, in an article entitled ‘We Don’t Need Dollars, We Need Men’, wrote that that “What America really needs are the principles of Islamic faith that Muslims like [Malcolm X] and [Muhammad Ali] have.” In these examples, Malcolm X is placed in the broader history of Islam in America, a history in which he and Muhammad Ali occupy an important role. Both Malcolm X and the boxer occupy a significant position within a pan-Islamist perspective of the United States.

Black American Servicemen and Turkish Workers in West Germany: Two cultural responses to prejudice

This is the twelfth instalment in ‘Siyah’ which explores the relationship between the African Diaspora and Turkish social and cultural narratives, with journalist Adama Juldeh Munu. In 1973, the sociologist Peter T. Suzuki produced a comparative analysis of the cultural responses of African-American Government Issue (GI) servicemen and Turkish workers in what was then known as West Germany. Black GIs were a part of the cohort of soldiers in the Western/Allied Forces’ protectorate of West Germany, following the end of World War Two. The following is a summary of Suzuki’s analysis on Black Americans and Turks navigating racism in West Germany.

Black American GIs and Turkish workers were two separate groups in West Germany. However, they were bound in the following ways. Firstly, they were both guests – one group supported the economy and the other group helped defend the nation. Secondly, both groups faced prejudice and discrimination. What distinguished them, however, was how they coped with this. Suzuki mentions that the young GIs used a process called dissimulation, while Turks used dissimilation – mechanisms that reflected aspects of African-American culture and rural Turkish society, respectively.

The grievances of the servicemen in Germany are well documented. Some of these included discrimination in housing; restricted admission to beer halls and clubs; German dislike and distrust of Black people; harassment in the Armed Forces; and unequal opportunity in an organization that professed otherwise.

For most Americans it came as a shock, in the fall of 1970, to learn through mass media that for a large segment of America’s fighting forces, the major battle lines drawn were not in the thickets and swamps of Indochina (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam) but in the cities and towns of West Germany; that the enemy was not “Charlie”, but “Heinz”; and that the main target was not the interdiction of the Ho Chi Minh Trail but the restriction at Hauptstrasse.

Suzuki states: “The irony of the situation in Germany is brought home sharply to the Black GIs and their families who cannot find adequate housing or cannot freely enter a place of recreation on account of social prejudice and discrimination practiced against them by the very people these warriors are here to defend. And these GIs are convinced that the US Armed Forces, or NATO, can readily enforce fair housing rules on German landlords and slumlords or minimize German prejudice and discrimination; but to date, the pronouncements and measures taken by the Command have been palliatives rather than real ones.”

Embittered by the failure of the Armed Forces to take strong measures and genuine steps to combat and alleviate prejudice, harassment, and discrimination, he found young Black GIs were using dissimulation to come to grips with the unfavourable situations within the military community and German society.

Dissimulation is described as “participatory withdrawal from…imposed military or civil societal norms.” That is to say, GIs would avoid confrontation with society or segments of it. Suzuki observed that the young servicemen would merely go through the motions of conforming and focusing on being the ideal soldier or airman. For instance, in performing their duties, patriotism, proper dress, and deferential behaviour and language, to list only a few.

But they participated in the system while keeping some elements of their identity. They did this by staying barely within the letter of the law and the bounds of propriety as established by military and West German society, and in a calculated way taunting the military with their power checks, daps, liberation handshakes, Afros, embellishments on their uniform and rap sessions. In doing so, they flouted authority, and German societal norms.

He notes that dissimulation has a long past, and, until the Black Power Movement, was deeply rooted among young Black GIs in the form described in this report as a continuation of a cultural tradition equally constrained by prejudice and discrimination. As part of the Black Power Movement, dissimulation helped nudge the Armed Forces into making change.

The New York Times ‘G.I.’s in Germany: Black Is Bitter.’

He goes on to say that the bureaucracy and the officers were so successfully socialized to the Apparat, that they failed to comprehend what was going on or at the very least responded with bemused tolerance.

Turks, whose numbers swelled from 2,700 in 1960 to over 700,000 in 1972, were also significant element of West Germany’s new foreign workers (Gastarbeiter; literally “guest workers”) that came primarily from the Mediterranean area. All these labourers also became a new pariah for prejudice and discrimination following World War Two. Turks were the least assimilated as they lived primarily in segregated housing units and ghettos; and German stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination meant they were the most disadvantaged in comparison to other Gastarbeiter.

“My findings, in working with a small group of Turks, show that these Muslim labourers have many characteristics concordant with the Protestant: asceticism, frugality, self-denial and self-sacrifice, and disdain for immediate gratification are pervasive features of their lives.” He continues: “Why then is there such a gulf between Turks and Germans? In spite of their genuine wish to be accepted by Germans – on their own terms – and their admiration for Germans, I found that these Turks emphasize a deliberate separation of their lives from their hosts because they are sensitive to prejudice and discrimination and, more significantly, because they are fearful that German values would vitiate and attenuate theirs.”

In other words, Turkish workers underwent a process of (cultural) dissimilation – the emphasis on distinctiveness from others when their identity is under threat. They achieved this through interacting and living exclusively among themselves, despite other alternatives; prolonged separation from their families, wives, and children; indifference toward learning German; idealization of their homeland; and a conscious effort to perpetuate their values.

Suzuki goes on to say: “Dissimilation, nevertheless, is a positive effect of their cultural heritage. They do not wish to be anything but Turks, and… assimilation, they realize, would force them to cede their cherished notions about pride, patriotism, morality, and identity to Germans and Germany…” The marked feeling of solidarity found among Turkish workers who come mainly from rural Anatolia accounts for this dissimilation.

“This feeling of solidarity rests not only on their being the most alien group among all foreign workers in Germany, owing to their religion, language, and Middle Eastern-Ottoman cultural background, which, reciprocally, estrange Turks even more from Germans, but rests also on a social reality and artifact of rural Turkish society.” Social solidarity is a basic component of that society from Ottoman and early Republican Turkey, based on the philosophy fostered by Mustafa Kemaln Atatürk (“Father of Turks”) that all Turks are indeed brothers under the skin, thanks to common ethnicity, language, heritage, and culture.

As shown, Black GIs and Turkish workers were two migrant groups in West Germany there to defend the new post-World War Two autonomous state and to help build its economy. However, they each faced a consortium of discriminatory practices, both within the institutions that served as their patrons and wider society. Black American GIs used dissimulation to survive poor treatment in their posts, which was a mixture of conforming to what was expected of an ‘ideal soldier’ or ‘blending in’ and yet utilizing their own distinct backgrounds as a form of passive resistance. The context of this was of course similar to conditions they experienced within the United States. Dissimilation was an aspect of African-American resistance against Jim Crow laws in the US too, and it is surprising that this is not included in Suzuki’s analysis.

For Turkish workers, Suzuki states that they specifically underwent a process of dissimilation, which was perhaps brought about due to the long-standing German stereotypes that existed about Turks, thus Turkish workers were one of the more badly treated group of guest workers. The act of dissimilation was achieved through interacting and living exclusively among themselves. The marked feeling of solidarity and not ceding to the idea of ‘German superiority’ is described by Suzuki to have come from Ottoman ideals and those associated with the early Turkish Republic under Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.

Sultans of Jazz II

Adama Juldeh Munu speaks to filmmaker Ümran Safter over her new feature-length documentary on the Ertegün Brothers, who left an indelible imprint on African-American music and culture. Audiences will learn how they helped to desegregate music during the Jim Crow era in the United States. This is the eleventh instalment in ‘Siyah’, which explores the relationship between African Diaspora and Turkish social and cultural narratives.

Adama Juldeh Munu: Can you explain the title of the documentary?

Ümran Safter: We opted to name the film ‘Leave The Door Open’. We chose ‘Leave The Door Open’ because of an experience Nesuhi Ertegün recalls in an interview he gave to the Washington Post. He had some friends over for a jam session at the Turkish Embassy residence. His father, the ambassador, was holding a formal event at the residence at the same time and Nesuhi feared being told off for making too much noise. The reaction he received instead was unexpected – something you will see in the film.

I also think ‘Leave The Door Open’ in a way reflects Turkey’s current open-door policy towards refugees. It is through this policy that Turkey extends a helping hand to millions of refugees and migrants. The position of the Turkish ambassador in Washington all those years ago shows that such a welcoming nature is part of a deeper-rooted cultural trait. The Turkish Embassy, by opening its doors to African-American musicians during that period, had smashed a massive race barrier by embracing the unifying power of jazz.

AJM: The story of the Ertegün brothers is well known within African-American music history. What drew you to tell their story through the documentary format?

ÜS: I read an article in an American publication a few years ago about the Ertegün brothers and was fascinated by their story. I started researching the topic in detail. It was a massive thing that the Ertegün brothers did in that period and the conditions that existed back then. It was practically unheard of that Black and white musicians could perform together to mixed audiences in the America of the 1930s and 1940s, due to the levels of racism. And the two people who took this courageous step were the two young sons of the Turkish ambassador to Washington DC. I felt a feature-length documentary detailing various aspects of this incredible story would do it justice.

AJM: The story of how their father invited Black musicians to the US Embassy was a bold move. Where did you think their determination to cross colour lines came from?

ÜS: Ambassador Mehmet Münir Ertegün was an educated diplomat who was raised in a multicultural Istanbul. His children also grew up in very multicultural settings in various parts of the world, owing to their father’s work. Racial discrimination was totally unacceptable for Ambassador Mehmet Munir Ertegün and his family. In the film, the ambassador’s daughter, Selma Ertegün Göksel, recalls an incident where white staff at the Turkish Embassy in Washington told the ambassador they would not sit at the same table with Black staff for meals and wanted segregated seating. The ambassador rejected their demand without hesitation. This incident led to Nesuhi and Ahmet being more comfortable with inviting African-American musicians to the residence.

AJM: Is the Ertegün brothers’ proximity to ‘whiteness’ explored in the film, and how important do you think it was for them to be able to navigate the music industry?

ÜS: The defining aspect of the Ertegün brothers is that they were colour blind and their total love for jazz. The way they went about setting up and running Atlantic Records was a game-changer for the recording industry because they refused to view their artists as mere commodities to be profited from.

AJM: Historically, accusations have been labelled against the music industry for cultural appropriation of Black music and culture. Did the Ertegün brothers face these accusations?

ÜS: We have people in the film speaking about how the Ertegün brothers changed the music industry as well. For instance, here is one quote from the film: “They broke ground in the recording industry by doing the same things they did with the jam sessions informally in the embassy. They got the top performers but not just on a business level… they befriended them …they showed them respect, which wasn’t always happening in the recording industry.”They did not look at these musicians as simply a commodity to be sold. They really respected them as artists and I think that was one of the reasons Atlantic Records became so powerful. It became one of the record labels that really focused on the art and really cared about doing the best that they could for the artists.

AJM: What do you think their overriding legacy is and how does the documentary convey this?

ÜS: I think the biggest legacy that Ahmet and Nesuhi leave is that they proved that prejudice of any kind has no way of succeeding in the face of the multicultural nature of music when people are willing to be courageous and stand up for what they believe in. There is no reason why we can’t make use of the universal and unifying nature of music, if two young brothers were able to defeat such entrenched prejudice back then. I also think the Ertegün brothers and their family, through their actions, strengthened both the US-Turkish cultural bond and created a deep-rooted friendship between Turkey and the African-American community.

Filmmaker Ümran Safter