History
Institute of Turkish World Studies was founded on 11th July 1992 within the body of Ege University in order to analyze historical developments, languages and literary works, socio-economic situation of Turkish World, to study and publish on these fields, to carry out postgraduate programs, to submit proposals for the wellbeing of Turkey around the world and utilizing moral and material capacity of Turkish World in a correct way, to open language courses in order to popularize Turkey Turkish within Turkish World and to contribute a common writing language in Turkish World.
Since the foundation day, ITWS (TDAE) has carried out postgraduate programs and researches on “Turkish Language and Dialects”, “Literatures of Turkish World”, “Turkish Folklore”, “Turkish History” and “Turkish Art”. In 2001 a new department named “Social, Political and Economic Relations in Turkish World” was opened and since then postgraduate education and researches on this specific field has also continued.
“Turkish Education Center” in our institute has performed “Turkey Turkish” courses since 1992. During the courses thousands of students from Turkish Republics and Relative Societies and all over the world received Turkish speaking and writing lectures. Beside Turkey Turkish. Since 2002 Chinese courses and since 2005 Russian courses has also opened in our institute. Our international students coming for language education engage also in activities like “Turkish Folk Music Choir” and “Turkish Folk Dances Group” in order to learn and utilize actively Turkish language and Turkish culture.
Our institute organizes conferences and panel discussions/public lectures on themes as of history, languages, literatures, culture, political and social issues of the Turkish World. Besides our institute organizes “The Culture Congress of Turkish World” every 4 years and the papers, presented at the congress, are published as well. Our institute publishes the international refereed journal of “Journal of Turkish World Studies (TDİD)”. On the departments of our institute are conducted with the support of DPT, TÜBİTAK and UNESCO many international and highly qualified research projects as “Designation of Epics in the Turkish World, Theirs translation in Turkish and publishing”, “Research in Old Gravestones in Azerbaijan in Light of Turkish Culture, Art, History and Folklore”, “The Role of the Polish Troops in the Caucasian-Russian War (1830-1859)”, “The Method Experiment to Determinate Historical Periods of Living Dialects in Turkish Language: The Example of the West Rumelian Turkish in 17.th Century”, “Research in the Alewi Societies of the Çubuk Area”, “Evaluation about the Alewi Societies of the Diyarbakır Region”, “City and Traveller: İzmir and its Surrounding As Witnessed by Evliya Çelebi”.
Our institute offers information and consultancy services on the Turkish Republics and relative societies, especially about the topics, needed by business and cultural environments in İzmir.
Our institute cooperates in academic and scientific areas related to the Turkish world with international institutions. We could mention institutions as: Turkish Council (Kenesh), Turkish Academy, The Academy of Sciences in Baku, The Muhtar Avezov Institute of Literature and Arts of the Kazakh Academy of Sciences in Almaty, The Research Institute of Manas at the Kirghiz Academy of Çingiz Aytmatov in Bishkek, The Alishir Nevai Institute of Litarature and Language of the Uzbek Academy of Sciences in Tashkent, The Turkmen Azadi University of Foreign Languages in Ashkabat, The Russian Academy of Sciences, The Institute of Research in Turcology in Moscow, The Institute of Turkish Studies in Paris.
