Galatasaray Imagines Istanbul: Urban Memory and Transregional Meaning in the 1947 Commemorative Journal

Authors : Gökay Kanmazalp

Pages : 51-74

Doi:10.53979/yillik.1691425

View : 445 | Download : 479

Publication Date : 2025-12-30

Article Type : Research Paper

Abstract :This article investigates how multiple and sometimes competing urban imaginaries of Istanbul were articulated in the May 1947 commemorative issue of Galatasaray Journal, a special publication marking the 494th anniversary of the city’s conquest. Drawing on Stuart Hall’s theory of representation and a transregional historiographical framework, the study analyzes six essays by Galatasaray-affiliated contributors—Turkish, French, and Swiss—to explore how Istanbul’s symbolic meaning was constructed through memory, emotion, and cultural brokerage. These essays range from nostalgic laments over lost moral order (Talu) and spiritual longing (Gökyay), to poetic spectacles (Dubois), imperial cartographies (Mamboury), trans-Mediterranean comparisons (Larroumets), and cosmopolitan Ottoman syntheses (Bayhan). The article argues that Galatasaray High School operated as a portal of globalization, where divergent positionalities shaped hybrid urban narratives. Through close textual analysis, the article offers a discourse-analytical microhistory of institutional commemoration, revealing how Istanbul’s urban identity was reimagined through competing lenses of national memory, imperial legacy, and global entanglement. Rather than portraying Istanbul as a fixed heritage object, the study positions it as a palimpsestic city of layered imaginaries negotiated within Galatasaray’s transregional milieu.
Keywords : Galatasaray Lisesi, Kentsel Tahayyüller, İstanbul Hafızası, Transbölgesel Tarih

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