Rediscovering Turkish Jewish heritage: The Club as a teaching moment in Turkey

Abstract

ABSTRACT Turkish Jewish culture is largely unknown within Turkey due to various reasons, including demographic and historical factors. Negative stereotypes about Jews in Turkish film and television have further contributed to this lack of understanding. The ground-breaking television series, The Club, produced for Netflix, showcases Turkish Jews as its main characters and highlights their Sephardic heritage. We believe that media plays an important role in educating the public and shaping perceptions. To explore this, we conducted thirty in-depth, semi-structured interviews using the snowball method to investigate the impact of the series on the audience’s knowledge of Turkish Jews. Our findings suggest that The Club has helped raise awareness about Turkish Jews, Sephardic culture, and Judaism among the research sample, as it presents a non-stereotypical portrayal of its Jewish characters.