Recitation of Poetry by a Leader as a Means to Combine History with Politics and Ideology: Erdoğan and the Promotion of the akp’s Policy Formula

Language constitutes a powerful tool for the transmission of information and of ideology and power alike. Should this succeed, groups of people acquire an ‘identity’ and feel different from the ‘others’. Thus, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan uses poetry as a means to connect the past with the present and the future and also to promote his personal world view and that of the Justice and Development Party (akp). This method has been criticized, but seems to serve him well in terms of communicational needs. However, it is premature to evaluate the potential outcome of the new mixture between Turkishness and Islam that both the akp and Erdoğan himself promote.