Armeno-Turkish Writing and the Question of Hybridity

Abstract

This chapter examines the practice of writing linguistically Turkish texts in the Armenian script in order to excavate different registers of cross-cultural hybridity, long overlooked by nationalist views of Ottoman literary production. Thereby, this chapter offers an analysis of primary sources from different genres to illuminate the diversity of the Armeno-Turkish corpus and its multiple entanglements with other languages and cultures, as well as to demonstrate what kind of cross-cultural negotiations might have played a role in creating them. Finally, it locates the phenomenon of writing in the alphabet of the “Other” within a broader Mediterranean context to shed light on analogous digraphic practices.