Akademik Dil ve Edebiyat Dergisi

Öz

In this study, Tahir Harîmî Balcıoğlu's (1893-1951) story titled "Mayasıllı Muhtar Kabak Ali", published in 1936 and containing intense autobiographical observations about the center-periphery relationship, was analyzed. In this study, the Turkish intellectual's view of the periphery in the 1930s is discussed, based on the story mentioned. The aim of the study is to determine the autobiographical elements in the story within the framework of this issue and to show an example of a Turkish intellectual's relationship with the periphery by making use of archival documents. Both archive documents and biographical information about the author were examined in the context of the center-periphery conflict. In this review, within the framework of qualitative research methods, historical social research and document analysis methods were used eclectically together. The findings reveal that the author looks at this conflict from a very different perspective compared to other literary works that deal with the center-periphery conflict in Turkish literature. As in the literary works of the post-Republic period, in this work it is seen that the periphery has meanings beyond a mere place. In this respect, it can be said that there is a deep conflict between the center, which represents new knowledge, social change and modernity, and the periphery, which represents established order, traditional knowledge and opposition to change.