Expert: Turkey's educational system too nationalistic

PanARMENIAN.Net - Turkey's educational system is too nationalistic and does not breed pluralism in society, according to a sociology professor who is involved in a groundbreaking educational project with teachers to develop educational methods to eliminate discrimination.

As Today’s Zaman reported, professor Kenan Çayır said they develop educational courses for primary and high school teachers who often feel uneasy talking about the sensitive topic of discrimination in their classrooms because they lack materials to refer to.

Funded by the Open Society Foundation, Turkey, Global Dialogue and İstanbul Bilgi University, Çayır heads the project to help teachers in that regard and develops texts for classrooms on the topic of discrimination and hate speech.

“Students have the topic of stereotypes in their social science textbooks. They are being educated against such stereotypes as “gypsies are thieves,” “blondes are stupid” and “women are sentimental.” In order to be against discrimination, students and teachers need to be educated about stereotypes. For example, having the stereotypical belief that “women are sentimental,” which may be partly true for anybody, leads to discriminatory practices while employing women. The same goes for stereotypical beliefs with regard to Kurds, Armenians, Alevis, Muslims and so on, who are subject to stereotypes that lead to discriminatory practices against them. I first gave the example of discrimination against women because it is a really big problem,” Çayır said.