The production and represention of gender in the Turkish novel after 2000 through literary discourse

This study aims to draw attention to the possibilities that literature creates in the construction and representation of femininity and masculinity, transcending or clarifying sexist boundaries, and reproducing gender roles. In this respect, the establishment and consolidation of gender identity constructs, which constitute a specific and multifaceted agenda in the novels of the 2000s, are to be critically read. It is seen that the representations of the relevant identities, built on a political, social, and cultural ground, in novels published in 2000 and later, are sometimes explicitly engaged through literature, and sometimes classified with an "implicit" ideological engagement. Throughout the study, on the one hand, the relationship between literature and gender was discussed mostly through the fiction of femininity and masculinity, on the other hand, these gender-oriented identity constructs were approached from a historical perspective and the constructions of femininity and masculinity were tried to be analyzed. While the novel of the 2000s is scrutinized with a holistic view, the novels classified under the titles of "resistance", "anxiety" and "crisis" and described in this manner were subjected to a critical reading. Under the title of resistance, the focus is on narratives that open women's "subjectification" practices to the discussion by making the mechanisms of oppression on women visible. While it is observed that alternative masculinities positioned against hegemonic masculinity constructs are brought up for discussion under the title of anxiety, the narratives that fortify them by reproducing sexist boundaries are opened to question under the title of crisis. The starting point of the study will be the founding core of literature – especially novels – in gender fiction. The study tries to present not only gender identity constructs that have become increasingly "politicized" and visible with the 2000s but also the basic arguments in the construction of the representations of femininity and masculinity in the focus of the novels of those years. As a result of the analysis, it is found out that the literature has been used as a very suitable "device" and has been instrumentalized in consolidating, producing, and reproducing the gender identity constructs. Keywords: Gender and Literature, Femininity and Masculinity Fictions, Resistance, Worry, Crisis