Identity constructions in Halit Ziya Uşakligil's autobiographical narratives

This thesis focuses on the problematics of identity construction shaped in the context of ideology, subject and power relations in Halit Ziya Uşaklıgil's autobiographical narratives. Autobiographical narratives are not only narratives that convey individual life stories; on the contrary, they offer a discursive space of identity construction intertwined with historical, cultural and ideological contexts. This study explores autobiographical texts as a discursive field of identity production by revealing the constitutive dynamics behind the individual narratives. The main reason for selecting Kırk Yıl and Saray ve Ötesi in this thesis is that these texts reflect both individual memory and the political, cultural and the ideological transformation of the period in a multilayered way. In addition, these texts provide a suitable ground for analyzing how individual identity intersects with historical events and how the narrator constructs himself through discourse. The study aims to examine which discursive strategies are employed in the construction of individual memory through narrative how this construction is intertwined with power realtions and how representations of otherness are shaped in this process. Based on this statement, the main objective of the thesis is to how that the genre of autobiography not only narrates personal experience but also functions as a discursive field that constructs identity in historical and ideological contexts to analyze the manifestations of the self in narrative through Michel Foucault's analyses questioning power and subject relations and New Historicism approach. The thesis consists of three main chapters. In the first chapter, the themes of ideology, identity and memory on the autobiographical narratives are presented following four subheadings. In the second chapter, the autobiographical narratives Kırk Yıl and Saray ve Ötesi are analyzed in terms of discourse and ideology following four subheadings. In the third chapter, the relevant texts are discussed under two subheadings in the context of otherness constructs. Thus, the identity constructions in Halit Ziya's works are rendered visible in a multidimensional manner in line with the concepts of power, ideology, the process of subjectivation and otherness. Moreover, it has been attempted to reveal that autobiographical narratives are texts bearing traces of fiction due to the selective nature of memory, the author's identity formation process and the influence of literary elements. Keywords: Halit Ziya Uşaklıgil, Autobiographical Narratives, Identity, Memory, Power and Subject Relations.