POPULAR SOAP-OPERAS AS A TOOL OF TURKISH PROPAGANDA: RUBEN MELKONYAN IS TELLING

Professor Melkonyan noted that the members of the scientific group are mainly young Turkologists two of which have scientific degrees and are going to serve their professional knowledge to reveal the obstacles in Turkish propaganda.

Some popular Turkish soap-operas present the episodes from Ottoman history including the 16th and 19th centuries and the beginning of the 20th century. According to Ruben Melkonyan, these films are of good quality, are translated into many languages and spread in different countries changing the historical image of Turkey.

“It is important to take into account that all this is under state supervision: Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erdogan can be often seen in shooting sites and film studios participating in film making process, giving advice, even on his Twitter page he comments on every series, sometimes criticizes, sometimes praises providing additional PR”, said Ruben Melkonyan.

The scientific theme sets a task to study the Turkish historical novels from the point of view of propaganda evolution, to understand how the writers, historians, cinema critics and state officials, cooperating with one another create this propaganda direction.

“I can consider them one of the types of the “soft power” spread in Turkey, when the propaganda is made by distortion of historical cases through skillfully made films. It is shown as a country where once reigned morality, high civilization and other cultural values”, added Ruben Melkonyan.

Professor Melkonyan considers it to be rather dangerous as the films often have anti-Armenian propaganda: in the serial about Abdul Hamid the Armenian issue is focused on and it presented in distortion. During the research the influence on external and internal audience will be studied too.