TOPOGRAPHY AS A PERFORMATIVE ENTITY: TRANSFORMATION OF KARAKUSUNLAR, ANKARA

Date

2024-9-04

Author

Özkan Öztürk, Huriye Nur

Metadata

Show full item record

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Item Usage Stats

64
views

368
downloads

Cite This

This study is focused on topography and its changing role in determining urban environments. An increasing ignorance towards topography in urbanization practices has recently been observed in the Turkish context, and this trend can also be seen in Ankara’s urbanization process. The current state of the city, in terms of its built environment, represents a disconnection from its original topography and the related waterscape. In this context, the primary objective of this study is to investigate the urbanization process within the framework of physical and cultural aspects of topography as a performative entity. Topography's capacity to define a place and its transformation is examined through the selected area of Karakusunlar (Ankara) and its surroundings. The research on the Karakusunlar area, which represents the distinctive landform character of Ankara, analyzes and discusses the district's geographical, spatial, and cultural transformation and urbanization from the 1930s onwards. It is crucial to investigate the history of the site and related experiences to comprehend topography's physical and cultural transformation. In this respect, the traces left in topography and memory are significant layers regarding how topography was used during different periods. The overall approach and methodology are informed by the digital modeling studies of the land in different time frames, the field study that subjects oral history of the site, mind mapping the field study regarding toponyms and places, the further mapping process, and the transformation of topography as a performative entity. In this context, the investigation of Karakusunlar is based on findings from literature, historical maps, aerial images, prepared digital models, the field study that includes semi-structured in-depth interviews, and the toponyms gathered from the archival material and the interviews. The interviews of the field study are conducted in Spring 2023 and 2024, with individuals who have lived in the area between the 1950s and 1990s, and the mind maps are produced by the author. While the comprehensive digital modeling work orients the discussion on the physical topography, the field study focuses on the place-related aspects of landform elements, waterscape, and toponyms, as well as the interventions made to these elements, the transformation of topography in the Karakusunlar area.

Subject Keywords

Topography, Historical Geography, Toponymy, Karakusunlar, Ankara

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/111514

Collections

Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences, Thesis