A Historical Note from Millet Gazette: The Modernization and Liberation Manifesto of Selma Rıza, A Pioneer Woman of the Second Constitutional Era

Abstract

This research examines a historical interview conducted in Paris with Selma Rıza, the sole female member of the Committee of Union and Progress during the proclamation of the Second Constitutional Era. The interview, published by Tevfik Nadir in Millet Gazette on September 10, 1908, titled "Madame Selma Rıza," illuminates the period's women's movement, modernization, and educational perspectives. The study aims to analyze the women's rights discourse and modernization vision of the Second Constitutional Era by bringing to light a forgotten text from the Ottoman press. In this context, the study thoroughly examines Selma Rıza's intellectual world, women's changing positions in the public sphere, and their demands for rights within the freedom environment provided by the Second Constitutional Era. Methodologically, the study involves transcription of the interview and its translation into contemporary Turkish. Additionally, a detailed Ottoman-Turkish dictionary has been prepared, contributing to our understanding of the period's terminology, conceptual framework, and intellectual structure. This lexicographical work encompasses both journalistic language and concepts used in intellectual circles of the era. The significance of this research emerges in several key aspects. First, the study not only presents Selma Rıza's biographical narrative but also reveals how Ottoman women were positioned in terms of freedom, education, legal rights, and social equality during this period. Second, Selma Rıza's views on women's educational rights, the issue of polygamy, divorce rights, women's social identity acquisition, and their roles in the modernization process, as expressed in the interview, represent a pioneering text of the Ottoman women's movement. Furthermore, when evaluated alongside the works of her contemporary women's rights advocates, Fatma Aliye and Halide Edip, the study offers a unique perspective for understanding the feminist thought of the period, reflecting the transformation in women's intellectual world from the Tanzimat to the Constitutional Era.