Palmira Johnson Brummett Boeken

Through the lens of 100 cartoons, this work explores the clash between tradition and modernity during the Ottoman Constitutional Revolution of 1908. It focuses on the satirical press in Istanbul, revealing the political, economic, and cultural transformations of the time. By examining Ottoman-European relations and the artistic dialogue between East and West, the author highlights how cartoonists blended diverse literary and artistic influences. This cultural history offers fresh insights into the broader implications of modernity and the rhetorical power of imagery in shaping perceptions of the Middle East.

This work reframes sixteenth-century history , incorporating the Ottoman empire more thoroughly into European, Asian and world history. It analyzes the Ottoman Empire's expansion eastward in the contexts of claims to universal sovereignty, Levantine power politics, and the struggle for control of the oriental trade. Challenging the notion that the sixteenth-century Ottoman Empire was merely a reactive economic entity driven by the impulse to territorial conquest, Brummett portrays it as inheritor of Euro-Asian trading networks and participant in the contest for commercial hegemony from Genoa and Venice to the Indian Ocean. Brummett shows that the development of seapower was crucial to this endeavor, enabling the Ottomans to subordinate both Venice and the Mamluk kingdom to dependency relationships and providing the Ottoman ruling class access to commercial investment and wealth.