Modernization Through Leisure and Sports: The Case of Sümerbank Industrial Campuses in Turkey

Abstract

The Turkish Republican Regime exploited leisure and sports activities in terms of shaping the community in line with the modernization project of the newborn state in the early republican period of Turkey (1923-1945) wherein leisure and sports activities were organized to normalize secular life and to disconnect people from the traditional ways of life. Sumerbank industrial campuses were established as state institutions in various towns in the 1930s. They were mobilized in line with the state policy by providing sports and recreational grounds in the campuses. This article is an exploration of the role of leisure and sports in the modernization process of early Republican Turkey in the Sumerbank industrial campuses. The research is based on academic literature on leisure and sports and the social-spatial analysis of campuses so as to shed light on the role of leisure and sports activities on industrial campuses to shift the community from traditional, rural, and agricultural to contemporary, secular, urban, and industrial.