The spring seminars on teaching Turkish as a foreign language were organized by the Marmara University Institute of Turkic Studies between 5th and 9th April 2021, within the framework of “The Year of Yunus Emre and Turkish Language”.
On the first night of the spring seminars, Marmara University Institute of Turkic Studies hosted Prof. Dr. Şeref Ateş in the seminar titled “Turkish: World Language”, which was moderated by Prof. Dr. Okan Yeşilot. In addition to the Turkish language and Turkish culture activities of Yunus Emre Institute, the relationship between teaching Turkish as a foreign language and cultural diplomacy was discussed in the program.
In the seminar titled "Teaching Turkish as a Foreign Language and Turkish Thought", which was moderated by Lect. Dr. Aslı Fişekcioğlu and held on the second night of the spring seminars, Prof. Dr. Levent Bayraktar talked about the relationship between language and thought. He emphasized that Turkish is a language of science, art and thought, considering that teaching Turkish as a foreign language expands its cultural boundaries beyond geographical boundaries.
Prof. Dr. Nezir Temur was hosted to discuss the subject of "Teaching Turkish as a Foreign Language and Turkish Culture" in the seminar that was held on the third night of the spring seminars, on April 7, 2021, and moderated by Dr. Mehdi Genceli. Temur emphasized the relationship between language and culture, the importance of cultural transfer in the process of teaching Turkish as a foreign language, and the criteria through which this transfer should be made.
On the fourth night of the spring seminars held on 8 April 2021, it was organized a seminar on "Teaching Turkish as a Foreign Language and Language Museums", moderated by Prof. Dr. Özlem Deniz Yılmaz and in which Prof. Dr. Ahmet Akkaya attended as a speaker. In that seminar, the examples of language museums around the world and ideas about how to use these examples in teaching Turkish as a mother tongue and as a foreign language were discussed.
Finally, a seminar on “Teaching Turkish as a Foreign Language and New Criteria” was held on 9th April 2021, and in which Lect. Dr. Aslı Fişekcioğlu took place as a moderator and Assoc. Prof. Celile Ökten attended as a guest. After introducing the concepts introduced by the European Common Recommendations Framework for Languages to the field of teaching Turkish as a foreign language, the new criteria published in 2018 and 2020, which have not yet been translated into Turkish, were introduced and evaluated for the benefit of scientists working in the field.
