Yeni harflerin mekanları: Samsun millet mektepleri (1928-1935)
The spaces of the new letters: Samsun nation schools (1928-1935)
Yazar: AYŞENAZ SÖNMEZ
Danışman: PROF. DR. NEJAT TURGUT SANER
İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi / Lisansüstü Eğitim Enstitüsü / Mimarlık Ana Bilim Dalı / Mimarlık Tarihi Bilim Dalı
Derece: Yüksek Lisans, 2023
Konu: Mimarlık = Architecture ; İç Mimari ve Dekorasyon = Interior Design and Decoration

Özet:
Millet Mektepleri ile ilgili literatürde tarih, eğitim, edebiyat, inkılap tarihi ve iletişim disiplinlerinde yapılmış birçok çalışma bulunmaktadır. Ancak, mimarlık disiplininde yapılmış bir çalışmaya rastlanmamıştır. 
Millet Mektepleri, harf devrimiyle birlikte tüm ülkeye hızlıca yeni harfleri öğretmek amaçlı devlet tarafından planlanmış bir uygulamadır. Yalnızca hiç okuma yazma bilmeyenlere ve eski harflerle okuyup yazanlara yeni Türk harflerini öğreten dershanelerden ibaret olarak kalmamış ve sınırlarını genişletmiştir. Dershanelerde, ayrıca yurttaşlık ve günlük hayat bilgileri pekiştirilmiştir. Halk Okuma Odaları ve Köy Yatı Dershaneleri de bu örgütlenmeye dahil edilmiştir. Halk Okuma Odaları ile okuma alışkanlığının sürdürebilirliği hedeflenmiştir. Köy Yatı Dershaneleri, bilgiye erişimi ülkenin her yerinden kolaylaştırmak amacıyla köy çocukları için yatılı okul imkanı tanımıştır. 
Millet Mektepleri için ayrıca yeni binalar yapılmamış; var olan, halkın bir araya gelebileceği, ders vermeye uygun çeşitli mekanlar kullanılmıştır. Harf devriminin bir uzantısı olarak bir modernleşme aracı görevi gören Millet Mektepleri'nin mekanları, kentsel ölçekten eşya ölçeğine kadar geniş bir organizasyonu kapsamaktadır. Kentsel çevredeki tüm yazıların yeni alfabeye çevrildiği bu yıllarda; sokak, cadde ve toplu taşıma araçları gibi her mekan bir nevi okul haline geline gelmiştir. Millet Mektepleri'nde, boş bir odaya uygun mobilya ve araç gereç sağlayarak ders işlemenin ötesinde bir mekan ve işleyiş birlikteliği söz konusudur. 
Tezin amacı, Millet Mektepleri mekanlarını; Samsun örneği üzerinden inceleyerek, bu seferberliğin kentsel yaşayış içerisinde yarattığı etkiyi ve mevcut yapı stokunun nasıl dönüştürülmüş olduğunu ortaya koymaktır. Millet Mektepleri'nin resmi açılışı 1 Ocak 1929'a tarihlenmesine rağmen bu tarihten önce açılan Yeni Harf Kursları'nın aynı niteliği taşıması dolayısıyla ve ayrıca çalışmanın odağını oluşturan mekanların devamlılığının okunabilmesi açısından, resmi açılış öncesi sezon da çalışmaya dahil edilmiştir. Zaten, Başvekalet İstatistik Umum Müdürlüğü Millet Mektepleri istatistikleri de 1928 yılı itibariyle başlamaktadır. 1935'te yerini Ulus Okulları'na bırakan Millet Mektepleri, bu tez için de bu tarihle sınırlandırılmıştır.
Millet Mektepleri'nin "toplanmaya uygun her yeri" kullanabilmesi karşılıklı bir uyum sürecini beraberinde getirmektedir. Okullar, camiler, kahvehaneler, özel evler, resmi ve özel kurumlar gibi çok çeşitli yapı türlerinin Millet Mektepleri'ne dönüşmesi, yapı tipine ve mevcut durumuna bağlıdır. Fotoğraflar ve -sözlü ve yazılı- anılar, Millet Mektepleri'nin çevresi hakkında ipuçları vermektedir. Fotoğrafların çoğunda; mobilyalar, kullanıcılar, ısıtma ve aydınlatma elemanları görülebilir. Ayrıca teftiş raporlarında, eğitim kongrelerinde ve hatıralarda Millet Mektepleri mekan özellikleri anlatılmaktadır. Bu veriler arşivlerden, süreli yayınlardan, romanlardan ve akademik yayınlardan toplanmıştır. Yönetmelikler ve kılavuzlar da yol gösterici olmuştur. Genel çerçeveyi anlamak için Millet Mektepleri'nin mimari bileşenlerinin bir kataloğu hazırlanmıştır. Daha sonra genelden özele modelleme yöntemiyle aynı süreç Samsun Millet Mektepleri için daha detaylı olarak Millet Mektepleri'nin kullanılan binaları ve kentsel ilişkiler de dahil edilerek uygulanmıştır.
Çalışmada, Millet Mektepleri mekanlarının geçici dönüştürme, vardiyalı kullanım ve rehabilitasyon sonrası yeniden açılma olmak üzere üç farklı şekilde oluşturulduğu sonucuna varılmıştır. Her yolun kendine has gereksinimleri vardır ve mekan organizasyonu çağın ruhuna uygun olarak yapılmıştır. Cumhuriyet'in ilk yıllarında, yalnızca Millet Mektebi inşası değil, genel olarak okul inşası konusunda, kaynak eksikliği ve zaman kısıtlılığı engel teşkil etmiştir. Yeni bina inşasını beklemeden bir an önce eğitime başlamanın gerekliliğiyle, eldeki imkanlarla idare edilmiştir. İmkanların elverişsizliğine rağmen, yönetmeliğe uygun şekilde işleyecek ortamlar yaratılmıştır.

Abstract:
The alphabet reform, which is an extension of the nationalization and modernization policies of the republican revolution, was declared on November 1, 1928. The debates on abandoning the old alphabet, dating back to before the Republic, ended with the systematic and planned practices of the new Turkish Republic, and new letters were adopted. The practical implementation of the letter revolution was largely achieved through the establishment of the "Millet Mektepleri" [Nation Schools]. 
Nation School is a government-planned application to quickly teach the whole country new letters with the letter revolution. No new buildings were built for the Nation Schools; various existing spaces where the public could come together and which are suitable for teaching were used. Nation Schools' spaces, which act as a modernization tool as an extension of the letter revolution, cover a wide organization from urban scale to furniture scale. In these years when all the writings in the urban environment were translated into the new alphabet; every place such as streets, avenues and public transportation vehicles has become a kind of school. In Nation Schools, there is a space and function unity beyond teaching by providing suitable furniture and equipment for an empty room. 
There are many studies in the literature related to the National Schools in the disciplines of history, education, literature, history of revolution and communication. However, no study has been found in the discipline of architecture.
In choosing Samsun as a case study; the structure and teacher stock, which is remarkable both in terms of quantity and quality, the ability to adapt in spatial transformations during the exchange process that it went through just before Nation Schools, and Turkey's place in the modernization project have been effective. The population exchange between Greece and Turkey is also an exchange of buildings. The buildings left by the Greek and Armenian masters, known for their good workmanship, before the exchange, and the Sample Villages project implemented after the exchange, created a good stock for the places of the province suitable for the Nation Schools. In Nation Schools years; described as a "modern" city by two American travelers, Samsun is known to have a vibrant commercial and social life. Samsun offers important examples in terms of examining the relationship between Nation Schools and modernization.
The aim of the thesis, it is to reveal the effect of this mobilization in urban life and how the existing building stock has been transformed for Nation Schools' spaces by examining the example of Samsun. Although the official opening of the National Schools was dated January 1, 1929, the season before the official opening was also included in the study, since the New Letters Courses opened before this date have the same quality and also in order to read the continuity of the places that form the focus of the study. In fact, the Nation Schools Statistics of the Prime Ministry General Directorate of Statistics start by the year 1928. "Millet Mektepleri" [Nation Schools in arab-origin words], which left its place to "Ulus Okulları" [Nation Schools in turkified words] in 1935, was limited to this date for this thesis.
The chapters of the thesis were created in line with the space-oriented purpose of the study. Nation Schools were hosted by a wide range of building groups which are classrooms, public reading rooms and village boarding classrooms. In other words, three main types of spaces can be mentioned according to the function of Nation Schools: private teaching room, boarding school and library. With the definition of "any place suitable for gathering", the organizations of the private teaching institutions in cities and villages differ from each other. For this reason, classrooms have been handled by distinguishing between cities and villages in order to determine the spatial differences brought about by the scale difference. The distinction between cities and villages in the official statistics columns also supports this classification. This also makes it possible to establish relationships between numerical data and spatial data.
In the study, a method from general to specific was followed. After drawing a general panorama of Nation Schools spaces, examinations were made in Samsun. In order to draw a general panorama of Nation Schools spaces; a photo pool was created by scanning periodicals, anniversary books, foundation collections, second-hand booksellers, social media and websites. Especially; Halk Mecmuası, Cumhuriyet and Milliyet newspapers are periodicals rich in visual material on Nation Schools. Some images are also included in the parts of the books prepared for the anniversary of the Republic, or in the books prepared for the anniversary of the letter revolution. Collections of Suna ve İnan Kıraç, Vehbi Koç and similar foundations; they are reliable sources such as periodicals and anniversary books with photo descriptions, where the place and date of the photo are mostly known. However, the photos accessed through the second-hand booksellers, social media and websites require confirmation. In some of the photographs, the name of the Nation Schools and the shooting date of the photograph are written on the background of the students, on a plate or cloth. Such photos are automatically verified. In order to confirm the accuracy of other photos, search engines such as Yandex Visual and Google Lens were used. Thanks to image recognition technology, it has been tried to reach reliable sources that archive the same photograph and to determine the place and date information. For example; if the photograph was on the cover of a book, necessary information was obtained from the tag of that book. Photographs of the same place taken from different angles; they were analyzed and matched with criteria such as space features that are the continuation of each other or their ownership to the same human community. In the created photo pool, photos are labeled and cataloged with the criteria of indoor and outdoor items, furniture, user profile statuses.
Inspection reports and education congress proceedings provide detailed data in order to examine the implementation examples of Nation Schools. In 1929-1930, Nation Schools' classrooms and education inspections in which the people's reading rooms were entitled, together with the negotiations in the Turkish Education Congress (July 15, 1930); are the primary sources for exchanging ideas by revealing the status of the Nation Schools' spaces. In the Primary Education Inspectors' Congress (1929-1930-1931), which was organized specifically for the İzmir region, important issues about Nation Schools and people's reading rooms were criticized and strategies were developed.
By combining the photographic catalog and the written descriptions of the spaces (inspection reports, congress proceedings and memoirs), it was tried to shed light on the Nation Schools' spaces that were transformed within the framework of the rules in the instructions. After this analysis made throughout the country, the subject of Samsun has been passed on. In order to find the answer to the question in which places the National School was opened in Samsun, the locations in the newspaper advertisements, the activity reports of the community center, the addresses in the Nation Schools certificates and the memories of the local people and travelers were consulted. By making a list of detectable structures; site plans, architectural technical drawings, sketches, space photographs and descriptions of the Nation Schools years were searched one by one. By scanning the Salt Archive, Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye Directorate of State Archives; the relationship of some structures with the environment in various plans was understood. 
It has been observed that the evaluation process of existing old spaces for teaching new letters takes place in cities and villages in quite different possibilities and forms. There is a clear distinction between city and village and this is reflected in Nation Schools' spaces. On the other hand, many pro-peasantry movements, which tried to alleviate this distinction, were also active in these years.
Nation Schools, like other extensions of modernization, was initiated by the state. During the implementation of the Nation Schools, various actors were integrated. The process of adopting the revolutions still continues within the state itself. It has been witnessed that some people who are in a position to take important decisions still maintain their traditional approach, especially in the countryside. Inspectors and teachers, who are civil servants, took the floor as more modern thinking individuals in the state, as well as observing and directing the public. The small-scale actions of some citizens, such as peasants, philanthropists and clergy, who took an active part in the Nation Schools mobilization, had valuable effects on the whole structure. These include the fact that most village schools were built with the help and efforts of the villagers, and some benefactors' direct and indirect financial aid related to cultural affairs. Also, most muftis and imams learned the new script early and became Nation Schools teachers.
In the transformation of a place into Nation Schools, while the function of the place does not change in places whose primary function is education, it changes in those who have a function other than education. Also, some social functions are integrated for public motivation. The transformed space should basically provide basic needs such as lighting, heating and cleaning. These facilities, which are mostly dependent on financial conditions, meet the motivation of the people to a certain extent. The organization of entertainments such as shows and concerts demonstrates that the human psychology of the Nation Schools space is also considered.
At the end of the study, it was determined that Nation Schools' spaces were created in three different ways: temporary conversion, usage in shifts and reopening after rehabilitation. Each way has its own requirements and the spatial organisation was done accordingly with the spirit of the era. In the early years of the Republic, the lack of resources and time constraints were obstacles not only to Nation Schools building but also to school building in general. With the necessity of starting education as soon as possible without waiting for the construction of the new building, it was managed with the resources at hand. Despite the inconvenience of the facilities, environments have been created to operate in accordance with the regulation.