Muslim Ottoman feminists’ perceptions of their non-Muslim counterparts after Meşrutiyet

This article shows how Muslim and Muslim-Turkish Ottoman feminists interacted with women from other backgrounds and how they perceived both themselves and their non-Muslim counterparts who had similarly taken the initiative of using new platforms to make their voices heard. Several Ottoman Turkish periodicals for women published after Meşrutiyet were reviewed as primary sources for this work. Although feminists conducted their struggles within their own ethnic and religious communities during the Ottoman modernization period, they were nevertheless aware of and influenced by one another. Reflecting an enthusiasm for women’s liberation and the complex forces at work in their interactions, the voices that are conveyed here are mainly those of Ottoman Muslim feminists in their writings before the nationalization of the women’s movement.