Re-Thinking and Re-Writing Heimat: Turkish Women Writers in Germany

Since German unification, questions of Heimat and belonging have been discussed with renewed urgency. The definition of who is allowed to claim Germany as their home, and what its characteristics are supposed to be, has been at the center of many political, cultural, and literary debates. Examining literary texts by four Turkish women in Germany, I analyze how these writers challenge narrow and exclusive concepts of Heimat. They investigate home on the national as well as the family level, thereby pointing to the racist and sexist implications of traditional definitions. Ultimately arguing for a redefinition of Heimat that allows for cultural differences, their texts open up new possibilities of belonging. (HH)