Director of Communications Fahrettin Altun gave the opening speech at the “Workshop on Communication and Translation” “under the theme “Building a Unified Discourse and Common Language'' which was organised by the Directorate of Communications, and said, “Our main goal, above all, is to strengthen the Türkiye brand. Through the initiatives we undertake, we are trying to unveil our country's existing potential and capacity, as well as to communicate Türkiye's strength and capacity to the entire world in the most accurate and trustworthy manner possible, utilizing the best instruments.”
In his speech, Altun expressed his hope that the workshop would yield auspicious results for translation studies and the academic community, as well as positively contribute to Türkiye’s cultural life, and highlighted that translation studies are one of the most significant guarantees of the cultural enrichment.
In a post he shared on his social media account, Directorate of Communications Altun said “A unified discourse in translation and terminology studies will make significant contributions to strengthening our Türkiye brand and government studies”.
Altun remarked that translation is a crucial, dynamic communication initiative that involves mutual interaction in a global setting, and promotes intercultural negotiations and intellectual growth, and he went on to say that they are not only concerned with mass communication and new media tools that are debated for their destructive effects, but also with communication initiatives that stand out for their positive features and have a global building capacity.
Altun stated that they are deeply involved in the aspect of communication that enhances cultural environments, and they work hard to bring this issue to the attention of people, adding that they have taken several actions in this regard.
Barrier-free Access and Communication
Altun stressed that “Barrier-Free Access and Communication” book is an example of the attention they pay to various segments of the society’s communication and added that with this book, they intended to establish a framework to facilitate the communication of the both visually and hearing impaired individuals with the participation of the Hacettepe University.
Integrated Communication Strategy
Altun indicated that they believed the workshop would positively contribute to Türkiye as well as the cultural and intellectual communities of Türkiye, as required by the integrated communication strategy, and said, “We adopt an integrated communication strategy approach in initiatives we undertake as the Directorate of Communications. We are trying to adopt this integrated communication strategy in our activities in the field of public diplomacy, public relations and the press."
"One of our goals is to build a unified discourse for our state in the tasks we undertake"
Stating that they carried out these communication-related activities in collaboration with the government institutions and organizations, the private sector, non-governmental organizations, and universities, Altun said,
"Our main goal, above all, is to strengthen the Türkiye brand. Through the initiatives we undertake, we are trying to unveil our country's existing potential and capacity, as well as to communicate Türkiye's strength and capacity to the entire world in the most accurate and trustworthy manner possible, utilizing the best instruments. One of our goals is to build a unified discourse for our state in the tasks we undertake. Additionally, as part of our effort to strengthen the Türkiye brand and build a unified discourse for our state, we are defining and coordinating organizational and public communication standards, as well as collaborating with relevant government institutions and organizations in this field. From this perspective, we value unified discourse and common language in translation, and we believe that this workshop led by our Translation Department is critical."
The use of the phrase “Türkiye” on all international platforms
Noting that they had another important project called "Term Bank for Public Institutions in Türkiye", Altun said that they started out the project with seven thousand terms in collaboration with the representatives of different government institutions and organizations, and they increased that number to approximately ten thousand terms.
Stating that they made a significant effort to bring basic terms in 11 sub-categories, including public diplomacy, law, political science, economics, and sociology, into a unified perspective and conceptual framework, Altun congratulated those who contributed to the project.
Altun stated that there was another initiative that they deemed crucial in terms of Türkiye's public diplomacy, and they were taking steps for a while to ensure that the international platforms refer to our country as Türkiye, recalling that the phrase would be used in the communications undertaken by Türkiye’s organisations and institutions with other states and international institutions in accordance with the circular signed by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Altun asked academics, non-governmental organisations, public officials, members of the media, and strategic think tanks to use the phrase "Türkiye" in their texts and correspondence on all international platforms. Altun emphasised that doing so would ensure that Türkiye's name was appropriately pronounced on all international platforms. Altun highlighted the importance of the issue in terms of further strengthening the Türkiye brand and unified discourse, indicating that another project they carried out to further strengthen the Türkiye brand was the Turkish training they provided to international media members in Türkiye in collaboration with the Yunus Emre Institute.
Altun stated that through this nine-month training, they ensured that the members of the international media operating in Türkiye learned Turkish. He also stressed the importance of enabling press members to cover Türkiye in Turkish so that they can accurately reflect Türkiye to the rest of the world by building cultural affinity.
Altun informed that they presented certificates to members of the international press who successfully completed this training at the Istanbul Regional Directorate, emphasising the extremely positive interaction there.
Altun stated that they hoped to raise awareness about translation in communication and other disciplines of diplomacy through the workshop, as well as to develop solution proposals by identifying problems in translation experienced in public institutions, and that they would make an effort to make the issues highlighted here into policies.
Altun stated that Türkiye is a regional actor capable of thwarting plots against itself in its region, and made the following remarks:
“In this sense, Türkiye is not only a game changer, but also a country that brings order, stability, and contributes to regional peace. In this regard, under the leadership of our President, our country is also a party to global issues as well as a voice of global conscience. We believe that one of the most important capitals is our regional and global self-assurance. I believe that our country will grow much stronger and thrive much more when our regional and global self-assurance is matched by considerably greater cultural reciprocation. We are all aware that in the current international arena, translation cannot be a unilateral activity. It cannot be a process that only brings Western texts to Türkiye and the Turkish cultural world. If we value our cultural richness and diversity, translation should be a multilateral effort, as well as one of the key communication instruments that facilitates intercultural interaction. In this sense, we see translation as an activity that should take place not just between two languages, but across a range of them. In this regard, we believe it contributes significantly to the enhancement of our cultural life. Translations from foreign languages into Turkish are extremely important, as are translations of outstanding works from our cultural world, particularly basic texts in Turkish, into a variety of languages. It's essential to enhance current efforts while also establishing and extending educational activities."
Altun emphasised the importance of communicating Türkiye's cultural richness to the rest of the world, noting that the Directorate of Communications is working on this through public diplomacy and strategic communication tools.
Altun also underlined the significance of the act of translation, saying, "Language is the most important element of translation. One of the most essential roles of people in this country's cultural community is to protect, keep alive, and strengthen our language."
Altun stressed that, as in the past, efforts should be made to safeguard the Turkish language by keeping it free of ideologically motivated social engineering projects and by establishing a solid defence against foreign language invasion. Altun expressed gratitude to the attendees, noting that the workshop was a great achievement in terms of consolidating Türkiye's cultural diversity and advancing the area of translation studies as well as communications initiatives.
Please click here for the Presidential Circular on the Use of “Türkiye” as a Brand”.
