Infrastructure in the Making: The Ottoman Railway Company as Portrayed by the Smyrna Mail

Research output: Chapter in book/report/conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

Abstract

The Smyrna Mail, Izmir's weekly, English-language newspaper was published between 23 September 1862 and 21 May 1864. Despite its short run, the Smyrna Mail covered the frenzied years of railway construction in Izmir, a major modernisation endeavour that reshaped this important port city of the eastern Mediterranean. The Smyrna Mail provides an intimate, albeit biased and British-focused, look at the railway enterprise. Its articles often offer glimpses into the immediate effects of this massive infrastructural project on the ordinary lives of the people involved in its making, especially illuminating the social practices of the British who had moved their abodes to the Ottoman Empire due to their involvement in the railway. At the same time, the coverage of the Smyrna Mail reveals the crystallizing Ottoman agencies vis-à-vis the railway. These two parallel processes, as revealed through the pages of the Smyrna Mail, expand our knowledge of life that was transpiring around the building of the railway while exposing the dynamic power balances at play.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationThe Built Environment through the Prism of the Colonial Periodical Press
EditorsAlice Santiago Faria, Anne Shelley, Sandra Ataíde Lobo
Place of PublicationNew York; Oxon
PublisherRoutledge
Chapter3
Pages56-76
Number of pages21
Edition1st
ISBN (Electronic)9781003333180
ISBN (Print)9781032356709, 9781032366722
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 29 Dec 2022

Publication series

NameRoutledge Studies in Cultural History

Scopus Subject Areas

  • Arts and Humanities(all)

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