Music That Makes Turkish Voters Vote: The Idea of National Unity in the Justice and Development Party’s Election Songs

Fazila Derya Agis, University of the People

In this study, the songs of the Justice and Development Party of the current president of Turkey who is Recep Tayyip Erdogan will be investigated and regarded as data that convince Turkish voters to vote. These data can be downloaded from YouTube that can be regarded as a database. These songs appeared from 2011 through 2019 in Turkey. The concept of national unity was emphasized in all of them via different words. These words will be analyzed from a sociological linguistic point of view; for instance, the concepts of “we,” “Old Turkey,” “New Turkey,” “togetherness,” “country,” “service,” “nation,” “Anatolia,” “government,” “world,” “future,” and “time” will be analyzed together with the metaphors related to them. The genres of these songs and the images used in their video-clips will also be investigated on how they attract Turkish people from a cognitive semiotic point of view. Therefore, the societal metaphors in the songs prepared for the following elections in Turkey will be discussed: 2011: General Elections; 2014: Local Elections; 2014: Presidency Elections; 2015: General Elections; 2017: Referendum about the Presidency Government System; 2018: President Elections, and 2019: Mayor Elections. This study suggests that political songs form perfect data showing which concepts influence the Turkish society.

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 Presented in Session 19. Culture & the Politics of Nationhood