Tu？ccarzade I？brahim Hilmi C？？g？？rac？an as a Cultural Agent Of Change and his Discourse on Translation in his Publications between 1896-1963

Tüccarzade I？brahim Hilmi C？？g？？rac？an, starting his career in the transition period from the late Ottoman Empire to the early Republican period, became one of the first Turkish publishers of the Bab？a？li, the center of the press in the relevant period. In accordance with his self-expressive surname C？？g？？rac？an (meaning ground-breaking), I？brahim Hilmi published more than one thousand works in his publication house. Rather than being an ordinary publisher of the period, I？brahim Hilmi proved to be an active agent, as an editor, author and publisher. In this vein, I？brahim Hilmi, in the quest of pioneering the society and enhancing the cultural repertoire (Even-Zohar, 2002) provides resourceful insights on the act of translation that he either wrote or published. In this study, the analysis of the discourse of I？brahim Hilmi – who will be briefly introduced in differ- ent perspectives- on the ‘language’ and ‘translation’ along with translational concepts and practices will be analyzed on the basis of para-texts (Genette, 1997) such as prefaces, book covers and reviews. The scope of the study will dwell upon not only authorial works of I？brahim Hilmi but also translated publications of his publication house. Shaping his discourse on translation with a functionalist point of view, I？brahim Hilmi determined the social benefit as the main criteria of the evaluation of the works. As an influential agent of change (Toury, 2002) he introduced a number of prominent foreign authors to the Turkish cultural life, in- creased the visibility of the translator in his prefaces, and shaped the reception of the works by the target readership. Providing newness to the literary repertoire, I？brahim Hilmi also pioneered the field of religious publications with the first Turkish Qur’an translations of the period. In the same vein, his publication of the Qur’an in the Latin alphabet exemplifies his radical and courageous attempts as a publisher. Starting his career with a particular focus on military education and relevant publications, I？brahim Hilmi broadened the scope of his educational publications in time and published numerous works on the issues that he determined as gaps in the field. All of these points provide a portrait of an influential figure with respect to his publications in general and his translational discourse in particular, and projects I？brahim Hilmi as an important agent, constituting a considerable translational discourse