Turks and Tatars in Romania in the Bilingual Edition of the 𝐷𝑜𝑏𝑟𝑢𝑗𝑎 / 𝐷𝑜𝑏𝑟𝑜𝑔𝑒𝑎 Newspaper
Turks and Tatars in Romania in the Bilingual Edition of the 𝐷𝑜𝑏𝑟𝑢𝑗𝑎 / 𝐷𝑜𝑏𝑟𝑜𝑔𝑒𝑎 Newspaper

Summary/Abstract: This article analyzes the content of the bilingual edition of the Dobruja newspaper, which was published between 1919 and 1924 in Bazargic (present-day Dobrich). Until 1921, it was published in Romanian and Ottoman Turkish, and later only in the latter. Dobruja is important because it was the first bilingual newspaper of the Muslim community in interwar Romania that existed for a long time. Also, the main authors of the articles published in this newspaper were important figures of the community, such as Halil Fehim (the mufti of Caliacra County), Mehmet Niyazi (the national poet of the Tatars and a Turkish language teacher at the Muslim Seminary in Medgidia), and Ibrahim Themo who had an Albanian background and was an important leader of the Young Turks. After presenting the context in which the Dobruja newspaper came out, the article analyzes the content of bilingual editions from three perspectives: the demands that the Turks and Tatars made before the Romanian authorities, the organization of the community, and international developments. The author points out that the main idea encountered in the articles published in the newspaper is that the Turkish and Tatar minority was a safe one for the Romanian state because it had no territorial claims. This message was important, given that Southern Dobruja had an ethnic composition in which the Romanian ethnicity was a minority, and that the territory was claimed by Bulgaria. Thus, the reiteration of this by the elites of the Turks and Tatars was necessary for the attempts to obtain the satisfaction of some demands and support in the initiatives to improve the situation of the community. The Dobruja newspaper was the means by which this message was conveyed.

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