The House of Sciences: The First Modern University in the Muslim World

Following a string of military defeats at the end of the eighteenth century, Ottoman leaders realized that their classical traditions and institutions could not compete with Russia and the European states' technological and economic superiority.One of a series of nineteenth-century reform initiatives was the creation of a European-style university called darülfünun. From the Arabic words dar, meaning "house," and fünun, meaning "sciences," the darülfünun would incorporate the western sciences into deeply entrenched academic traditions and institutions in an effort to bridge the gap with Europe. The completely new institution, distinct from the existing pre-modern medreses, was modeled after the French educational system and created an infrastructure for national universities in Turkey and some of the Arab-speaking provinces. It also influenced the establishment of universities in Iran and Afghanistan. Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu's study sheds new light on an important and pioneering experiment in East-West relations, tracking the multifaceted transformation at work in Istanbul during the transition from classical to modern modes of scientific education. Out of this intellectual ferment, a new Ottoman Turkish scientific language developed, the terminology of which served as a convenient vehicle for expressing and teaching modern science throughout the Empire.

About the Author :
Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu is a Turkish scholar and diplomat. He was the founder and chair of the first Department of the History of Science in Turkey at the University of Istanbul and has taught at the universities of Ankara, Exeter, Istanbul, and Munich. He is the founder of the IRCICA, the Turkish Society for the History of Science, and the International Union of history and Philosophy of Science (2001-2005). His written works include Turks in Egypt and Their Cultural Legacy, Scientific Technology and Learning in the Ottoman Empire, and The Islamic World in the New Century. A member of the Turkish Parliament and the Parliamentarian Assembly of the Council of Europe, Ihsanoglu was a candidate for president of the Republic of Turkey in 2014.

Review :
An original contribution of this book is the detailed scholarly study of how a new Ottoman scientific language developed and its focus on the Ottoman administration which fashioned the new ethos that come to undergird its norms and institutions of the Empire. Given current events in Turkey, it should be of interest to anyone who wants to understand the educational and cultural background of countries that were part of, or in close contact with, the Ottoman Empire. We cannot help asking, how sturdy are the structures of these new universities? The answer can perhaps be read between the lines of this useful and scholarly work. Its comparative approach, scope of coverage, rigorous analysis, and concern for situating the Ottoman experiment in the larger context of global higher education history make The House of Sciences a major contribution. Another important aspect of this well-planned and assiduously researched study is that in addition to providing a definitive account of the Ottoman Darülfünun, it provides the first in-depth analysis of the Ottoman experiment in higher education in the post-Tanzimat era. This book will remain as the standard book on the subject for foreseeable future and would draw considerable interact among scholars. The House of Sciences is a notable contribution to the scholarship in English on the history and institutions of science in the nineteenth-century non-Western context.