The Unknown Film Campaign That Shaped US-Turkey Relations | Dr. Jülide Etem

Dr. Jülide Etem, Assistant Professor at the University of Virginia, joins Business Talk to unpack her book, Film Diplomacy: A Media History of Turkey-US Relations. Drawing on her Istanbul upbringing and years in the archives, she traces how educational and missionary films quietly built the US-Turkey alliance, turning military pacts and NATO ties into emotionally resonant stories of friendship and progress, exemplified by the film Turkey Middle East Bridgeland. Etem shows how "educational" cinema doubled as persuasion, teaching agriculture and health alongside ideology about modern families and preferred political systems, and how mobile cinema units carried these messages into Turkey's remotest villages. She examines the Cold War's "capitalism with a human face," whiteness as an invisible standard of modernity, and how Turkey's national film narrative excluded Kurds, Armenians, Greeks, and other minorities. The conversation closes with striking parallels to today's faster, larger-scale digital media ecosystems, revealing film as enduring infrastructure of power. This podcast is brought to you by Global Management Consultancy. Disclaimer: 1. The background music incorporated in this video is the intellectual property of its respective developer and is protected under applicable copyright laws. Notwithstanding that it is a free-to-use version, Business Talk, Global Management Consultancy, and Deepak Bhatt do not own, and expressly do not claim, any rights, title, or interest in or to this music. 2. Dr. Jülide Etem shared key insights from her compelling book, “Film Diplomacy: A Media History of Turkey-US Relations”, in an engaging episode of the Business Talk podcast. The uploaded video contains copyrighted content, so changing any graphics, music, or on-screen appearance of the author or host is not allowed.