XIX. Armenian Intellectuals in the Ottoman Empire in the 19th Century

…What I especially appreciate is that in the context in question, as has been done many times, we speak of the Ottoman Empire and the Armenian -whether explicitly, implicitly or indirectly- as separate or even contradictory elements, which are added to each other in the most reasonable assumption but cannot come into contact with each other sincerely. was not done. Therefore, your book fills a void. I would like to express my appreciation and congratulations for this important service and contribution to the Ottoman-Armenian common intellectual history, and I sincerely hope that your work will reach as wide a readership as possible...
prof. Dr. Boghos Levon Zekiyan

The majority of the studies on Armenians, whose experience of living together with the Turks is long, has been transformed into a field conceptualized as the Armenian Question. Therefore, Ottoman subjects of Armenian origin have been the subject of very little research outside the areas of conflict. Yıldız Deveci Bozkuş focused on a neglected phenomenon with her work. The emergence of the modern intellectual class is related to the formation of the appropriate atmosphere. The Ottoman intellectual class was also born with the formation of a suitable atmosphere with its own peculiarities. Intellectuals of Armenian origin also breathed in the same atmosphere. It can even be said that the emergence of Armenian intellectuals, rather than the intellectual development in the West, although they established a printing press centuries before the Turks, was mainly the result of the processes experienced in the Ottoman capital. In this sense, it would not be right to separate the intellectual world from the emergence and development of Ottoman-Turkish intellectuals. In this process, intellectuals of Armenian origin contributed to Turkish cultural life, which we can see as logistic support. These contributions are mostly dictionaries, music, art, etc. will appear in the fields. Yıldız Deveci Bozkuş, with her research on the people she dealt with and her works, has taken this contribution from the level of discourse to the level that can be supported by facts, while also showing that different doors can be opened for research on Armenians.
prof. Dr. Ahmet Ozcan

This work of Yıldız Deveci Bozkuş is very important as it shows that a study on Ottoman Armenians can go far beyond the narrow frame of the 1915 events. With this comprehensive study, Bozkuş reveals the contributions of the Ottoman Armenians to the Ottoman culture and science world, and also shows that this community is an inseparable part of the Ottoman society. Compressing centuries-old intricate inter-communal relations into a few years of political/military conflict is one of the greatest weaknesses of the Armenian studies literature in Turkey. For this reason, it would not be wrong to say that this work fills an important gap in the literature.
Assoc. Dr. Mustafa Serdar Palabiyik