ABSTRACT
This chapter examines displays at the Atatürk and War of Independence Museum in Ankara, setting it into its historical context at a time of internal political threat to Kemalist secularism by Islamist forces in government. The museum’s focus on Atatürk relates to a wide-scale memory culture that is at once a cult of personality. The museum is a complex space, set within Atatürk’s mausoleum and representing him both in life and in death. The museum operates as a sort of test of character, for Atatürk’s testing gaze is prevalent in public space, holding citizens to account to ensure that his civil and political legacy is carried out. It encourages an emotional pedagogy of the self as national subject and an ethics of care for Atatürk’s vision of the national project.
