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Mehmet Celik

M.A., Bilkent University

Mehmet Celik



Mehmet Celik was born and raised in Turkey. After receiving his B.A. in history from Boğaziçi University (Istanbul) in 2004, he attended graduate school at the Bilkent University history department (Ankara), where he developed an interest in the Ottoman Balkans. He earned his M.A. with a thesis entitled “Tanzimat in the Balkans: Midhat Pasha’s Governorship in the Danube Province, 1864-1868,” which he published as a Turkish language monograph in 2010. Currently he is a PhD candidate writing his dissertation, which examines the complex process of urban change in the city of Ruse, now in northern Bulgaria, between 1839 and 1885. His research explores how people of various religious and ethnic backgrounds lived together in a discreet urban environment during the Ottoman reform period, so called Tanzimat (1839-1878) and the early years of Bulgarian state building following liberation. He is particularly interested in the Ottoman management of diversity, changing interactions and the shared or separate everyday experiences of ethno-religious groups. His project has been funded by the Fulbright-Hays DDRA Program, American Research Center in Sofia and the UT History Department.


Urban life, multiculturalism, ethnic conflict and gender in Southeastern Europe and the Middle East
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