Sukru Ilicak
H. Şükrü Ilıcak was born and raised in Ankara. On the trail of rebetiko music, he has developed a serious interest in Greece when he was in college. He decided to pursue an academic career and specialize in the so-called Ottoman “Three Nations,” namely the Greeks, Armenians and Jews. He continued his studies in Turkey, Greece and the US. He received his PhD degree from Harvard University in 2011, with a dissertation entitled “A Radical Rethinking of Empire: Ottoman State and Society during the Greek War of Independence (1821-1826)”. His dissertation investigates the Greek War of Independence as an Ottoman experience, exploring in particular how Sultan Mahmud II (1808-1839) and the central state elite tried to make sense of and reacted to the rapidly changing world around them. He has published broadly on the Greek War of Independence and the “Three Nations.”