Selen E.2023-06-162023-06-1620070740-770X1748-5819https://doi.org/10.1080/07407700701621582https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14365/3478This essay examines the roles of women's lives in contemporary Turkey as ‘the work of sacrifice’ wherein tragedy and irony take place simultaneously. I will present one of the major Turkish female singers, Ajda Pekkan, articulating her relationship to womanhood as an endpoint on the continuum that represents the ‘Turkish women’. In contrast, I will assess the case of Konca Kuris, a Turkish Muslim feminist, who stands at the other end of the continuum, and explore her tragic death as a primary sacrifice. Western discourse has framed the ‘woman question’ in a way that problematizes secularisms and Islamic practices. This problematization will serve as the initial momentum to assign sacrifice as a notion that lies in between the object—secular Islam—and the subject—Turkish women—of analysis. Thus, ‘sacrifice’ will be explored as a performative notion, in order to understand, mediate and measure gender performativity in contemporary Turkey. © 2007 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.eninfo:eu-repo/semantics/closedAccessArticle10.1080/074077007016215822-s2.0-43249136085