Issue 70 · Summer 2014

Dear Readers,

Welcome to the 70th issue of bilig. You will see that this issue involves some new practices. First of all, this is a special issue on the topic of “Turks abroad”. We do not regularly publish special issues, but it is also a fact that special issues bringing together articles on certain topics prove very useful to readers. That is why we are planning to have other special issues on various other topics in the near future.

The articles in this special issue were brought together through the efforts of Prof. Dr. Kutlay Yağmur, lecturer at Tilburg University. That is why, in this issue you will see his name as guest editor for the first time.

This issue of bilig also includes an introductory article by Prof. Dr. Kutlay Yağmur. Here you can find further information on the articles and the special issue.

Until now we have tried our best not to publish more than one article by a single author in a single year. However, in this issue you will come across a contributor as a single or first author in one article and as joint author in another. In order to abide by our editorial principles, we have left out the third articles of contributors who are joint authors in more than one article to be published in later issues.

There was yet another first practice in this issue. Normally as editor, I used to spend the last few days before publication at SFN Ajans, where the journal’s graphic design is completed. This time, however, due to field research, I tried to contribute to the editorial procedures from abroad, and the heavy burden of preparing the journal for publication fell on the shoulders of E. Sıdıka Toptaş and Prof. Dr. Kutlay Yağmur. I would like to thank both of them for their valuable contributions. I would also like to extend special thanks to Prof. Dr. Yağmur for his significant contributions in enabling this special issue to come out.

Currently I am in Mongolia among the Altai-Tuvans for the purposes of field research conducted together with colleagues from our department. In the near future I will try to share the results of our field research through the pages of bilig.

I hope you enjoy reading our special issue.

Yours sincerely,

Prof. Dr. Nurettin Demir

Editor-in-Chief