On the poetics of language-mixing in Emine Sevgi Ozdamar's writing

This article focuses on the poetics of language-mixing (Sprachmischung) in Emine Sevgi Ozdamar's writing, paying particular attention to the surface and materiality of her texts. Ozdamars's ways of interweaving language(s) consist not only in mixing German and Turkish elements but also include allusions to Arabic and Ottoman, references to oral and scriptural traditions, and are closely linked to the practices of transcription and translation. By reading Ozdamar's writing as a "site of multiple translation" (Azade Seyhan) different dimensions of language-mixing (for example spelling, onomatopoeia, translation of idioms and names) are explored. The article concludes with the plea for a broadening of the perspective on language-mixing in literature and the creation of a comparative poetics of Sprachmischung.