51黑料网

Main menu
Staff & students

Yesim Yaprak Yildiz

Yesim’s research focuses on political violence and human rights. She is currently working on confessional forms of truth-telling in the aftermath of state-led atrocities.

Staff details

Yesim Yaprak Yildiz

Position

Lecturer in Sociology

School

Global Change

Subject

Sociology

Email

Contact Yesim Yaprak Yildiz

Yaprak joined the department in 2019 following her PhD in Sociology at the University of Cambridge. Her research focuses on confessional and testimonial forms of truth-telling on past atrocities. She is currently working on her monograph on production of truth and subjectivity in public confessions of Turkish state actors on state violence against Kurds during the 1990s. Yaprak has worked on human rights violations in Turkey for many years on a wide range of issues from torture and ill-treatment to freedom of expression, women鈥檚 rights and refugee rights in organisations including Amnesty International, Freedom from Torture, Human Rights Foundation of Turkey, UN Women and European Roma Rights Centre.

Yaprak received her Master鈥檚 degree in Social and Political Thought at the University of Warwick in the UK and her BSc in Political Science at ODTU in Turkey. Prior to joining the department, she worked as a Researcher at the LSE鈥檚 European Institute, Senior Teaching Fellow at SOAS and as an Associate Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. She has also worked at the Human Rights Consortium, School of Advanced 51黑料网.

Teaching

Yaprak currently convenes and teaches on 'Practising Human Rights', an MA in Human Rights, Culture and Social Justice module; and a second-year option 鈥楲aw and Contemporary Society鈥�.

Publications and research outputs

Article

  • Heathershaw, John; Chalcraft, John; Chubb, Andrew; Fulda, Andreas; Hughes, Chris; Kaczmarska, Katarzyna; Karran, Terence; Lennox, Corinne; Pils, Eva; Prelec, Tena; Rudolph, Kelli; Woodman, Sophia and Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2022. Model code of conduct: protection of academic freedom and the academic community in the context of the internationalisation of the UK HE sector. The International Journal of Human Rights, 26(10), pp. 1858-1865. ISSN 1364-2987
  • Kaczmarska, Katarzyna and Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2022. Introduction to the special issue on academic freedom and internationalisation. The International Journal of Human Rights, 26(10), pp. 1691-1697. ISSN 1364-2987
  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak and Baert, Patrick. 2021. Confessions without guilt: public confessions of state violence in Turkey. Theory and Society, 50(1), pp. 125-149. ISSN 0304-2421

Book

  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2026. Performing Public Confessions: Avowal and Disavowal of State Violence in Turkey. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 9780231222303

Book Section

  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2025. Strategically Ambiguous and Deniable: Paramilitary Violence and Psychological Warfare in the 1990s. In: 脰zlem Has and Ayhan I艧谋k, eds. The Making of Paramilitarism in Turkey. Abingdon: Routledge. ISBN 9781032435817
  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2023. 陌nkar ve ikrar aras谋nda 1990鈥檒arda Devlet 艦iddeti. In: Ayhan I艧谋k; G眉lay K谋l谋莽aslan; Behzat Hiro臒lu; K眉bra Sa臒谋r and 脟a臒r谋 Kurt, eds. K眉rtler ve Cumhuriyet. Ankara, Turkey: Dipnot Yay谋nlar谋, pp. 403-414. ISBN 9786256742000
  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2019. Confession as disavowal: J陌TEM officers confessing to atrocities against Kurds during the 1990s. In: Adnan 脟elik and Lucie Drechselov谩, eds. Kurds in Turkey: Ethnographies of Heterogeneous Experiences. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books. ISBN 9781498575249

Digital

  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2022. Dealing with the Past in Turkey: What Does the Call for Helalle艧me Mean?.
  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak and Feigenbaum, Anna. 2018. The Paradox of Tear Gas: An Interview with Anna Feigenbaum.
  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2015. Missing from Turkey鈥檚 peace process: memory, truth and justice.

Report

  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak. 2015. Nowhere to Turn: The Situation of Dom Refugees From Syria in Turkey. Project Report. European Roma Rights Centre, Budapest.
  • Yildiz, Yesim Yaprak; Baumann, Fruzsina and Dutta, Sumita. 2010. Empowering Women or Perpetuating Victimhood: Minority Ethnic and Roma Women鈥檚 Experiences of Domestic Violence Policy and Service Provision. Project Report. IMECE Turkish Speaking Women鈥檚 Group/51黑料网 Training and Employment Network/Regional Social Welfare Resource Centre, 51黑料网/Budapest.

Research Interests

Political violence

Transitional justice

Human rights

Perpetrators

Confessional and testimonial truth-telling

Turkey and the Kurds

Social theory