Before actually beginning my post as a teacher at Selcuk University, I noticed people referring to my host, Gulbun, as hocam, pronounced “ho-jahm,” in English. For some reason, there was something endearing about this word. Maybe it was the way people said it. Hocam is a combination of hoca, a flexible term bestowed upon people who are devout Muslims and /or renowned for their wisdom as teachers, and the possessive suffix. The “m” at the end of hocam denotes possession-not just teacher but MY teacher. The term is reminiscent of Rabbi, which is recognized as the address for Jewish leaders and scholars and is also present in the Bible as an address for Jesus. This knowledge, alone, set the tone for what it would mean to be a teacher in Turkey. In a culture where a teacher is revered as a wise person of spiritual dimensions, I felt and still feel honored each time a student refers to me as hocam. I am honored because with hocam comes a challenge and a responsibility. I am not only responsible for presenting information; I am looked upon as a wisdom practitioner. This ideal is not so foreign to me. I remember referring to some of my teachers with the Dr. So and So that is customary in American academic spaces but thinking of them as more than that. I wish I had been afforded the opportunity to refer to them in the possessive tense; my wisdom teacher, Dr. Sujai, my wisdom teacher, Dr. Hembree, my wisdom teacher, Dr. Neal except in Turkey, students do not refer to their teachers by their surnames, instead they use the teacher's first name followed by hocam. I think using the first name also bridges the relationship between the teacher and student. Instead of referring to a lineage of which the student has no connection, the student calls the teacher by their given name. When I return to the US, I hope that my teachers will allow me to also refer to them with the First name, hocam template of which I've become so accustomed. Not only out of the respect and closeness I feel for them, but because the knowledge they imparted upon me was more than terms in a book. They left me with wisdom for living and a framework for relating with students that was useful for the academic setting in which I found myself.
The academic setting in Turkey is different from what I knew in America. The teacher is the wise one. I’ve even had colleagues regale me with tales of parents who call them to straighten out students who have gotten out of hand because the hocam has the last word. With this in mind, tonight, I am thinking about what it means to be a teacher.
I have spent one year, thus far, as a teacher in Turkey and during this year I have learned as much, if not more than I have taught. In the beginning, when I arrived on the wings of my Fulbright grant, I thought about all that I would teach the students of Turkey. I spent many nights devising my syllabi and making plans for how my classes would be conducted. I was going to share my superior American-educated knowledge with the students of Selcuk. Now, as I embark on another year, I realize that I have learned more about being a teacher than I ever anticipated. Being a teacher means being open to the lessons that come to you everyday. Sometimes the lessons come from the man pushing a cart of old goods (the eskici) or from the students you encounter from day to day. In a class where we discussed the ideal of sacrifice, I cried with a student who shared a story which spanned from her life in an Afghani village to her life as a student in Turkey. When she came of age, there were two children in her family who had the opportunity to attend the university. She and her brother had both been granted the opportunity for a university education but the family could only afford to send one of the children. As she shared the pain of her brother’s sacrifice, I realized that I was experiencing something beyond my initial imaginings of a teacher’s life-I was becoming hocam.
Becoming hocam, for me, means setting aside all of the imaginings that having a Fulbright can do for me. I focus more on being in the moment. Whatever importance should come with this prestigious grant is disregarded as I try, instead to be mindful. This mindfulness means living for the sake of the students I meet everyday. The impressive impact of my CV becomes less important as I meditate on the now. This opportunity is not a stepping stone to another place, being here, now, can allow for deepening of the teaching experience. There are people who have been teachers for a long time but if I had that experience to trade, I would trade 10 years for my one year has hocam because this experience is not about me. How can I think more about them than I do myself? Did I give more today than I did yesterday? Being hocam will not be recognized by any authoritative committee but being hocam means more to me than being recognized.
