Understanding Homeland through Hospitality Practices

This essay explores notions of homeland among descendants of the 1923 Greek-Turkish Population Exchange. Visits to ancestral villages transform understandings of the homeland that previously existed only in memory or family stories. These visits also require interactions between Greeks and Turks, typically conceived of as national enemies. Inspired by the Ottoman model presented by their forebears, exchangees reply upon shared hospitality practices to structure cooperative and durable interactions that become central to their conception of their homeland.