Arel Teorisinin İktidarı Üzerine Bir İnceleme

Hüseyin Sadettin Arel, who is one of the leading actors and directors of the world of Turkish makam music, has created significant effects in his time and today with his scientific and artistic works in the field of music, publishing, education, management, system builder in the theory and teaching of Turkish makam music, and composer, and the Arel-Ezgi-Uzdilek System, which he theorized, has become a subject of criticism and discussion. This article aims to analyze the continuity of Arel's theory, which constitutes an important turning point in the theory of Turkish makam music, in the fields of education and performance despite all the criticisms, within the framework of the factors related to the theoretical legitimacy ground and institutional structures that make this continuity possible. The scope of the study includes the analysis of the social and institutional mechanisms that ensure the continuity of this system, apart from the functionality of Arel theory. In this direction, the music circle formed around Arel, called “Arelists”, was associated with the conceptual framework that corresponds to the “epistemic community” in the sociology of science. Descriptive analysis based on qualitative approach was preferred as the research method. The data obtained as a result of the literature review were evaluated using Warren Olaf Hagstrom's model of epistemic communities; it was analyzed how the interpersonal network established through the institutions where Arel worked, the journals he published and the students he trained maintained the power of Arel theory. As a result, it has been determined that the influence of Arel's theory today is based not only on its theoretical competence but also on the continuity of the scientific/epistemic community formed around it.