I was born in early 1960 in Kiremithane village on the outskirts of Taurus Mountains
in the plains of Chukurova, in southern Anatolia, Turkey. During my childhood I walked to
distant villages with my father and participated in the performances of oral tradition.
During my childhood, the storytellers were almost sacred personages in the villages. They
came from a deeply rooted ancient tradition of professional bards of Chukurova that is,
the ancient Cilicia, where Homer once lived and told stories. 

For my graduate studies in 1990s at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, I went to
Sub-Saharan East Africa and worked with African storytellers as a part of my doctoral
research and learned the art of storytelling from the African storytellers, poets, and
historians with whom I worked. In 2004, I went to Baku, the capital city of Azerbaijan
and worked with Azeri storytellers. 

At Western Michigan University, the voices of African, Azeri, Kurdish, and Turkish
storytellers constitute the core of my teaching and research. I teach the following
courses: African storytellers; Folklore and Mythology; Oral Tradition and the Novel; Hero
and Trickster; Creative Muslim Writers; Literary Interpretation; Asian Literature; Post
Colonial Literature; Travel Writing; and Turkish Literature in Translation. 

I edited a book entitled, Lake Rudolf as Colonial Icon in East Africa (2006), Duke
University Press. Currently I am working on a book manuscript entitled African
Storytellers: The Jie and Turkana Oral Tradition of Origin. My essays have appeared in
Ethnohistory, History in Africa, African Studies Review, Journal of Muslim Minority
Affairs, Journal of Modern African Studies. 

I conducted research on oral tradition in Uganda, Kenya, and Azerbaijan. I am a recipient
of National Endowment for Humanities, Wenner-Gren Foundation, Social Science Research
Council