A country exterminating a whole ethnic group and then denying it ever happened; Taner Akcam attempts to reveal facts from various sources to clarify events before, during and after the Armenian genocide in his book, A Shameful Act. In A Shameful Act Akcam discusses question of Turkish responsibility for the genocide, as well as events holding major relevance to the deportation of Armenians and other non-Turkish Ottomans. Akcam's reasoning for writing this book is showing a Turkish writer acknowledging the genocide happened and going over more evidence proving Turks were responsible for committing these crimes and attempting to cover them up.
The author tries to show that although Turks deny the Armenian genocide ever happened there is more than enough evidence to prove them guilty of annihilating a whole race. The book seems to be a write-up of primary research in which Akcam states facts in a chronological fashion. The author is a well established sociologist and historian who currently works at the University of Minnesota's Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. The Armenian genocide was undoubtedly caused by the Turks which resurfaces throughout the content of this book. Although I have never before discussed or even heard of the Armenian genocide before this book the Turks who were behind these series of massacres seem even more heinous because they tried to hide such a staggering crime.
The book's content is linear and clarifies on some subjects, but the information can be easy to get lost in because the paragraphs seem to introduce a new character or event if not several which sometimes didn't seem to have any ties to the paragraph before it. Akcam achieved his goal by accurately revealing facts that might have been oblivious to many people because of where they came from, such as Turkish/Ottoman documents found in archives. Akcam made several points to show how a nation could comply with such brutal actions. He also showed that the Turks managed to cover up a large amount of their operations by using the World War as something to keep Europe preoccupied with their own problems rather than those of the Armenians.
The author writes about how the social class kept a sort of traditional role from the medieval period to the modern era, where Turkish citizens were considered of higher class and served in the army while other races such as Armenians, Greeks and so on were just the working class or slaves. In the modernized world the merchant class (Armenians, etc.) began to gain more power and live longer, luxurious lives than their so called Turkish masters who were mostly just soldiers. The government which was still run by Turks began to rally the Empire into a nationalistic state and target the Armenians as the enemy. Akcam writes about how one of the leaders in the Armenian genocide operation would make promises to stop killing to European ambassadors one moment and then send a message to continue, just to get them off his back. Events that the book left out and how it would compare to others on the subject I have no basis of comparison to refer to since I haven't read any other books or heard anything about the Armenian genocide until this book. I found it intriguing how the Turks avoided being caught for a while and still deny that the genocide ever took place. I disliked how the book seemed to drag on and on which made it hard for me to get into because I have trouble reading just a list of facts.
I found several key events interesting such as moving the Armenians and other non-Turk races into the center of the empire in order to control them better. The idea of a Turkish historian writing about something that's considered taboo in his country also gave this book a slight twist from the beginning. I would not recommend this book to most people due to how the information is presented and that I doubt they could get much out of it unless they seriously outlined each chapter after reading it or spent some time thinking over the facts before moving on.
In 1915, under the cover of a world war, some one million Armenians were killed through starvation, forced marches, forced exile, and mass acts of slaughter. Although Armenians and world opinion have held the Ottoman powers responsible, Turkey has consistently rejected any claim of intentional genocide.
Now, in a pioneering work of excavation, Turkish historian Taner Akam has made extensive and unprecedented use of Ottoman and other sources to produce a scrupulous charge sheet against the Turkish authorities. The first scholar of any nationality to have mined the significant evidence--in Turkish military and court records, parliamentary minutes, letters, and eyewitness accounts--Akam follows the chain of events leading up to the killing and then reconstructs its systematic orchestration by coordinated departments of the Ottoman state, the ruling political parties, and the military. He also probes the crucial question of how Turkey succeeded in evading responsibility, pointing to competing international interests in the region, the priorities of Turkish nationalists, and the international community's inadequate attempts to bring the perpetrators to justice.
As Turkey lobbies to enter the European Union, Akam's work becomes ever more important and relevant. Beyond its timeliness, A Shameful Act is sure to take its lasting place as a classic and necessary work on the subject.