Where History Comes to Life
For many students, studying history entails reading about distant civilizations, political conflicts, and religious traditions from a textbook. For students in Notre Dame’s Istanbul Summer program, those lessons extend beyond the classroom.
Over the course of three weeks, students embark on a journey through Türkiye, with two weeks in Istanbul and the remaining week traveling throughout the country. Led by Professor Mahan Mirza, the learning experience explores thousands of years of history, from the origins of religion in the Stone Age to the fall of Constantinople, the rise of the Ottoman Empire to the complexities of modern Türkiye.
The program, titled “Istanbul Summer: From the Stone Age to the Drone Age,” captures the breadth of the journey. Along the way, students visit some of the country’s most significant historical and religious sites, including the Hagia Sophia, Topkapı Palace, the Çamlıca Mosque, Konya, Ephesus, and Gallipoli.
The idea for the Istanbul Summer program grew out of an earlier Notre Dame course that brought students to Oman. In spring 2020, Mirza participated in a spring break dialogue journey to Muscat as part of a course called Holy Crossroads, which examined global educational networks of the Congregation of Holy Cross.
After Mirza approached Notre Dame Global with a proposal for a winter course in Oman and learned that Notre Dame did not currently offer courses for credit during the winter, they began exploring possible summer destinations.
Istanbul quickly emerged as a natural fit.
“Türkiye bridges Europe and Asia, East and West,” Mirza says. “It is a magical city with layers of history: Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Ottoman, and modern Turkish.”
That history is visible throughout Istanbul. Students visit archaeological sites, museums, mosques, churches, Sufi lodges, bazaars, and universities. For Mirza, the value of the program extends beyond simply seeing historic landmarks. “Classes like Istanbul Summer are bigger than any single topic or experience,” he says. “They are invitations to a culture of encounter.”
Discovery Beyond the Classroom
Throughout the program, students engage with questions of identity and belonging, religion and politics, innovation and nostalgia. Notre Dame student Joshua Barnard ‘28 had a longstanding interest in history and knew much of the region’s story. He found it surreal to stand in ancient sites he had spent many years in school reading about. This program allowed him to engage with these traditions while exploring a culture and religious tradition that were new to him.
One of the moments that affected him most was during a visit to a church in Ankara, where the congregation was composed of Turkish converts to Chrisitanity. Having the ability to share in
their faith in a very different geographic setting gave Barnard a new perspective on the global Christian community.
“History stops being abstract. The classroom gives students concepts and context; being there introduces texture, ambiguity, emotion, and sometimes discomfort. You begin to notice that the same place can carry very different meanings for different people,” Mirza says.
Understanding the Unfamiliar
For Luke Montano, a Notre Dame junior who embarked on this journey to Istanbul, the opportunity to immerse himself in a culture different from his own was a major reason for participating. Having traveled extensively throughout Europe, Montano wanted to discover a place that felt less familiar. He had never visited a majority-Muslim country and was particularly interested in Islam and the history of Istanbul and Constantinople.
His time in Türkiye challenged some of the assumptions he had carried with him prior to arriving. Montano had grown up with the impression that Muslim-majority countries were populated largely by highly fundamentalist religious communities. Instead, he found that many people he interacted with described themselves as Muslim while distinguishing themselves from being particularly religious. This was a dynamic he found comparable to nominal Christianity in the United States.
“The country may be of a different religion, but the people are not as foreign to us as we have been taught to believe," Montano says.
Montano found that some of the most valuable lessons came not simply from observing religious sites, but from speaking directly with people. At the Blue Mosque, he visited an “Ask Me About Islam” stand, and spent about 30 minutes speaking with a Syrian man about questions ranging from the Assad regime to Islamic theology.
The conversation, Montano says, made his visit to the Blue Mosque far more meaningful than simply seeing the building itself. For him, travel was ultimately about the people he encountered and the conversations that followed.
The Tensions of a Modern Identity
The course then moves into the modern era, examining Türkiye’s role in the global balance of power. Students visit the Naval Museum and the Dardanelles, a strategically important waterway connecting the Sea of Marmara to the Aegean and broader Mediterranean.
“The ‘Drone Age’ part of the title is a poetic reference to Türkiye’s role in the balance of global power,” Mirza says. The program encourages students to consider how the country’s ancient past continues to shape its modern identity. That complexity is one of the central ideas students engage with throughout the course.
“Perhaps the biggest question is what happens when a place refuses to fit neatly into our categories,” Mirza says. “Is Türkiye European or Asian? Eastern or Western? Religious or secular? Modern or traditional? Of course, the answer in every case is both–and neither.”
Students consider how people inherit history without being imprisoned by it, how religious and national identities coexist, and how memories of conquest, displacement, coexistence, and conflict continue to shape the present.
For Montano, this tension became especially apparent when he and a friend debated Turkish attitudes toward the country’s Ottoman past and its modern history during a flight from Ankara. The conversation followed a visit to the burial place of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, where Montano observed the significance of Atatürk to modern Turkish national identity.
“I understand the degree to which Turkey is caught between two worlds: the West/Europe and the Middle East/Islamic world,” Montano says. “It has a unique identity situated between both and has a fascinating history, culture, and active political tensions.”
Learning Through Encounter
Some of the program’s most meaningful lessons come not only from historical sites, but from interactions with the people students meet along the way. Students speak with Turkish scholars and religious leaders and explore different perspectives on religion, history, and identity.
Mirza recalls several moments that stayed with him, including a late-night visit to a Sufi lodge, a quiet moment of contemplation at the House of Mary, and conversations with a Greek Orthodox priest in Ephesus. In another instance, a student wearing a cross around his neck was confronted by a Turkish man who took offense to it. A woman wearing a headscarf stepped in to defend the student’s right to religious freedom. For Mirza, these exchanges demonstrated the complexity students discover when they move beyond the classroom.
Another conversation with a Greek Orthodox priest offered a different perspective. Rather than focusing on the tragedies of the past, the priest spoke optimistically about the schools, churches, educational programs, and relationships through which the community continues to thrive.
Students’ final assignment brings together five sources: the course’s common book, a poem by Rumi, a journal reflection, a book of their choosing, and an actual experience from their time in Türkiye. For Mirza, that approach reflects Notre Dame’s broader commitment to experiential learning.
“Notre Dame’s distinctiveness comes from its faith-based identity and mission,” he says. “Spiritual questions need not be bracketed. Rather, they are the essential fabric for the tapestry of the global classroom.”
The result is an academic immersion in which students are asked not only to learn about history, but to engage with it, reflect on it, and consider how it continues to shape the world around them.
For Montano, the journey also reinforced the value of traveling beyond familiar surroundings. Throughout the trip, he was struck by the hospitality of the people he met, recalling instances when locals went out of their way to help students who were lost or confused.
“My biggest takeaway about Türkiye itself is that, in the 21 countries I have visited, I have never encountered such friendly and welcoming people,” he says.
Both students ultimately came away with a deeper appreciation for what can happen when learning moved beyond the traditional classroom. For Barnard, the program brought history and Christian communities he had studied to life. For Montano, it challenged assumptions and encouraged conversations with people whose perspectives differed from his own.
“The biggest thing I took away was the value of traveling, seeing new places, and meeting people with experiences vastly different from my own,” Montano says.
Through Istanbul Summer, students move from ancient archaeological sites to modern geopolitical questions, from classrooms to religious spaces, and from historical texts to conversations with people living that history today. In the process, the program offers a different way of understanding the past, not as something distant and settled, but as something that continues to influence how people understand faith, identity, culture, and the world they inhabit.
Photo at top: Istanbul Summer program students at the Grand Çamlıca Mosque