Comparative Literature and Its Contemporary Challenges: Translation, Multilingual Training, and Turkish-German Relations in Türkiye

Comparative literature has been shaped by shifting debates over influence, comparison, interdisciplinarity, world literature, and cultural studies. Rather than treating the French and American schools as fixed national paradigms, this article approaches them as historically situated tendencies that illuminate broader methodological tensions in the discipline. Focusing on Türkiye, the article examines how translation history, philological traditions, foreign-language education, and Turkish-German literary relations reveal the institutional challenges of comparative literature. The study is framed as a conceptual and institutional analysis rather than a comprehensive empirical survey of all Turkish programs. It argues that the Turkish case shows why comparative literature depends not only on theoretical openness but also on multilingual competence, curriculum design, and scholars trained across literary traditions. By linking methodological problems such as superficial comparison, exclusivism, and externalism to the Turkish context, the article suggests that comparative literature in Türkiye requires a stronger balance between philological training, cross-cultural methodology, and attention to translated and migrant literatures.