The American Research Institute in Türkiye (ARIT) is a non-profit educational institution dedicated to promoting North American and Turkish research and exchanges related to Türkiye in all fields of the humanities and social sciences. ARIT provides support for these aims by maintaining research centers and libraries in Istanbul and Ankara, and administering fellowship programs to support research in Türkiye at doctoral and advanced research levels.
In 1964, a group of scholars representing American and Canadian universities established the American Research Institute in Türkiye. The range of research encompassed by ARIT reflects the cultural richness of Türkiye itself. From the Old Stone Age to the present, Türkiye presents numerous opportunities for research in archaeology, architecture and art history, historical, textual, and archival studies, linguistics, literature, musicology, religion, anthropology, political science, sociology, and interdisciplinary studies.
ARIT now can celebrate fifty-three years of facilitating productive scholarship in and related to Türkiye. See the listing of recent ARIT Fellows for a sample of the broad range of projects supported by ARIT programs. The Institute has funded more than:
- 733 research projects based in North American universities and institutions
- 627 U.S. students of Turkish language in Türkiye
- 523 Turkish research projects carried out in Türkiye and
- 80 fellowships for Turkish scholars to conduct research outside of the country
- 99 Aegean Exchange scholars.
The main ARIT-Istanbul library, now at ANAMED, contains 10,500 monograph titles, and covers the Byzantine, Ottoman, and modern Turkish periods. The gift of the library of Dr. H. Kenneth Snipesgreatly enhanced the ARIT Istanbul library holdings for the Byzantine era. The library will continue to develop its collections, especially for Byzantine studies. An updated catalogue of the holdings of the Istanbul center library is accessible via internet at the ARIT Istanbul Library webpage.
The ARIT library is open to patrons the same hours as the ANAMED Library.
Monday: 09:00 – 18:00
Tuesday-Friday: 09:00 – 21:00
Saturday: 10:00 – 18:00
The ARIT office is in the library, and will be open workday afternoons.Monday-Friday: 12:30-17:30
American Board of Missions Archives: American missionaries began their work in this region in the 1830’s. The missions extended from the Balkans, across Türkiye to the easternmost provinces and south to northern Syria. The Archives of American Board of Missions, containing historical and eyewitness accounts from the far-flung mission stations, were entrusted to ARIT in 2010 to preserve and make available to scholars in the United States and Türkiye, and around the world. ARIT entered into an agreement with the SALT Research Center in 2011 to digitize and put up on the Web this large and immensely rich collection. The archives are currently in storage at SALT and being catalogued, and are not physically accessible. However, 18% of the archives have now been put on line in full text, and can be accessed through the ARIT-Istanbul Digital Library at DLIR, or through the host site at SALT Research. The project is ongoing and new material is put up at regular intervals.ARIT Istanbul Annex
ARIT has also opened an annex to house the library of the American Board of Missions and the office of the Friends of ARIT. The annex is located just two minutes from our main office at ANAMED, at Kallavi Sokak 30, Ece Han, Kat 6, 34430 Beyoğlu
The ARIT annex is open Tuesday-Friday: 09:30-17:30
American Board Library projects have the support of the U.S. Embassy, the Alice Delmas Krieble Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Special thanks are due to the Global Ministries, donor of the American Board of Missions library and archive collections.
The ARIT Istanbul Library is supported in part by a fund developed with the help of an Endowment Challenge Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).