Dr. Sabri KIZILKAYA

I was born in 1970 in Sorgun, Yozgat. I received my Bachelor’s degree from Ankara University Faculty of Theology and completed my Master’s and PhD studies at Ankara University Institute of Social Sciences, earning my doctorate in 2007. I began my public career in 1995 as a teacher at the Ministry of National Education (MoNE). Between 2008 and 2013, I served at the Education Counsellorship of the Turkish Embassy in London as part of MoNE’s overseas assignment program. After returning to Türkiye, I served as Head of the Higher Education Department at the Directorate General for Higher Education and Study Abroad (MoNE) between 2014 and 2017, overseeing the selection and monitoring of students sent abroad for education. In 2017, I was appointed as Director of International Relations at TRT (Turkish Radio and Television Corporation). During this period, I led the coordination of Türkiye’s relations with major global media organizations, including the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU), and COPEAM. On January 7, 2021, I assumed office as TRT’s Representative in Berlin. I currently continue my professional duties at TRT as Senior Advisor. Alongside my professional career, I have conducted academic research in the fields of Hadith studies and Islamic intellectual history. My PhD dissertation, Analytical Approaches to Isnād and Matn Readings in Ḥadīth Literature: ‘a Rāwī and a Riwāyah’  analyzes the transmission system in Hadith literature through isnād- and matn-based methodologies. My Master’s thesis, Sectarian Fanaticism in the Discipline of al-Jarḥ wa al-Taʿdīl within Hadith Criticism, explores the impact of sectarian biases on the classical rijāl tradition. I have also translated major works of Ottoman and modern Turkish-Islamic thought into English, including: Fuad Sezgin’s Studies on the Sources of al-Bukhārī, Filibeli Ahmed Hilmi’s Āmâk-ı Ḥayāl and The History of Islam, Said Halim Pasha’s Our Tribulations, Hüseyin Kâzım Kadri’s Islam in the Twentieth Century, Musa Jarullah Bigiyef’s In the Radiance of the Noble Verses of the Qurʾān: Hatun, and Yusuf Akçura’s Three Political Systems.