Ölüm, gömme kültürü ve anma mekanları : Ankara Cebeci Mezarlığı örneği

This thesis evaluates cemetery as a specialized built environment that differs from other urban and architectural spaces by its own created culture which varies from society to society through the religious beliefs, cultural rituals and funerary customs. After the realization of death, the need for committing the body to the ground (interment) results with a specific space requirement. The burial rituals and beliefs of that culture shape the built environment of cemeteries while, the cemetery environment vice versa, shapes the quality of visitation of mourners and the way of remembering the deceased through its memorial as a representation of memory. Although cemeteries concern almost each individual – either as a living being or a body that awaits interment- and they cover huge burial grounds, they represent and/or are representing a place to be avoided for most people. The avoidance of the fact of death and the experience of cemeteries in daily life also asserts itself on the practices of the architectural profession. Cemeteries are transformed into property areas which are figured out by stone-masons, cemetery managements and users/ mourners of that space, whereas they should be / or expected to be / designed by architects, planners and engineers. Although it needs interdisciplinary studies including architectural, urban, sociological, historical and theological research, lack of comprehensive work in this field and avoidance of the practice of the profession in cemetery architecture and burial management, leads to the exclusion of the aspects of design and causes the ignorance of architectural principles in design, planning and spatial organization of burial spaces. Throughout this study, it is intended to reveal the role of cemeteries in providing a cultural milieu for the public use of commemoration spaces which requires to be designed, managed and used as qualified built environments. For this reason, this thesis aims to stimulate further and deeply concerned architectural studies on the design of cemeteries by referring to the interdisciplinary key themes through the analysis of a contemporary cemetery of Ankara, Cebeci Asri Cemetery.M.Arch. - Master of Architectur