Ankara Word Museum

Word Museum, located in Türkiye’s capital Ankara, is the country’s first word-themed museum, established by Şermin Yaşar to teach children and young people the meanings of Turkish words, proverbs and idioms. Situated in the Altındağ district, directly beneath Ankara Castle and opposite Museum of Anatolian Civilizations, the museum opened its doors to visitors on 26 May 2022, during Language Day. A four-story historical building, previously used as a warehouse for raw wool and tiftik, has been restored and converted into a museum.

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The Word Museum is a long-held dream of Şermin Yaşar. A year ago, while sitting in the garden of the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations, she was struck by the empty building opposite her and conceived the idea of transforming it into a word museum. Observing that despite learning Turkish for twelve years, children still lacked sufficient familiarity with words, Yaşar aimed to provide an opportunity in this museum for visitors to explore and discover the meanings of words. After a year of planning, the museum was realized with the goal of bringing together the richness of the Turkish language with creativity.

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The museum, with its four-story structure, explores different dimensions of words. The ground floor features the roots section, introducing the history and etymological origins of words. The entrance level hosts the words exhibition, presenting the diversity and everyday usage of Turkish through objects and visuals. The top floor is dedicated to the sentences theme, where proverbs, idioms and their cultural contexts are explored. Between the entrance and first floor, a chandelier made of Turkish, Uygur, Göktürk and Arab letters and rice draws attention.

In the museum, words are arranged in harmony with art. Works by numerous artists including paintings, installations and ceramic pieces are displayed. One of the standout items in the collection is a three-dimensional digital statue created by an Iranian artist using photographs of Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. Visitors are warmly greeted upon entry with phrases such as “Welcome”, “You have brought us joy”, and “How wonderful that you came”, and are bid farewell upon exit with expressions like “Goodbye”, “We have treated you”, and “We look forward to seeing you again”.

The museum’s inauguration program took place at the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations. Hosted by actress Ceyda Düvenci, the ceremony featured Şermin Yaşar sharing the museum’s development process and her passion for words. Attendees included historian Prof. Dr. İlber Ortaylı, former National Minister of Education Ziya Selçuk, Culture and Deputy Minister of Tourism Nadir Alpaslan, as well as Ankara Provincial Director of Culture and Tourism Ali Ayvazoğlu. The ribbon-cutting ceremony was performed by Ortaylı and Selçuk. In his speech, Ortaylı emphasized the cultural and educational significance of the Word Museum for language learning and encouraged children to visit and reflect on words.

The Word Museum combines the unique lexical richness of Turkish with art, visual design and emotion to offer visitors an interactive learning environment. Şermin Yaşar stated her goal is to open similar museums in every province of Türkiye and highlighted the symbolic importance of the museum’s opening on Language Day with the phrase “Let our Turkish be the celebration of the holiday”. The museum aims especially to teach children and young people the power, history and daily use of words.

The Word Museum is open daily from 10:00 to 17:00, except on Mondays. This museum enriches Ankara’s cultural fabric by offering both local and foreign visitors the opportunity to discover the richness of the Turkish language. As an innovative cultural space that emphasizes that language is alive and that words are carriers of culture, the Word Museum stands out as a unique educational and artistic destination.