Michelle Lynch-Köycü PhD

Biography

Michelle Lynch-Köycü is a recent graduate in the History of Architecture from Middle East Technical University (Ankara, 2024), where she focused on the Seljuk architecture of Anatolia as well as 19th and 20th-century engagements with the monumental medieval past, particularly in the contexts of popular representation, academic historiography, and adaptive reuse.

Her current research centers on the museographic adaptation of Seljuk monuments for local museums in the 1920s-60s, as well as the development of cultural heritage concepts and practices in the late Ottoman and early Republican periods. Additional areas of research include travel and architectural representation in Ottoman lands.

Lynch-Köycü also holds an MA and MS in History and Archives Management from Simmons University and is passionate about the use of archival research, visual resources, and ephemera in her teaching and research. During her studies, she worked as a visual resource assistant at the Aga Khan Documentation Center, MIT, and in various archival and research roles in museum and library settings.