| Total population | |
|---|---|
| 1.3 million with Turkish citizenship (Statistical Office of the European Union 2023)[1] 2,926,000 million with a migration background from Turkey (including other ethnic groups) (2023 estimation)[2] | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Languages | |
| Turkish, Kurdish, German, English | |
| Religion | |
| Mostly Sunni Muslim, partly Alevi, agnostic, atheist, Christian[3][4] or other religions |
 | This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. The specific problem is: MOS:SANDWICH. (November 2024) |
Turks in Germany, also referred to as German Turks and Turkish Germans (German: Türken in Deutschland/Deutschtürken; Turkish: Almanya'daki Türkler), are ethnic Turkish people living in Germany. These terms are also used to refer to German-born individuals who are of full or partial Turkish ancestry.
However, not all people in Germany who trace their heritage back to Turkey are ethnic Turks. A significant proportion of the population is also of Kurdish, Azerbaijani descent and to a lesser extent, of Christian descent, such as Assyrian, Aramean and Armenian. Also some ethnic Turkish communities in Germany trace their ancestry to other parts of southeastern Europe or the Levant (such as Balkan Turks and Turkish Cypriots). At present, ethnic Turkish people form the largest ethnic minority in Germany.[5] They also form the largest Turkish population in the Turkish diaspora.[citation needed]
Most people of Turkish descent in Germany trace their ancestry to the Gastarbeiter (guest worker) programs in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1961, in the midst of an economic boom that resulted in a significant labor shortage, Germany signed a bilateral agreement with Turkey to allow German companies to recruit Turkish workers. The agreement was in place for 12 years, during which around 650,000 workers came from Turkey to Germany. Many also brought their spouses and children with them.
Turks who immigrated to Germany brought cultural elements with them, including the Turkish language.[citation needed]
- ^ "Infographic: Europe's Turkish Communities". 11 May 2023.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
:0was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Esra Özyürek (6 August 2016). "Convert Alert: German Muslims and Turkish Christians as Threats to Security in the New Europe". Cambridge University Press. 51 (1): 91–116. JSTOR 27563732. Retrieved 22 August 2016.
- ^ Özyürek, Esra. 2005. "The Politics of Cultural Unification, Secularism, and the Place of Islam in the New Europe." American Ethnologist 32 (4): 509–12.
- ^ Horrocks & Kolinsky 1996, 17.