İoanna Kuçuradi’s funeral will be held on October 4, the day she would have turned 90. The Turkish philosopher, who spent six decades arguing that human rights rest on a philosophical understanding of human dignity, died in Istanbul on October 2, 2026.
She died in hospital in Istanbul, where she had been receiving treatment, the state news agency Anadolu reported. Born on October 4, 1936, she was 89. Turkish outlets have reported her age as 90.
Founding a department
Kuçuradi was born in Istanbul and graduated from the city’s Zappeion girls’ school in 1954. She studied philosophy at Istanbul University, graduating in 1959, and completed her doctorate in 1965.
After three years teaching at Atatürk University in Erzurum, from 1965 to 1968, she moved to Ankara. In 1969 she founded the philosophy department at Hacettepe University, and she chaired it until 2003. She became an associate professor in 1970 and a full professor in 1978.
In 1997 she took charge of Hacettepe’s Centre for Research and Application of the Philosophy of Human Rights, and of the UNESCO Chair attached to it.
An international voice
Kuçuradi was president of the Philosophical Society of Turkey. From 1998 to 2003 she was secretary-general of the International Federation of Philosophical Societies, the umbrella body for philosophical associations worldwide, and from 2003 to 2008 she was its president, the first woman to hold the post. She later served as its honorary president.
Her books, published in Turkish, include studies of Nietzsche and Schopenhauer, as well as Man and His Values, Ethics and Looking at Art Philosophically.
She received the Goethe Medal, the award of the Turkish Academy of Sciences and the press freedom award of the Turkish Journalists Association.
Tributes
Tributes came from across Turkish political life. Numan Kurtulmuş, speaker of the Turkish parliament, praised her contribution to human rights. Burhanettin Duran, the presidency’s communications director, said she left “a lasting legacy” through her work and her students. Ömer Çelik, spokesman for the governing AK Party, recalled that she described philosophy as “the art of being human” (quotes translated from Turkish).
Funeral
A ceremony will be held on October 4 at Maltepe University’s Mimar Vedat Çakırca Conference Hall. She will be buried at the Şişli Greek Orthodox Cemetery in Istanbul.