This essay focuses on how cultural studies has been translated into the Turkish context, in terms of its modernizing framework, and how this has given rise to very particular (and often defiantly held) opinions on the interdisciplinary limits of the discipline. The first part concentrates on how translation as a concept has been perceived as a means to develop the national culture, especially in the education and publishing fields. Through a case study of one version of cultural studies, practiced in departments of humanities, the following part discusses how the preservation of the national culture has been instrumental in determining the ways in which the discipline has been imported and subsequently developed. The conclusion suggests that the future of cultural studies in Turkey is intimately related to the material technologies of power and cultural policy.