Villages in European Turkey, along the Black and Aegean Seas and to a lesser degree along the Mediterranean Sea have long been in contact with urban and western influences. Coastal villages have almost always lacked the self sufficient subsistence patterns of the Anatolian villages. Economic rather than traditional kinship considerations tend to pattern social relations.

Most coastal villagers have a broader social awareness than other Anatolian villagers and are more susceptible to national influences. In these villages, large landowners, by providing employment and land for tenants and by serving as an economic link between the village and the outside at world, are the primary holders of power and prestige.