​EXPLANATIONS OF USED TERMS IN ACCORDANCE WITH ACADEMIC WRITING AND CULTURAL SENSITIVITY

 

A widely used word for the scrutinized historical chapter is The Anfal campaign. However, the term is also used in further contexts. To avoid creating the impression that the tragic events are harmless, we will mainly use the word operation.  

 

Regarding the definition of genocide, it is worth mentioning that the International Criminal Court does not have the authority for crimes committed after 01/07/2002; hence, jurisdiction cannot retrospectively be exercised in the Anfal case, even if the Iraqi state would have officially recognized the jurisdiction of the ICC:

»The ICC has jurisdiction only with respect to events which occurred after the entry into force of its Statute on 1 July 2002. If a State becomes a party to the Statute after its entry into force, the Court may exercise its jurisdiction only with respect to crimes committed after the entry into force of the Statute for that State, unless that State has made a declaration accepting the jurisdiction of the ICC retroactively. However, the Court cannot exercise jurisdiction with respect to events which occurred before 1 July 2002 [1].«

 

Indisputably, the word genocide should not be used over-proportionally. Its propagation, nonetheless, outlines the perception of the occurrences from the perspective of those directly affected, depicts the proven deliberate and systematic destruction, and was respectfully adapted as it matches the legal definition of the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide that entered into force on 12/01/1951. The second article of the convention includes five key acts we will come across during the research:

»a. killing members of the group, b. causing serious bodily or mental harm, c. imposing living conditions intended to destroy the group, d. preventing births within the group, and e. forcibly transferring children out of the group [2].«

 

 [1] “Understanding the International Criminal Court”. In: International Criminal Court 2020, The Hague, p. 11. Available here: www.icc-cpi.int/sites/default/files/Publications/understanding-the-icc.pdf

 

[2] “Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide”. In: United Nations, p. 1. Available here:

www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.1_Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.pdf

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

Abstract

 

I. Prologue

 

II. Introduction: The Anfal Operation in the Historical Context

 

III. Research Objectives and Question

• Expectations and feasibility

• Research Timeline

 

IV. Methodology

 

V. Theoretical Fundamentals

• The Conceptuality of Self-Esteem and Collective Identity

• Transnational History

 

VI. Epilogue: The societal impact and the significance of temporal dynamics

 

Bibliography | Sources 

 

Appendix

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I. Prologue

 

Building upon the foundations of my doctoral research in Post-War (1947−1953) and Cold War History, I respectfully submit this proposal to the Department of Balkan, Slavic, and Oriental Studies at the University of Macedonia. My overarching aim is to situate the Kurdish genocide—implemented through the Anfal operation (1986–1989)—within an expanded geopolitical and normative framework that elucidates the entanglement of regional conflicts with broader constellations of international complicity, strategic collaborations, and ethical responsibility without overlooking the repercussions, to which the project meticulously pays attention.

In seeking to advance the scholarly boundaries of Oriental political studies, accomplished by considering the triptych perpetrator−accomplices−victims, it is structured around two domains of inquiry:

 

1) A systematic re-examination of the structural dynamics governing Middle Eastern history and international politics in the late 1980s by enforcing a comprehensive reassessment of the historical responsibility borne by the Iraqi State for the orchestration of Anfal, examined in conjunction with the corollary accountability of Western powers—most notably the United States and the Federal Republic of Germany—whose political, technological, and industrial interventions substantively enhanced Iraq’s strategic capacities during the Iran–Iraq War on the one hand. The project particularly accords analytical prominence to Germany for numerous reasons:

 

a. Distinctive modalities of involvement

In contrast to other Western states whose engagement was predominantly geostrategic, Germany’s participation was driven primarily by economic imperatives. Although Dutch intermediary Frans van Anraat—exporting materials to the United States and Japan—facilitated certain transfers, the principal production of Iraq’s chemical weapons of mass destruction occurred within German-owned military-industrial and chemical facilities.

 

b. Diaspora configurations and commemorative practices

Germany hosts the largest Kurdish diaspora. Despite state-imposed constraints—particularly with respect to individuals associated with, or presumed to be associated with, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK)—Kurdish communities have nonetheless succeeded in establishing collective spaces for commemoration, public testimony, civic engagement, and cultural preservation, frequently supported by segments of German civil society. In addition to that, thirty years after the Halabja massacre, survivors have sued three German companies for aiding and abetting genocide and crimes against humanity―a judicial verdict has not yet been reached. Notwithstanding these developments, on 23/06/2021, the German Federal Parliament declined to endorse a proposal submitted by the Left Party to formally recognize the Kurdish genocide. Consequently, the Federal Republic has issued no formal acknowledgment of shared responsibility and has initiated no measures aimed at reparative justice or restitution.

 

c. Security doctrine and the institutionalization of prohibition

Since 1993, the Federal Republic has proscribed several Kurdish self-organization groups on the grounds of purported affiliation with the PKK, preceding by more than a decade the European Union’s designation of the PKK as a terrorist organization in 2004. The subsequent unilateral disarmament and dissolution of the PKK on 12/05/2025, coupled with Abdullah Öcalan’s articulation of a more moderate orientation, renders the German case particularly salient for examining the intersection of state security doctrine, minority politics, and transnational governance. 

 

d. Contemporary institutional frameworks

The present research was undertaken shortly before the announcement of the establishment of the first German–Kurdish university, the Internationale Kurdische Hochschule Deutschland (IKHS), on 18/10/2025 in Dresden, marking a substantial institutional milestone in the formalization of European–Kurdish academic and cultural exchange.

 

2) An examination of the formation, articulation, and consolidation of Kurdish discourses and identity, shaped by intersecting historical, political, and religious determinants, and manifested through practices of remembrance, resilience, and narrative self-representation within Kurdistan and the Kurdish diaspora.

This component involves a critical examination of homodiegetic Kurdish narratives in literary texts, commemorative rituals, and witnesses' interviews conducted during my ongoing fieldwork in Kurdistan since April 2024.

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II. Introduction: The Anfal Operation in the Historical Context

 

The Anfal Campaign, rooted in the Arabization of the villages around Kirkuk in 1963, the subsequent deportation of Feyli Kurds, and implemented in various locations beyond the Halabja district, was a series of systematic, coordinated military operations, conducted between 1986 and 1989 by the Iraqi Ba'athist regime under Saddam Hussein—primarily targeting the Kurdish population in northern Iraq.

 

Named after the eighth surah of the Qur'an, »Al-Anfal« (»plunders of war«), orchestrated under Saddam leadership and implemented by Ali Hassan al-Majid, it signifies the genocidal effort to conquer Kurdish resistance and erase Kurdish identity. The acts further included forced disappearances, mass executions, the destruction of numerous villages, large-scale displacement of civilians, and the use of chemical weapons—including the chemical [3] attack on Halabja in 1988. These vicious episodes of state-sponsored violence during the final stages of the Iran–Iraq War (1980–1988) endure as a critical case study and mark a pivotal moment in modern History that sustainably shaped the broader Middle East.

 

The state-orchestrated military and political operation against the Kurdish population in Iraq 's northern regions was officially portrayed by the Iraqi government as a counterinsurgency measure aimed at eliminating Kurdish guerrilla fighters (Peshmerga) allied with Iran during the Iran–Iraq War. Nevertheless, Anfal evolved into a war of mass violence that has since been recognized by numerous scholars and legal bodies, outside of Iraq, as an act of genocide and deserves further research.

 

The roots lie in a long history of tension between the central Iraqi government and the Kurdish minority. Following the formation of modern Iraq under British mandate in the early 20th century, Kurdish aspirations for autonomy were consistently suppressed. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, successive Iraqi regimes clashed with Kurdish resistance movements, particularly the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP/PDK) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), headed by Bafel Talabani, that sought greater political rights and cultural recognition. 

 

By the 1980s, in the pinnacle of the Iran–Iraq War, the Kurdish leadership saw an opportunity to strengthen its position by aligning with Iran against Baghdad. This was perceived as a betrayal and intensified the regime’s hostility toward the Kurds. In response, Saddam Hussein authorized a comprehensive military strategy to eliminate both the Kurdish resistance and the broader civilian population suspected of supporting them. The campaign was spearheaded by Ali Hassan al-Majid―later dubbed "Chemical Ali" for his role in employing chemical weapons during the operation.

 

The Anfal Campaign was conducted in eight distinct phases, each targeting specific areas of Iraqi Kurdistan. Tactics included mass executions, destruction of over 4.000 villages, agricultural devastation, forced displacement of entire communities, and the widespread use of chemical agents such as sarin and mustard gas. One of the most notorious episodes occurred in March 1988 in Halabja [4]. Estimates advocate that approximately 5.000 civilians, including women and children, were killed in a chemical attack.[5]

 

International response to the Anfal Campaign was limited at the time, mainly due to the Cold War’s geopolitical dynamics and the West’s interest in maintaining Iraq as a counterbalance to revolutionary Iran. It was not until after the 1991 Gulf War and the subsequent exposure of mass graves and testimonies that the full extent of the atrocities became widely known.

​

Beyond the immediate loss of life, the campaign inflicted enduring demographic, psychological, and cultural harm upon Kurdish society. These cumulative effects, paradoxically, also contributed to the political consolidation that later facilitated the emergence of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in the post-2003 period. The 2005 Iraqi Constitution formally recognizes the Kurdistan Region—whose administrative foundations were established in 1970—as a federal entity within the Republic of Iraq.

 

The post-war period in Baghdad and Erbil

In an almost 1.000 pages document, the Iraqi High Tribunal, according to documentary evidence, survivor testimony, and military order, concluded that the Anfal Campaign consisted of multiple coordinated military operations designed to destroy the Kurdish rural population through mass executions, widespread village destruction, forced displacement, and the use of chemical weapons. It was determined that these actions were not isolated abuses but a centrally planned state policy. In its decision, the IHT declared that the Anfal Campaign met the legal criteria for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. Several defendants, including Ali Hassan al-Majid, were found guilty and received the death penalty. The judgment is significant as the first domestic legal ruling to formally classify the Anfal Campaign as genocide[6]​.

 

Regarding the political landscape in the Kurdistan Region, it functions today as a parliamentary democracy encompassing the governorates of Duhok, Erbil, and Sulaymaniyah. Although Masoud Barzani remains a central figure in Kurdish politics and continues to wield significant influence as the long-standing leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, the presidency of the Kurdistan Region is held by Nechirvan Barzani, who has served since 2019. His recent political activities, including public statements and institutional engagements in November 2025, supported by the Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Region, Masrour Barzani, underscore ongoing efforts to advance constitutional implementation and to vnegotiate enduring disputes between Erbil and Baghdad. According to preliminary results, the ruling party secured over 1 million votes in the recent elections on 11/11/2025.

 

The project does not conceptualize the events as discrete or isolated occurrences; instead, it situates them within a longitudinal continuum of political domination, resource exploitation, and sectarian stratification whose structural legacies remain deeply embedded in contemporary regional dynamics. The Iraqi state’s reconquest of the predominantly Kurdish city of Kirkuk on 16/10/2017—an urban center of exceptional strategic importance due to its extensive oil reserves—exemplifies this historical continuity. Currently administered by the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), a coalition of predominantly Iran-aligned Shi’a militias, Kirkuk constitutes a paradigmatic locus of persistent interplay between geopolitical contestation, structural violence, and collective precarity.

 

A dedicated chapter of this project examines the genocide perpetrated against the Yezidi (Yazidi) community, with particular attention to the Islamic State’s assault on Sinjar on 3/08/2014. This case accentuates the persistence of genocidal violence and the recurrent manifestations of state-sponsored or state-enabled persecution in the broader Middle Eastern context.

 

Moreover, it reveals the extent to which entrenched forms of international complicity, structural indifference, and the persistent inadequacy of global accountability mechanisms have facilitated the recurrence of mass atrocities. By drawing systematic parallels between historical and contemporary configurations of state and non-state violence, the project seeks to make a substantive contribution to ongoing scholarly debates concerning transnational responsibility, regimes of memory, and the ethical and political parameters of humanitarian intervention.

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[3] United Nations Security Council. Report of the Secretary-General on Chemical Weapons Use in the Conflict Between Iran and Iraq. New York: UN, 1986–1989. Available here:

www.securitycouncilreport.org atf/cf/{65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9}/DisarmS17911.pdf

Cf. also US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Chemical Weapons Use in Kurdistan. Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1988. Available here: www.casi.org.uk/info/usdocs/senatecw8810a.pdf

 

[4] Kurdistan Regional Government. Halabja: Documents of Genocide. Erbil, 2013.

 

[5] McDowall, David. A Modern History of the Kurds. 3rd ed. London: I.B. Tauris, 2004, pp. 357−367.

Cf. also Human Rights Watch. Genocide in Iraq: The Anfal Campaign Against the Kurds. New York: HRW, 1993. Available here: www.hrw.org/reports/1993/iraqanfal/ANFALINT.htm

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[6] ​

Iraqi High Tribunal. Anfal Trial Judgment. Baghdad, 2007. Available here: www.asser.nl/upload/documents/DomCLIC/Docs/NLP/Iraq/Anfal_verdict.pdf

Cf. also Anfal Case and Genocide Crime [Appeal dissenting opinion]/ Al Anfal Appeal Dissenting Opinion. Case Law_ Al Anfal (Ali Hasan Al-Majid et al.). In: Legal Tools Database. Available here: www.legal-tools.org/doc/f7e5aa/pdf

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III. Research Objectives and Questions

 

The Anfal Operation and its long-lasting implications on Kurdish identity, society, political developments, and collective memory in Iraq and the diaspora is, as mentioned, the subject of my second book, aiming to profoundly study the culture of remembrance and the processes of resilience in this framework and supplementary contribute to the global human rights discourses on genocide, ethnic cleansing, state violence, and the use of modern military technology against civilians. Although considerable scholarship has examined specific facets of Anfal, there remains a significant lacuna in academic studies that interrogates its aftermath by simultaneously scrutinizing Western accountability and perceptions of Anfal within Kurdistan and the Kurdish diaspora.

 

Employing a plethora of methodological approaches, I will thus not only try to delve into the Western accountability and advance understanding in the overlooked domain of the Anfal perception in the Kurdish Communities in Germany, but also try to answer the following questions, focusing on the Aftermath within and beyond Kurdish borders that address a deficiency in the literature.

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Research Questions

 

• How has the aftermath of the Anfal Genocide shaped the individual and political identity, as well as the collective memory of Kurdish survivors in Iraqi Kurdistan and the Diaspora?

 

• How have processes of justice, acknowledgment, and memorialization influenced survivors’ ability to heal and re-establish a sense of security after the genocide?

 

• In what ways has the Anfal trauma influenced psychological and social well-being among survivors and their descendants? How does the transmission to subsequent generations function? Did the victims, also in terms of a gender specific post-war assessment, have opportunities for recovery? What coping strategies have survivors developed in the aftermath of the genocide, and how have these influenced community resilience? What are the attitudes of survivors toward death, and how do they appreciate and honor the worth of life in?

 

• How have processes of justice, acknowledgment, and memorialization influenced survivors’ ability to re-establish a sense of security after the Anfal genocide, including the recent offensive by the Islamic State in August 2014? What is their attitude towards the German arms industry involved in the Anfal?

 

• How did the destruction of the villages alter patterns of community reconstruction and displacement in post-1988 Kurdish society? What were the long-term socioeconomic effects of the genocide on survivors, and how did these shape their post-war life trajectories?

 

Hence, the study does not only seek to address significant gaps in the historical understanding of the Anfal campaign, with particular attention to the role of West Germany in supplying materials for chemical attacks and the double standard of the Reagan administration, which, despite being aware of these events, chose to adopt a lenient stance toward Iraq while it simultaneously fought its archenemy, Iran. The research situates itself within the ongoing historical reassessment in both contemporary Iraq and Western countries regarding the Ba’athist campaign of extermination against the Kurds. Additionally, this project examines cultural practices of remembrance in Kurdistan, northern Iraq, and the Kurdish diaspora. The latter does still remain a not deeply examined field.

 

The purpose is to highlight how Kurdish identity and collective memory have been profoundly shaped by genocidal events, including the recent Yazidi [7] ​genocide (2014–2017). Furthermore, the study analyzes commemoration ceremonies in which massacre victims and Peshmerga fighters are honored as martyrs, emphasizing the cultural and symbolic dimensions of remembrance.  

 

The literary texts, many introduced for the first time in an academic context, are critically assessed as valuable sources for historical analysis, illustrating how novels, poetry, and theatrical works could offer insight into collective trauma and memory.

It is estimated that the Yazidis have been witnessing circa 74 genocides throughout their history.

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[7] It is estimated that the Yazidis have been witnessing circa 74 genocides throughout their history.

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Expectations and feasibility

By investigating the political, historical, and ethical dimensions of the Anfal operation—particularly Iraq’s internal and external dynamics during and after the Iran–Iraq War—this study adopts an interdisciplinary methodology that integrates cultural history, ethnography, international relations, political ethics, and critical literary analysis. In doing so, it also seeks to reassess Western complicity in Middle Eastern conflicts by examining archival materials, declassified intelligence reports, and historical documentation (see bibliography).

 

Building on the foregoing, this project constitutes the first comprehensive study to focus explicitly on Germany, drawing predominantly on German-language sources, conducted within a Greek university context, and intended for presentation to the international scholarly community. The undertaking is considered eminently feasible, as the researcher resides part-time in Germany, maintains extensive networks with numerous Kurdish organizations, is a native German speaker, and has already produced a monograph alongside multiple scholarly articles in German. Regarding methodology, the experienced researcher has already conducted short-term ethnographic research in Burkina Faso, West Africa, and archival research at the New York University Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives, and the Boston University Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center. In addition, she has been running International Political Literature Projects in Munich since 2011.

 

The study will be completed within the allocated timeframe of two years.

 

Research Timeline

1. Arrangement (literature review & digitalized archives)

January 2026−April 2026 

2. Research (ethnographic fieldwork & archival research

in Iraq, Kurdistan, and Germany)

April 2026−September 2026   

3. Assessment (evaluation & classification of the material)

September 2026−January 2027    

4. Writing Process

January 2027−April 2027      

 

A historical coincidence may further underscore the relevance of this project: On 6/05/2025, Reem Alabali Radovan, a woman of Iraqi origin and of Chaldean Catholic faith, whose father—a member of the Iraqi Communist Party—appears to have been targeted by Saddam Hussein's extermination policies, assumed a prominent role in German politics. Other notable political figures of Kurdish origin active in the German political arena, such as Bavarian MP Gülseren Demirel and Sevim Dağdelen, a Left-wing MP serving from 2005 to 2025, are among those I intend to approach for insider perspectives.

 

The above arguments underscore the need for scholarly research aimed at revealing the broader historical and political context. This is particularly evident in the examination of the Anfal genocide, which remains relatively underexplored outside academic circles, especially when contrasted with the response to the recent genocide of the Yezidis, which commenced on 03/08/2014 and was formally recognized by the Bundestag on 19/01/2023.

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IV. Methodology

 

As an American cultural historian, I advocate for the coalescence of advanced archival and field research, combined with the evaluation of oral history materials and cultural projects of remembrance, which have become imperative for unraveling complex interdisciplinary challenges, pushing the boundaries of knowledge, and advancing our understanding in Area Studies. The methodology, chosen for a topic that is coined by the traumatic experience of a harassed stateless nation, is based on a cluster of three methods. The following explains every approach in detail.

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― A. Archival Research

To substantiate the purely historical part and foster an objective contextual understanding, we will, methodologically, prioritize the significance of archival research. Hence, not only will the credibility of the historical study be enhanced by using archival materials, but the study will also be strengthened. The primary sources, including original records and documents, will provide firsthand insights and help us avoid distortions, even if the latter cannot be guaranteed, since the researcher is not of Kurdish origin and therefore emotionally unattached and ideologically unbiased. Moreover, the study will aid in verifying and cross-referencing new and previously published information.

 

Finally, the primary bibliography in the present project is considered a preservation of cultural heritage. The used archival materials will serve as repositories of collective memory, preserving the documentary heritage of the Kurdish nation, and will contribute to safeguarding and interpreting this heritage as well as transferring it to future generations and maintaining the continuity of cultural and historical consciousness; the documentary evidence will serve as custodians of collective memory and cultural heritage, ensuring that the voices of the past—both powerful and marginalized—are not lost.   

 

― B. Short-term Ethnographic Fieldwork

Ethnographic fieldwork is a qualitative research method in the social sciences in which researchers immerse themselves in a community or culture over an extended period to observe and understand its social practices, beliefs, and behaviors in their natural context. The central method is participant observation, in which ethnographers document their experiences and observations while actively participating in the daily life of the community under study. This method is inductive and open-ended, aiming to explore what is significant to the community itself rather than testing pre-formulated hypotheses. Ethnography is a collaborative process between researchers and participants, based on relationships and ethical guidelines.

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Visiting villages that were nearly destroyed in the 1980s and talking to survivors makes sense for several scientific reasons. Ethnographic fieldwork enables researchers to understand the experiences, perspectives, and cultural frameworks of meaning of the affected people from an insider's perspective. Through direct on-site presence, researchers can capture not only verbal testimonies but also the spatial, material, and social contexts in which these traumatic events occurred and how they continue to resonate today. The combination of historical and ethnographic methods allows researchers to explore both the historical events and their present-day significance and processing within the community. Oral history interviews with survivors produce important sources that document underrepresented or marginalized voices and preserve personal memories and narratives.

 

For research with traumatized people, the ethnographic method offers specific advantages when conducted in a trauma-informed manner. Ethnographic approaches enable a flexible, respectful, and context-sensitive approach that can be adapted to survivors' needs and pace. Unlike standardized surveys, participant observation and open, semi-structured conversations allow participants to tell their stories in their own words and according to their own priorities. Long-term presence in the field enables the building of trust relationships, which are central to traumatized persons. Trauma-informed ethnography requires specific competencies, including awareness of re-traumatization risks, ethical sensitivity, and the ability to adapt research to participants' emotional and psychological needs.

 

Furthermore, the ethnographic method enables the capture of local conceptualizations of psychological distress and cultural explanatory frameworks that are often overlooked in standardized psychiatric or psychological instruments. This is particularly important because traumatic experiences are processed and expressed differently across cultures. The long-term, relationship-based nature of ethnographic fieldwork stands in contrast to a "hit-and-run" model of data collection and enables more ethically responsible research that respects the dignity and autonomy of survivors and centers their perspectives.

 

― C. Interdisciplinary Literature Review

An interdisciplinary literature review synthesizes research from multiple academic fields to provide a comprehensive understanding of a topic that cannot be fully explored from a single discipline. It goes beyond a simple summary to identify themes, contradictions, and gaps in the existing research by combining methodologies, theories, and findings from various disciplines. The goal is to generate new insights or develop a framework that integrates diverse perspectives, informing future research, policy, or practice.

 

The anthology, chosen, is based on a cluster of three works, written initially in Kurdish (translated into English), in Greek (translated into English), and German. Following, every book will be shortly described.   

 

• THE CORPUS (Indicative literary regarding the psychological and )

 

1. Theater as therapeutic remembrance work: The Amanat Project in Sati, Kurdistan

Author: Husain »Hawre« Zangana, based in Munich, Germany

Original Titel: Theater als therapeutische Erinnerungsarbeit: Das Amanat-Projekt in Sati / Kurdistan

»The end of a war is not the end of the war in the mindset of many people«

Dr. Zangana

Poems about Kurdish women, victims of the Al-Anfal events in 1988, during which 182,000 people were displaced in Iraq, inspired Dr. Zangana to write the drama Amanat. Despite inherent risks, Amanat was performed with and for people near Kirkuk in 2007. With the participation of relatives, a memorial stone with the names of the missing was erected, and a tree was planted for each victim. In 2016, a theater monument was erected as part of a theatrical ritual—a play that revolutionizes the European theater.  

This work, initially published as a PhD at the University of Munich, deals with the postwar traumatic memories, focusing on a nation, where access to therapy is not an established culture and gives answers to two main questions: What therapeutic effect does theater have on people who have lost loved ones to violence? Who is a therapeutic theater model aimed at?

This literary and academic masterpiece will significantly contribute to our understanding regarding the culture of remembrance and the resilience processes as well.

 

2. Crystal: The sacred fulfillment of Faqra ― to be published in English―

Author: Ahmad Jasem, author and journalist, based in Duhok, Iraqi Kurdistan

Original Titel: رکرسیتال 

Crystal is a Kurdish novel dedicated to the victims of two difficult periods that the Kurdish people have gone through: the period of the war with ISIS and the period of the Anfal massacre. During the ISIS period, there is a Yazidi hero who is arrested together with a journalist who intends to turn his story into a novel. During the Anfal period, there is a character from the victims of the massacre who, over time, turns into a drug dealer. The story highlights the effects of war on the victims and how some victims became executioners. In addition, the story describes the atmosphere of gambling halls that developed after the war, the psychology of the gambler, the workers in these halls, and the financial status of their owners. The novel also thematizes Yazidi culture and depicts the suffering they experienced when abducted by terrorist organizations. It was recently translated into English by students of the Translation Department at Nawroz University under the supervision of their professors.

 

3. Azad is my name

Author: Cemîl Tûran Bazîdî, based in Athens, Greece

Original Titel: Αζάντ με λένε, also translated into Spanish unter the title Me IIamo Asad

The novel Αζάντ με λένε narrates the story of those who escaped the Halabja massacre.

»He saw his mother leave the door of their house wide open as they abandoned it for the great escape. "Let the air in, let it take away and dispel our scent. I don't want to leave that behind in this unforgiving place either. Nothing. Our graves are enough." Azad didn't know why they had to leave, nor did he have a say in the decisions; he was just a teenager, fourteen years old. Their destination was freedom and civilization, Greece. "We will meet free people who are our friends and who will help us. Our homeland doesn't want us? We will find another one," their father encouraged them. They had no life in Iraq. They lived with the certainty of death. And a breath away from "the other side," a river away from reaching the land of friendship, everything was lost. And he was left alone, a beardless child, having to decide, to follow, to refuse, to pursue, to resist, to escape, to find and to lose... People came and went, as did borders, customs, religions, and romantic stirrings. And everything was done for one goal: to obtain the passport that would turn Azad from an illegal citizen of the world into a visitor to his homeland, in the hope of finding his own people. But sometimes luck withdraws from the choices and plays its own game, in other places, with other people, with other encounters.« (From the presentation on the back cover of the book)..« (From the presentation on the back cover of the book).

 

4. Poems by the Kurdish poetess Venus Faiq inspired by the Anfal operations.

 

V. Theoretical Fundamentals

 

1. The Conceptuality of Self-Esteem and Collective Identity

Regarding the socially constructed nature of identity, I will mainly work on Georg Mead’s theory of the self, emphasizing the relationship between the self and the other. He distinguished “I” from “me,” proposing that “I” is the social self, while “me” constitutes each individual’s own sense of self. He further asserted that neither of these can exist without the other. According to Mead, individual identities develop in response to others' attitudes, which are incorporated into individuals’ self-perception. The development of the self occurs through interaction with others and the world around us. To subsume these ideas in Mead’s (1934) own words: To subsume these ideas in Mead’s own words:

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»We are one thing to one man and another thing to another […]. There are all sorts of different selves answering all sorts of different social reactions. It is the social process itself that is responsible for the appearance of the self.«

 

Further, Anthony Giddens (1991) also provides a theoretical framework by arguing that:

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»The work of identity is always going on. Identity is not some primordial core of personality that already exists. Nor is it something we acquire at some point in the same way that, at a certain age, we grow a set of permanent teeth. (…) Our identity is something we constantly renegotiate during the course of our lives. Identity is fundamentally temporal. Because it is constructed in social contexts, the temporality of identity is more complex than a linear notion of time. Identities are defined with respect to the interaction of multiple convergent and divergent trajectories.«

 

Giddens’ understanding of identity is one of »coherent, yet continuously revised, biographical narratives«. Self and reflexivity are interwoven, so that identity is considered as the ability to construct a reflexive narrative of the self. Identity comprises many narratives a person constructs for himself or herself, which can vary over time and occasion. In other words: an individual’s self-identity is a collection of reflexively constructed, personal, and social narratives. The narrative created by an individual includes past memories and future plans in which private “stories” are shaped by the external sociocultural environment and form their life trajectory or »trajectory of the self«. Narratives also offer a way of understanding the self as a unity.

 

At this juncture, the challenge lies in approaching the utopian notion of a 'common' national identity among the Kurds—spread across four countries (Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey)—through a multifaceted lens. The complexity of analyzing Kurdish identity extends beyond geographical distinctions to comprehend the country in which this identity was historically and socially merged, the diversity of political ideologies, and the plurality of religious affiliations, including Sunni Islam, Alevism (a significant minority), Shia Islam (a small minority), Yezidism, and Yarsanism. At this point, a theoretical construct could be here Richard Jenkins (2014) conclusions on the conceptuality of collective identity:

 

»Hence, identity is not a given fact; identity is a practical accomplishment, a process. Identifying ourselves or others is a matter of meaning, and meaning always involves interaction: agreement and disagreement, convention and innovation, communication and negotiation«

 

In this context, the following critical observation can also be foregrounded: The Anfal campaign—a systematic extermination primarily targeting Kurdish victims, predominantly Sunni Muslims, and executed by Iraqi Shiite forces—was named after the eighth chapter (Surah) of the Qur’an and justified in the name of so-called 'faith,' drawing a parallel with the historic Battle of Badr in Medina in 624 CE between the Quraysh and the Prophet Muhammad’s followers. From a semiotic perspective, this raises a profound question:

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Does the designation 'Anfal' constitute a meaningful signifier that conveys a deliberate ideological and religious rationale, or does it function as a hollow verbal construct, devoid of resonance for the victims themselves?

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