5 - Beyond the mountains: transnationalizing the Kurdish struggle for land and national identity

Summary

The word “diaspora” is derived from the Greek word dia, meaning through, and speirein, meaning scatter, the dictionary definition of which is “dispersion from”. Avtar Brah suggests that the word embodies the notion of a centre, a home, from where the dispersion occurs (Brah 1996). William Safran further defines diasporas as expatriate communities characterized by their special relationship with a homeland, whether real or imagined (Safran 1991).

The last few decades have seen the proliferation of Kurds in the diaspora. The most significant of all are the Kurds who left both Kurdistan and the state they belonged to. The history of such movements goes back to the nineteenth century when large numbers of Yezidi Kurds migrated to the former Russian-controlled Transcaucasia, now the republics of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia. Although the population was later dispersed, with some being forcibly moved by Stalin to Siberia and central Asia, they played a substantive role in developing modern Kurdish culture through radio transmissions from Yerevan in Armenia and via print media. The radio broadcasts in particular had a notable impact on the national awareness of the Kurds in Kurdistan (van Bruinessen 2000).

The twentieth century saw the Kurdish diaspora developing in multiple patterns. Large populations of Kurds moved out of the Kurdistan regions in Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran to other parts of these sovereign states, the Middle East region and further afield to western Europe, north America and Australia. Many of them, especially those who settled in Europe, north America and Australia, were politicized Kurds who had left Kurdistan from any one of its four segments, seeking refuge from political repression and persecution. McDowall estimates the number of diaspora Kurds to be around two million (McDowall 2021: 4).

While a cross-section of diaspora Kurds succeeded in boosting and promoting Kurdish art, literature and language, the more politicized Kurds concentrated on advancing Kurdish nationalist aspirations, transnationalizing the Kurdish struggle for territory and national identity. This chapter focuses on the latter group, who have undeniably made an enormous contribution to Kurdish nation-building, or “long-distance nationalism”, a term coined by Benedict Anderson referring to “a nationalism that no longer depends as it once did on territorial location in a home country” (Anderson 2001: 42).