This paper analyzes the ideas of two infuential Turkish nationalists hailing from predominantly Kurdish areas, their perception of Kurds and definition of their own national identity at the expense Kurdishness. While Gokalp denied any Kurdish affiliation but accepted the existence of the Kurdish people, Arvasi rejected both his own connection with the Kurds and the existence of a Kurdish people. In the judgment of the latter, Kurds were in fact Turks who had false consciousness. The evolution of Turkish national identity from an Ottoman and Islamic to a Turkish affiliation was a gradual process under the influence of political events and the endeavors of intellectuals. Ziya Gokalp (1876-1924) was one of the most important figures in the emergence of political Turkism as he tried to synthesize the dominant political currents at the time in favor of Turkish nationalism and worked for the systematization of Turkism. He advocated a Westernist Turkish nationalism without totally breaking off with the Islamic heritage. However, a number of his ideas, such as his call for the abolishment of the monarchy and Turkification of the ezan, were revolutionary making him a precursor of Kemalist nationalism. Ahmet Arvasi (1932-1988) on the other hand was one of the most influential ideologues of the Nationalist Action Party with his conceptualization of the Turkish-Islamic Ideal (T(rk-rslam llk s?). He supported a hiearchically conservative society where Turks were to be the dominant element in society. Writing in the 1960s and the 1970s, his ideas were indicative of a more Islam-centered worldview which has been gaining ground in Turkey. In women's issues, for instance, he was unlike G kalp, very restrictive and patriarchal. A comparison of the two ideologues in general and their approach to Kurds in particular offers both an ideological and biographical analysis, demonstrating the similar and diverging elements in their thought and the increasing power of conservative nationalism. A particularly interesting dimension of this presentation is when G kalp and Arvasi discuss their own identity. Needless to say, Gskalp offered a more nuanced approach, employing social science methods developed in Europe, whereas Arvasi remained provincial, very much in line with NAP circles. However, the reasons for choosing or rejecting a particular identity, Turkish, Kurdish or Muslim, which will be tackled in this study, remain a highly relevant issue for modern Middle Eastern politics.

The Turkish state under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal initiated far reaching statist policies focused on rapid industrialization and modernization of the economy and citizenry. Not unlike many other societies in the world at the time, the new Turkish state heralded the family as the basic unit of society and the workshop for creating modern, nationalist Turks. The extent to which the state penetrated the realm of the family becomes evident through examining Turkish criminal and civil law codes that emphasize the culture of honor in familial law, particularly in regards to domestic violence, including murder. Despite significant revisions in the Turkish legal system under the Kemalists in the name of "modernization," until 2005 Turkey incorporated loopholes in the law for people (mostly men) who kill or otherwise victimize their wives, sisters, and other family members in the name of honor. Now, in the context of European Union candidacy and pressures from domestic and international human rights advocates, the Turkish state and dominant popular culture emphasizes the "Kurdishness" of honor-related violence in Turkey. I contend that the effort to identify honor killings with Kurdish "tradition" allows the dominant culture and Turkish state to detract attention away from the occurrence of such crimes, and is an attempt to re-affirm a "modern" Turkish identity to the international community as well as to maintain internal power dynamics within Turkey itself. Further, my paper examines the impact that nationalist modernization projects had on the culture of honor and the existence of honor-related gendered violence, and argues that the existence of honor killings in the Kurdish regions and in the diaspora has more to do with "modernization," particularly as it concerns the importance of women in twentieth-century nationalist modernization projects, than it does with tradition. From its inception in 1923, the Turkish state and legal codes insisted that its citizenry, particularly women, behave "honorably." After examining Turkish law codes and court cases, it becomes increasingly difficult to argue that honor-related violence is simply a backward, ancient Kurdish tradition. Instead, I offer a historical understanding of honor-related violence that situates the apparent increase in honor killings in the Kurdish regions in the context of civil war and Kemalist reforms with an eye to the legal aspects of this process.

This paper analyses a series of "home narratives" gathered in Yuksekova district of Hakkari, a Kurdish town located on the Iraqi-Turkish border. In Hakkari, the border was a significant marker of people's lives and imaginations as at once a physical and a socio-psychic entity. Not a mere consequence of physical location, this was a dynamic product of the histories of economic and political movements across the border. Ruled under an aggressive State of Emergency Rule from 1980 to 2003, Hakkari was also one of the major sites where the war between Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish army has been the bitterest. Wars and armed conflicts are rarely fought only at the battleground. Rather, they find their ways into the most intimate domain of the home, disrupting it in a variety of ways. Perhaps the most important aim of those under conditions of war or after is to maintain a sense of home, a sociality created around the home, other than their life security. This article will trace the ways in which people have struggled to create and maintain the sense of being at home in violent moments of the last century. I want to draw a picture of war and survival by tracing how people have made homes or been unable to make them. And how in this process, the meanings of home and what is associated with it have changed. I will focus on narratives on three historical and political moments that are most emphasized in the narratives and life stories I gathered: the genocide and deportations of the Armenians as well as other non-Muslim populations of Hakkari in 1915 that turned the region into a home only for the Muslim Kurds; the destruction of homes as rural Hakkari was depopulated as a part of the recent counterinsurgency warfare against Kurdish guerrillas, and the struggles of people to make homes and maintain the sense of being at home after they came to Yuksekova.

Kurdish political and cultural rights in Bashar Al-Assad's Syria This paper examines the situation of the Kurds in Syria since the ascent to power of Bashar al-Assad in 2000. Kurds, who make up just under 10% of Syria's population, are marginalized and repressed. I argue that they are worse off now than under the ultimate decade of Hafez al-Assad's reign. Kurdish public space in Syria has shrunk from almost infinitesimal to nil in the past 10 years. While the expectation was an opening and relaxation of harsh laws repressing the Kurdish population of the country, those expectations have not been fulfilled. In 2004, massive state crackdowns on Kurdish cultural and political expression wiped away any hopes of gains under Bashar's regime. But then in 2005, the Ba'ath Party congress promised to give more cultural and linguistic rights to the Kurds of Syria. Again, nothing happened. In fact, due to the events in the neighbouring countries of Iraq and Turkey, it seems that Kurds face more repression under Bashar al-Assad than before. There are several possible reasons for this rise in repression of the Kurdish community in Syria and I will explore two possible explanations, particularly relevant since late 2008. First, the rise of the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq and the 'Kurdish Initiative' in Turkey. The KRG offers full language, cultural, and political rights. The region operates as a quasi-independent nation. In Turkey, the ruling AKP (Justice and Development Party) is offering unprecedented rights to Kurds there. There are dozens of media outlets in the KRG, broadcasting 24/7 in Kurdish. Turkey has begun Kurdish broadcasting. Syria, on the other hand, has never allowed TV, radio, or newspapers in Kurdish. Second, there is better networking amongst Kurds in the region--with each other regionally, and with other Kurds in the European diaspora This has led to more awareness of rights offered to Kurds under the tutelage of Ankara and Erbil. Damascus is extremely wary of possible popular movements within its own territories as Kurds grow restless and are emboldened by what they see happening in neighboring countries. Bashar al-Assad makes promises to the Kurds, raising their hopes. The Kurds in turn express that hope via cultural celebrations or rallies. This brings on the government crackdowns as Damascus has no other mechanism to deal with non-Arab political or cultural expression.

The period of 1960-1990 in Iraq represents a volatile interlude of internal strife illustrated by demographic shifting, new cultural and political policies, and the rise of ethno-nationalism. The traditionalist view that this period of Iraqi history is comprised of an Iraqi Arab versus its ethnic Kurdish enclave is an oversimplification at best. This work is concerned with whether or not this period can be marked solely by a Kurdish verses Arab struggle, or, was it indeed a more intricate situation of major power politics affecting a much larger area, with greater implications for all Iraqi's including its various ethnic and religious minority groups. A closer examination of the region affected (according to military campaigns) in northern Iraq demonstrates that the Kurds were but one ethno-religious group to suffer in the wake of this period marked by military activity. Primary estimates numbered 183 Yezidi and Christian Assyrian villages destroyed from 1963 to 1988. Later estimates saw a significantly higher number between 1974 and 1989, citing 220 villages destroyed and their people killed or forcibly resettled. In the case of Turkoman and Shabaks much less has been published (with the exception of the Kirkuk region) but it is the hypothesis of this study that further research will show that they too experienced major demographic shifting during the period in question. Thus this work will focus on the periods of the 1960s concentrating on the Kurdish Uprising of 1961; the border clearings of 1977-1978 in the Barwari Bala region; and finally the Anfal campaign in 1988 and its immediate aftermath. This study contributes to a greater understanding of power politics in the Middle East and specifically Iraq. More importantly it examines such political struggles between minorities and majorities as it relates to sectarian strife in post 2003 Iraq highlighting not only common internal struggles, but also external forces which have contributed to the current situation.