WUNRN
Turkey Kurdish Women: Resilience In The Face Of Double
Discrimination
Kurds living in
By Kathambi Kinoti – 4/12/12
The Kurdish ethnic group historically
inhabited Kurdistan, an area now divided between the modern states of
AWID asked two Kurdish women about the
unique challenges that Kurdish women face in securing equality rights as part
of a marginalized group. Dr. Handan Çağlayan[ii] is an independent researcher and writer while Nurcan
Baysal[iii] is an activist working on rural development.
Turkish women face several barriers to
full equality but the situation of Kurdish women is exacerbated by prejudice
against their ethnic and linguistic identity. Çağlayan attributes the
discrimination that Turkish women face to patriarchy in private and public
spaces. Women have heavier workloads at home and this is a barrier to their
participation in work outside the home. They are also marginalized socially and
politically. “Capitalism benefits from patriarchal control over women,” says
Çağlayan. “Women are marginalized in the production process, and their
employment is increasingly informalized.” She adds that for Kurdish women,
armed conflict, village evacuations and forced migration further impoverish
women and expose them to human rights violations.
Baysal says that since there are not many
opportunities for employment, several entrepreneurship projects for Kurdish
women have been started with foreign support, but many of these have failed.
Çağlayan notes that data collected by the Turkish Statistical
Institute (Turkstat) does not distinguish on the basis of ethnic origin.
Nevertheless, inferences that can be deduced from data collected indicate that Kurdish
women engage less in the labour market, earn lower wages and work in more
precarious conditions than either Kurdish men or non-Kurdish women. “In the
East,” she says. “Either they do not participate in the paid labour force or
they work in precarious and low-paid jobs as unpaid [domestic] workers,
seasonal agricultural labourers or textile workers.”
Baysal flags lack of access to education
and employment as some of the most significant barriers faced by Kurdish women;
and these are compounded by the language barrier. “They start their [formal]
educational [journey] with a language other than their own and this brings many
challenges –estrangement to their own culture, incomprehension of the lessons
taught, and discrimination within the school system.”
State
policies prohibiting any official use of the Kurdish language[iv]marginalize Kurdish women even more. In order to access
education, employment and social welfare they must be able to speak Turkish
fluently. According to Çağlayan, to communicate with the outside world
they often need the intervention of a Turkish-speaking family member – usually
male - and this reinforces men’s control over women.
Migration experiences
Baysal highlights some problems that those
who migrate – especially forcibly - to the west of
Çağlayan agrees that those who move
west to
Her research about women forcibly migrated
to
Impact of the War
Çağlayan says that the impact of the
war on women has been multifaceted. “Women have undergone the traumatic
impact of conflicts, rights violations, forced migration and impoverishment,”
she says. But in her book Mothers, Comrades Goddesses she writes that
the conflict situation has provided opportunities for women’s activism and
greater voice. “The conflict has had the impact of politicizing them.”
Combating stereotypes
Kurdish women are often stereotyped as
ignorant, victims, subjects of so-called ‘honour killings’ and so on. Baysal
says: “Kurdish women are depicted as passive and pitiful subjects, ignorant and
oppressed by their culture.” But this is not the case. “They fight for their
own and their children’s rights despite all the dispossession and losses;
despite everything,” she says.
Both Baysal and Çağlayan emphasize
the folly in depicting Kurdish women as homogenous. “A great majority
underwent a political socialization during the process of political
mobilization on the basis of Kurdish identity and are empowered,” says
Çağlayan. “They are not victims.” They participate in decision-making and
are represented politically. More recently, the stereotype of Kurdish women as
pro-conflict and violence has arisen, according to Çağlayan who cites media
characterizations of BDP (Peace and Democracy Party) Deputy Emine Ayna as a
“hawk.” She says that on the other hand, women are subject to stereotyping by
the ideology of the Kurdish political leadership; the “free Kurdish woman”
homogenization that is central to Kurdish political identity discourse is
misleading. “Reduction of women’s emancipation to the demonstration of active
political participation… can trivialize patriarchal control, oppression and the
violence women face,” says Çağlayan.
Kurdish women’s activism
According to Baysal,
Çağlayan says that there are a number
of organizations that provide services to address conflicts, forced migration,
violation of rights and poverty. “Such institutions are usually affiliated with
municipalities and are service-focused rather than policy-making,” she says.
To reinforce their activism, women’s
rights organizations often form networks. : “There are widespread and strong
networks in the region, built mainly by the women’s departments of political
parties or other associations,” says Çağlayan. “They organize regional and
national women’s rights campaigns.”
Women human rights defenders in
There are several Kurdish women’s rights
initiatives. The Saturday Mothers is a group of women who for over 17 years have been seeking justice for disappeared
relatives. The Women’s Initiatives for peace brings together young women,
both Kurdish and non-Kurdish. Young Kurdish women actively support these
groups and according to Baysal, today almost all Kurdish women’s associations
are run by youth under the age of 30. Baysal says that most are
politically engaged and although they may differ on certain issues, they are
united on the question of Kurdish as a language for education.
Political participation and engagement
with Kurdish question
Kurdish women are very actively engaged on
the political front. Çağlayan says: “They participate in political
decision-making mechanisms and have strong representation. The BDP which is
predominant in the region applies a quota requiring a minimum of 40% female
representation.”
Baysal believes that the reason Kurdish
women are very active in politics is their sensitization influenced by over 30
years of war. “[It has made] Kurdish women more [forceful] about the rights of
the children they have lost [and] their [families],” she says. She adds that
while they have lost a lot, “the war has transformed them into significant
political actors.”
The Kurdish women’s rights movement is
closely related to the Kurdish political movement. According to Baysal, the war
and poverty have been key mobilizing factors. The Kurdish movement has opened
up spaces for women to organize; Kurdish municipalities have set up women’s
centres, and gender quotas have been applied. She says that while there is a
common consciousness and struggle, the Kurdish women’s movement is not
dependent on the wider Kurdish political movement. According to Çağlayan,
the gender-equity discourse within the Kurdish movement has opened spaces for
women to assert themselves as independent, equal rights-holders. They have
relative freedom of movement, although the concepts of honour and patriarchal
control have not been completely eliminated.
“Kurdish women,” says
Çağlayan."Are politicized and organized prevalently and in mass under
the umbrella of the Kurdish political movement.” In the broader context
of repression and violence, their women rights advocacy is not separate from
the Kurdish political movement.
Successes and challenges
Baysal says that a major challenge is the
restriction over the freedom of speech. [vi] “I always know where and to what extent I should speak
as a Kurdish woman,” she says. “There is always a limit.” The inability
to access to resources and funding, and a shortage of competent human
resources, is another challenge.
However, says Baysal, “The most important
success could be the fact that Kurdish women are more active in politics and
NGOs.”
Çağlayan adds that by becoming
effective political agents, even without formal education, Kurdish women have
subverted the prevalent Turkish image of the “emancipated and modern woman” as
one who has an education and career. [vii]
Saira Zuberi contributed to research on
this article.
[i] See : http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/country_profiles/1022222.stm
[ii] Dr. Handan Çağlayan has authored two books about
women in the Kurdish movement, Kurdish women’s identity and Kurdish women’s
experiences of forced migration: Analar Yoldaşlar Tanrıçalar: Kürt
Hareketinde Kadınlar ve Kadın Kimliğinin İnşası
(Mothers, Comrades, Goddesses: Women in the Kurdish Movement and the Formation
of Women’s Identity), İstanbul: İletişim, 2010 (3rd ed.), and Ne
Değişti? Kürt Kadınların Zorunlu Göç Deneyimi (What Has
Changed? Kurdish Women’s Experiences of Forced Migration), co-authored by
Şemsa Özar and Ayşe Tepe, İstanbul: Ayizi, 2011.
[iii] [iii] Nurcan Baysal is the founder and Coordinator of
the Rural Development Program at the Hüsnü Özyeğin Foundation. She is also
a founding member of a newly established Kurdish Institue, DISA, the
Diyarbakır Institute for Social and Political Research. Nurcan
serves as an advisor and board member to several organizations such as the
Global Fund for Women, Urgent Action Fund, Women Labour and Employment
Platform, and is also a writer on development issues in
[iv] To even speak in Kurdish in public was criminalized
until the 1990s .
[v]See shadow report to the United Nations.
[vi] Generally, Turkey’s
record on freedom of speech is poor.
[vii] Ironically,