Images of working lives: Experiences of Kurdish migrants in London

Photo Exhibition

Organized by Working Lives Research Institute, London Metropolitan University

Date: Friday 16th- 23rd July 2010 ( Exhibition opening reception 5pm on Friday 16th July 2010)

Venue: RenkArt Centre, 86 Stoke Newington High Street, Stoke Newington N16 7PA

Images of working lives is an exhibition held as part of an Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded research project conducted by Working Lives Research Institute, London Metropolitan University to highlight the working conditions of an ‘invisible’ community, Kurdish Diaspora, in London.

The study focused on minority ethnic workers who experienced difficulties at work and how they developed strategies to solve work related problems including racism, discrimination, bullying, exclusion and isolation. We chose three different minority ethnic communities- locally based ethnic groups, Kurds in Hackney, South Asian in Ealing and Black Caribbeans in Lambeth- in London to enable us to compare and contrast a whole range of different issues. We interviewed total of 185 workers – 100 individually and 88 in 16 focus groups and 64 interviews with ‘key respondents’ who were officials from trade unions, advice agencies and community groups.

Our research team will give brief information on our research findings on the working condition of the Kurdish workers and their strategies to solve work related problems and difficulties.

The exhibition illustrates different experiences of the Kurdish Diaspora in the context of ethnicity, identity, belonging, community and working lives. The audience is invited to take a closer look at the migrants’ life experiences reflected to the lens of photo journalist Jim Hodson, Ümit Avcu and Kurdish photographers’ group RenkArt including Döndü Demir, Erdogan Guccuk, Bektaþ Arif, Alper Taþçý as well as locally based Kurdish photographer Ümit Avcu.

Research team: Dr Jane Holgate (Principal investigator), Janroj Keles, Dr Leena Kumarappan and Professor Anna Pollert.

For further information please contact Dr Jane Holgate or Janroj Keles

j.holgate@londonmet.ac.uk or j.keles@londonmet.ac.uk

This research project is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and is being undertakeby the Working Lives Research Institute, London Metropolitan University.
For further information about our research please visit our website
http://www.workinglives.org/research-themes/wlri-project-websites/$-emraw/emraw_home.cfm

Talk

Talk: Ms Milena Buyum, Campaigner on Turkey for Amnesty International and Mr Ali Has, Lawyer

Concert

Aygul Erce, singer-song writer

Film Screening

‘Taslanan Vicdanlar/Brutal Consciences’ by Cenk Örtülü & Zeynel Koç Turkish and Kurdish with English subtitles, Running time 50 minutes.

Date and time: 24 June 2010,@ 6:00

Venue: Khalili Lecture Theatre, School of Oriental and African Studies SOAS, Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG

Organised by Kurdish society at SOAS(KSSOAS), Kurdish Studies and Student Organisation (KSSO) and Britain Peace Council (MECLISA AŞITIYA BRITANYA’YE – BRITANYA BARIŞ MECLISI)

Seminar abstract and program

We are deeply concerned about the routine and systematic beating, ill-treatment and imprisonment of Kurdish children in Turkey. According to Amnesty International’s newly published report, “since 2006, thousands of children in Turkey, some as young as 12, have been prosecuted under anti-terrorism legislation solely for their alleged participation in demonstrations”.

Children aged 10-18 are being detained, interrogated and tried under the same conditions as adults. As a consequence, some are sentenced and jailed for 5  to 10  years under the anti-terror law. The children are accused of participating in street protests, doing the victory sign, shouting slogans, throwing stones at the Turkish police or singing Kurdish songs.

Children have been forced to make statements in adult courts without their lawyers or social workers present. They have been imprisoned in adult prisons and were deprived of their rights to education. Moreover children have been deported to other prisons far from their families so their families have difficulties regularly visiting them.

Reports about this mistreatment of children have caused an outcry amongst Kurdish communities and the international public. Families of the children, Kurdish and Turkish civil organisations, human rights organisations and intellectuals have called on the Turkish government to release children and abandon discriminatory laws against the Kurdish ethnic minority, especially towards Kurdish children. The human rights group Justice for Children Initiative has begun a campaign to force the Turkish government to find a solution for the imprisoned children before the Turkish parliament goes on summer holiday.

Turkey is a signatory to the Convention of the Rights of the Child and has a duty to protect the rights of all children. Article 2 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child bans discrimination against children. It states that “Within the jurisdictions and authorities bestowed upon them, Signatory States of this convention recognise and guarantee the rights defined in this Convention to all children without any discrimination based on the children’s, their parents’ or guardians’ race, colour, gender, language, political or otherwise opinions, national, ethnic or social background, property, disability, birthright or any other status.”

We have invited Ms Milena Buyum, campaigner on Turkey for Amnesty International to talk about Amnesty International research and report on imprisoned Kurdish children. Ms Fatma Unsal, of from ‘Justice for Children Initiative’ (ÇİAÇ) will talk about ‘Justice for Children Initiative’ newly announced campaign to force the Turkish government to stop these policies towards Kurdish children.

Aygul Erge, singer-song writer who has composed a song titled “Dayê Min Bifiltîne/ My mum rescue me” on imprisoned Kurdish children will sing before starting the seminar.

We will screen the film ‘Taslanan Vicdanlar/Brutal Consciences’ by Cenk Örtülü & Zeynel Koç (running time 50 minutes). The film focuses on imprisoned Kurdish children who are subjected to the Turkish state’s physical and psychological violence.

Further information on www.ksso.org.uk , mc@ksso.org.uk or www.barismeclisi.com • britainpeacecouncil@googlemail.com

You are kindly invited to attend the forthcoming Kurdish Studies seminar and book launch

The Passion and Death of Rahman the Kurd: Dreaming Kurdistan

Speaker: Carol Prunhuber, journalist and author of the book “The Passion and Death of Rahman the Kurd: Dreaming Kurdistan”

Date/time: 7th June 2010, 18:00

Venue: G2, School of Oriental and African  Studies(SOAS) Nearest tube station: Russell Square, Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, LondonWC1H 0XG

Organised by Kurdish Society at SOAS (KSSOAS) and Kurdish Studies and Students Organisation (KSSO)

Seminar abstract

Ms Carol Prunhuber, a Venezuelan author and journalist explores the life of the legendary Kurdish leader, Dr Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou in her book titled “The Passion and Death of Rahman the Kurd: Dreaming Kurdistan”. Dr Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou “was a visionary and cultivated leader of the Iranian Kurdish revolutionary movement and a respected interlocutor for the West. He brought the concepts of democracy to his country.  Educated in Paris and Prague with a PhD in Economy, he spoke eight languages. Beloved by his people, Ghassemlou was ahead of his time, leading a movement to oppose the theocratic regime of the Ayatollah Khomeini for ten years.” (from The Passion and Death of Rahman the Kurd ). Dr Ghassemlou was assassinated by the agents of Islamic Republic of Iran on July 13th 1989 in Vienna, Austria where Dr Ghassemlou was holding secret talks on negotiating a supposed peaceful solution of the Iran’s Kurdish question with Iranian envoys sent by then Iranian president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.

The Assassins were not punished for their terrorist crime by “Austrian democratic law state”. “Soon after his untimely murder, responsibility was directed towards Iran; yet no one was ever tried or punished for the crime. To this day, many unanswered questions remain” (from The Passion and Death of Rahman the Kurd )

The author states that “It was in Paris, in 1983, that I first met Dr Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou. We were introduced at the Kurdish Institute, where I was attending an exhibition with the Kurdish filmmaker Yilmaz Guney and his wife, Fatos Guney

After our meeting in Paris, Ghassemlou invited me to come to Kurdistan. Two years later, I arrived there alongside the French Gamma TV crew to film the Kurdish conflict in Iran. The seed for this book was planted at that time.”

Please join KSSO in this important seminar to hear the words of a journalist who actually witnessed the struggles of Kurds in the mountains of Kurdistan. Ms Carol Prunhuber has kindly accepted our invitation to come and talk about her journey to Kurdistan and her friendship with Dr Ghassemlou.

The book will be available on sale at the venue in English and Kurdish Sorani.

For further information click on www.ksso.org.uk or mc@ksso.org.uk

Speaker: Dr Hashem Ahmadzadeh, Senior lecturer in Kurdish Studies, Director of Centre for Kurdish Studies of Exeter University

Date/ time: 27th May 2010 @ 5:30pm-7:00pm

Venue:  B104, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London  Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG

Organised by Kurdish Society at SOAS (KSSOAS) and Kurdish Studies and Students Organisation (KSSO)

Seminar Abstract

Kurdish novel since its rise during the early 1930s has experienced many profound changes both thematically and stylistically. This presentation aims to identify the main changes that have occurred in the Kurdish novel since its rise up to the first decade of the 21st century. Comparing the style and theme of the early Kurdish novels with recently published novels, shows that there are radical changes in both their form and theme. These changes are the result of the destruction of the pre-modern ways of life and the penetration of modernity in the Kurdish societies.
While internal Kurdish cultural and socio-political factors have been at play behind changes in the form and content of the Kurdish novel, the “global culture” has also been effectively influential in shaping the Kurdish novel. Despite the fact that the Kurdish novel has been influenced by the transition of the Western novelistic discourse to the Middle East, it has, thematically, been functioning as a “national allegory” as it has been conceptualised by Jameson as the main feature of “the third world” literature.

Defining the Nation: Kurdish Historiography in Turkey in the 1990s

Speaker: Dr Konrad Hirschler of School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

Date and Time: 4^th May 2010, @ 5:00pm

Venue: B104, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London  Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG

Organised by Kurdish Studies and Students Organisation (KSSO) and Kurdish Society at SOAS (KSSOAS)

Seminar abstract

Dr Hirschler will talk on the Kurdish historiography in Turkey in the 1990s and especially the ways in which it constructs, defines and reworks Kurdish national identity.

Biography

Dr  Konrad Hirschler is Senior Lecturer in the History of the Near and Middle East of SOAS, London University. His research interests: Historiography; history of reading; cultural and social history of the pre-modern Middle East; crusades in the Middle East. He is the author of the book “Medieval Arabic Historiography: Authors as Actors” and has published academic articles widely on pre-modern Arabic Historiography and two comprehensive articles on Kurdish Historiography in Turkey in the 1990s.

For more Information click on www.ksso.org.uk or mc@ksso.org.uk

Speaker: Recep Marasli, the author of the book „ Armenian National Democratic Movement and The 1915 Genocide“

@Kurdish Advice Centre

24th April 2010, @ 5:00pm at Kurdish Advice Centre, 2 Birkbeck Road ondon N8 7PF   020 8347 9657

@Cafe Mostra

25th April 2010, @5:00pm at  Cafe Mostra, 86 Stoke Newington High Street, Stoke Newington London N16 7PA

@ SOAS

Speakers: Recep Marasli and Dr. Choman Hardi

Unfortunately, due to his busy schedule, Dr Surhan Cam of  Cardiff  University is not going to come to London to  chair the seminar

Date and Time: 22nd April 2010, @ 7:00pm

Venue: KLT, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London

Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG

Organised by Kurdish Studies and Students Organisation (KSSO) and Kurdish Society at SOAS (KSSOAS)

Dr. Choman Hardi will open the seminar with a brief talk on Nationalism and Genocide. Then Mr. Recep Marasli will talk about Turkish nationalism and the Armenian genocide.

Genocide and Facing Historical Facts

Most of our planet is inhabited by multi-ethnic, multi-national and multi-cultural groups of people. However the nationalist doctrines and ethnic chauvinism combined with a policy of homogenization that pushes all other ethnic entities to a secondary and dependent position, are key forces that contribute to policies of genocide. For example until the 20^th century, the Ottoman Empire was significantly preserving its multinational, multiethnic, multicultural nature. However the conversion of this multi-national, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural entity to the Turkish ethnic supremacy in the form of “nation state” was only possible through systematic destruction and extermination policies. The lives of some ethnic groups (Armenians, Assyrians-Syrians and the Pontic Greeks) have been destroyed through genocide, massacres, direct/ indirect dispossession, and deportation in order to construct a Turkish nation and facilitate the Turkisation of Anatolia. The genocide of 1915 was the apex of this political process when the Turkish nationalists annihilated the oldest inhabitants of Mesopotamia and the ancient Near Eastern region. According to different sources, one and a half million Armenians have been killed (see Marashlian 1991, Noël 1994, Gaunt 2006, Henham and Behrens 2007,Schaefer 2008, Schaller and Zimmerer 2008) during systematic destruction and extermination policies of Turkish nationalists. It is also the result of such a political reality that the Kurdish nation today suffers from ethnic discrimination, displacement, assimilation and genocide (Fernandes 2007) and linguicide (Hassanpour 1992). Despite an extremely long-running political struggle and conflict it continues to remain an internationally unrecognised and oppressed nation whose rights are constantly denied. In this atmosphere of political confrontation it is important for people to understand history of systematic destruction and extermination policies of Turkish nationalist and their nation building process.

Mr. Marasli states that he has started his research in prison “with my desire to learn what actually happened. But during the research I came to the conclusion that the fates of Armenian, Greek, the Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac people, Kurds and Arabs in this region are interwoven and their history needs to be studied in relation to each other. I attempted to analyse the shift from a multi-cultural region to a single national, mono-cultural wasteland

How have these societies encountered a future, after experiencing such a large scale of historical and social destruction? What kind of problems has this destruction caused for different ethnic groups and for the restructuring of the Turkish Republic? What role does this historical tragedy play in the ethno-national conflicts and problems experienced today?

The lack of analysis and condemnation of these tragic events plays an important role in the repetition of the ethnic and national discrimination, oppression and annihilation policies in the 21^th century.

How can ethnic cleansing, forced displacement, assimilation and intersectional national discrimination policies are prevented? How can we change the mental structures implicated in these large scale crimes against humanity? What are the obstacles and opportunities to challenge the mental structure of nationalism?”

Mr. Marasli states that “when discussing historical events, of course, what we really want to find out is how we can establish fair, equal and peaceful societies. I believe that facing the facts of our own history bravely and condemning genocide in everyday life including in political, social, cultural practices and developing international intervention policies against possible genocide can only help us to create a more secure and peaceful world”

Speaker: Ms. Bayan Sami Abdul Rahman of Kurdistan Regional Government’s High Representative to the UK

Chair: Dr. Konrad Hirschler, Senior Lecturer in the History of the Near and Middle East, SOAS

Date/time: 20^th March 2010 at 5:00pm

Venue: G2, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (SOAS) Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG

Organised by Kurdish Studies and Students Organisation (KSSO) and Kurdish Society at SOAS (KSSOAS)

Seminar Abstract

In the 1980s, the people of Kurdistan in Iraq were under chemical bombardment, thousands of villages were being destroyed and the people were being massacred in their thousands by Saddam Hussein’s regime. Today the people of the Kurdistan Region live in a peaceful and stable environment, the number of universities has increased from one in 1991 to more than 10 today with more on the way, thousands of villages have been rebuilt and infrastructure projects undertaken. As well as having their own regional government, the Kurds hold key positions in the federal government in Baghdad. These achievements cannot be underestimated in the context of Iraq and the Middle East, however, the path has not been smooth and there are uncertainties that lie ahead of the Kurdistan Regional Government.

Bayan Sami Abdul Rahman, the Kurdistan Regional Government’s High Representative to the UK, will discuss the challenges ahead.

Seminar Abstract

The recent resistance against the Islamic regime and cry for freedom in Iran, labelled as ‘the Green Movement’, has taken the focus of attentions.  It all started when the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009, was disputed by the two defeated candidates, Mir Hussein Mousavi and the former speaker of parliament and senior cleric, Mehdi Karroubi. In the past seven months despite increased security, official warnings and often brutal crackdowns on opposition figures, journalists and ordinary demonstrators, mass protests have increasingly taken place.  In fact, the continued mass protests across the country, despite harsh security measures, turned the Green Movement into a nationwide uprising against the regime.

In this speech, Said examines the weight of the national minority communities in the politics of the Green Movement. He argues that the right national minorities in Iran has received little attention in the recent oppositional movement. This speech enlarges upon this topic using political perspective and conceptual framework characteristic of the recent Iranian movement aiming at the human rights and democracy. The emergence of intellectual debates on reformism, establishment of the law-state, the reaffirmation of Persian nationalism as hegemonic and liberating discourse, are shared characteristics which shed lights on democratic developments that is currently occurring in Iran. The speech suggests that by a continued silence about the multi-national fabric of Iranian society and by reluctance over multi-ethnic definitions of the conditions of citizenship, the leaders of the Green Movement are increasingly turn away from liberal and democratic rhetoric towards the less privileged nationalities of Iran. It is argued that a democratic movement must have a democratic agenda. In Iranian’s context, it must not only aim for the human rights values but must also incorporate national rights and justices for peoples of Iran.

Biography

Said Shams was born and educated in Iran. From the early 1970s, he was an active revolutionary. After the revolution of 1979, he continued his political activities, subsequently he lost his job as teacher and suffered persecution and then repeated threats before he was able to immigrate to the UK in 1990 where he continued his studies: B.A. (University of East London, and PhD (Royal Holloway). He managed a range of projects and conducted researches and surveys from 1996 to 2008 while working for the voluntary sector in London. He is presently an independent researcher.

Organised by Ipek Demir (Leicester University)

For further details, see here.

This symposium will provide a forum for reflecting and discussing ‘diaspora’ by focusing on the case of Kurds from Turkey. Since the late-1980s there has been a significant migration of Kurds from Turkey to the various countries in Western Europe. Even though Kurds from Turkey make up a significant proportion of London’s ethnic minority population, they constitute an ‘invisible’ diasporic community, both in terms of the current ethnicity debates in the UK and in diaspora studies. The papers will consider theoretical and political dimensions as well as discuss current empirical work.

Speakers:
Dr Umut Erel, RCUK Academic Fellow, Open University
Janroj Keles, London Metropolitan University
Dr Ibrahim Sirkeci, European Business School, London
Latif Tas, Queen Mary, University of London
Dr Issa Tozun, London Metropolitan University
Dr Ipek Demir, University of Leicester

The symposium is free for all BSA members and those at the University of Leicester. For all others, there is a charge of £10 payable on the day. As places are limited, if you would like to attend, please register by e-mailing (before May 1^st 2010) Ipek Demir (id34 AT le.ac.uk) and stating your institutional affiliation.

Understanding Diaspora: The Case of Kurds in London

BSA Theory Study Group Symposium, organised in association with

the Department of Sociology, University of Leicester

14 May 2010, University of Leicester

Programme:

10.30 -11.00: Registration (tea and coffee)

11.00 -13.00: ‘Diasporic Experiences’

• Dr Umut Erel, RCUK Academic Fellow, Open University
  ‘Kurdish Migrant Mothers in London’
• Janroj Keles, London Metropolitan University
  ‘Community, Network and Ethnic Politics of Migrants in London: The Case of Kurds’
• Dr Issa Tozun, London Metropolitan University
  ‘Educating Children of Kurdish Origin in Britain’

13.00 – 2.15: Lunch

2.15 – 4.15: ‘Diaspora, Identity and Belonging’

• Latif Tas, Queen Mary, University of London
  ‘Kurds in the UK: Legal Pluralism and Dispute Resolution in the Diaspora’
• Dr Ibrahim Sirkeci, European Business School, London
  ‘Diasporas from Turkey: Transnational space between the Turkish and Kurdish’
• Dr Ipek Demir, University of Leicester
  ‘Battling with Homeland’

4.15 – 5.00: Wrap up Session (tea and coffee)

Date and Time: Sunday, 7 February 2010, @7:00pm

Venue: The Wheatsheaf, at 129 High St, Oxford, OX1 4DF

Ticket prices are £6 (£4 concs).

The places can be booked either through the following facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=257072437894&ref=mf

or by sending an email to: moonlight_culture@yahoo.com

Kind Regards,

Peyman Heydarian