論文

Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday
Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji
Kurds in Urmia City, Iran
Mostafa Khalili

I. Introduction
This research is an attempt to study Kurdishness (Kurdayeti ), from an
ethnographical perspective, among the comparatively understudied Kurmanjispeaking Kurds who recently urbanized in the multi-ethnic city of Urmia, in thenorthwest of Iran. The main motivation behind choosing this specific case study
and methodology lies in its potential to pose a challenge to the reified image ofthe Kurds which is presently dominant in political and academic circles. Urmia
city is an area of co-habitance of ethnic Kurds and Azeris, and so adds morevariables to the study of the Kurds in Iran, who are usually studied in relation
to Persians and analyzed within center-periphery frameworks.1 Accordingly,
dynamics of Kurdishness shall be revealed in a more complex setting, adding a
new vantage point to the field of Kurdish studies which presently is filled withanalyses of the reification and politicization of Kurdishness. The main researchquestions of this article are: what is it like to be a Kurd and when does
Kurdishness matter for the Kurds?
As the Middle East is experiencing one of its most historic, yet painful,
episodes, the fate of the Kurdish people has attracted unprecedented global
interest. Despite this huge interest, the study of Kurds is overwhelmingly
focused on political events and conflicts within the countries in which theyre s ide . T he dom i n a nc e of t he p ol it ic a l p er sp e c t ive a nd t he event f u linterpretation of history among both scholars and Kurdish nationalists andstates has limited Kurdish studies to moments of political mobilization, turmoil,
or conflict. This eventful understanding of history would be relevant if it werelimited to the political realm or applied to specific branches of political science,
security studies or a research tradition. But it raises a red flag when it tends to41

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be the only image portrayed of Kurds. Today, in much of the existing literature
on Kurdish studies, researchers use the terms Kurdayeti (Kurdishness) andKurdish nationalism interchangeably. 2 This problematic conflating of ethnic
belonging and ethnic nationalism resulted in shaping of the dominant discourseof Kurdish studies to deal with the origin and nature of Kurdish nationalism
and its verities of formation in diverse parts of Kurdistan, while highly
neglecting the Kurds in their daily lives.
Urmia county had long been the center of political activism, from the time of
the Ottoman-Safavid empire conflicts until the rise of Isma’il Agha Simko (19181925), a charismatic chieftain in the region whose revolt is highly controversial
as to whether it should be considered to be a Kurdish nationalistic movement. 3
After Simko, and specifically by the establishment of the short-lived Republic of
Mahabad in 1946 in Sorani-speaking regions, the focus of literature on Iranian
Kurds has shifted away from the Kurmanji-speaking areas to the Sorani partsinfluenced by the political changes. As the majority of Kurds in Iran live in
Sorani-dominated Kurdistan Province, Kurmanji-speaking regions, which include

Map 1. Distribution of the Kurds and their languages.
Source: Martin van Bruinessen, Agha, Shaikh, and State: The Social and Political Structures of
Kurdistan (Zed books, 1992), 21 (modified by the author).

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Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji Kurds in Urmia city, Iranparts of the West Azerbaijan Province administrative divisions, have been
neglected in most studies of Iranian Kurds.4 Moreover, this research focuses on
the study of the shaping of Kurdish ethnic identity as city dwellers with ananthropologic approach, which according to Bruinessen is scarce within Kurdish
studies. 5
Studying nations and nationalism from the perspective of ordinary people isan emerging trend; but still, most researchers have looked at the Kurdish issues
from the viewpoints of the state or political actors. The constructivist approachclaims that ethnicity is constructed through a process of collaboration between
two or more ethnic groups. Therefore, ethnicity is the product of a social
process, not a cultural given.6 Scholars with constructivist perspectives mainly
have criticized the existing classification in various ways. Henry Hale, forinstance, finds definitive categories unhelpful, and calls for producing “microlevel” explanations for why and how people tend to think and act in terms of“macro-level” identities.7 Another example would clarify what a micro-level
analysis would mean. Eric Hobsbawm, who is one of the defenders of the studyof ethnicity and nationalism “from below”, believes it is not enough that westudy the spread of ethnic identity from above―the process through which it
has been imposed on people―but also from below, because for most people,
national identification―when it exists―is more a “reminder of the set of
identification which constitutes the social being” 8 (such as religion andlanguage).
This is why Hobsbawm heavily criticizes Gellner’s classic work on nations
and nationalism,9 accusing it of looking at the phenomenon as constructed only
from above. He calls for the need for some alternative research from below inorder to understand how these notions are being practiced or internalized.10
Analyzing the view from below, which is seeing nationalism neither from thegovernmental discourse nor from the point of view of nationalist (or nonnationalist) groups, however, is methodologically “exceedingly difficult” toresearch, in his view. But, as he notes, “this is the area of national studies inwhich thinking and research are most urgently needed today.”11
Following Hobsbawm’s call, I took the challenge to approach Kurdish
nationalism and the self-perception of the Kurds towards their ethnic identity as“dual phenomena”, constructed both from above and below. The aim is to depict
an image portraying “how it is to be an ordinary Kurmanji-speaking Kurd in
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Urmia city”. Not surprisingly, the process of data collection was the mostchallenging part of this research. The main fieldwork was done from September
2018 to March 2019, relying on several unstructured and semi-structured
interviews and analyzing daily conversations. Then, I returned back to theregion in August and September 2019 again to complete the data collection
process. Trying to keep distance from the substantialist approach, I was very
concerned not to influence what I was intending to investigate among ordinary
people by not asking directly about their ethnic and nationalistic sentiments. As
Michael Moerman indicates, it is too easy to find ethnicity or nationalistic
sentiments if one looks for them.12 The discussions were general―asking about
the interviewees’ life stories, family backgrounds and daily struggles. In somecases, I tried to lead the conversation indirectly towards their personal standing
during the armed conflict years, but avoided introducing Kurdishness or
Kurdish nationalism as my theme of research.

II. K
 urmanji speaking Kurds: from de-tribalization into
urbanization
1. Dynamics of the transition in Kurdish societyOver the last few decades, Kurdish tribal organizations in Iran haveundergone dramatic changes. Transformation of the pastoral economy to asemi-pastoral, semi-agricultural one occurred during the reign of Reza Shah
(1925-41), when he tried to settle many of the Kurds moving between theborders of three neighboring countries.13 Though his policy was successful in
reducing cross-border mobilities, the tribal chieftains still hold a comparatively
large share of symbolic power in the villages. It was the land-reform policy
launched from 1963 during the reign of Mohammad Reza Shah (1962-66) that
disturbed the social organization of Kurdish residing regions to a great extent.
Though in its execution level, many of the initial goals were not met, the powerhegemony of chieftains and heads of villages were reduced to a great extent,
and caused an increase in migration to the bigger cities.14 If we consider theurbanization process and transition of the local economy towards capitalism as
the main reasons behind detribalization of the Kurds, it happened gradually but
relatively late among the Kurmanji-speaking Kurds.15
The Iranian Revolution of 1979, however, changed the local political order in
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Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji Kurds in Urmia city, Iranthe region dramatically. A few years a fter the revolution, the Kurdish
nationalistic movement, which originated in the Sorani-speaking regions, turned
to an armed conflict with the newly established government.16 The armed
conflict spread to the Kurmanji-speaking areas and took different forms in eachregion depending on the region’s tribal composition and geopolitical situation.
Increased insecurity started from the late 1980 and lasted until the end of thedecade in the form of guerrilla wars in the rural areas, which caused a massmigration of Kurds to Urmia city. The city area and population were nearly
doubled in the first decade after the revolution.17 Most of the migrant Kurds
who were victims of the conflicts used to be landless commoners in the prerevolutionary years. Therefore, they did not have an incentive to go back totheir places of origin after peace came to the region. A reverse migration
happened only among the peasants of fertile plains like Margavar, who had
economic incentives to go back to their villages. Most of the migrants from

Map 2. Kurdish Districts Migration Patterns to Urmia City.
Source: Made by the author in consultation with numerous Kurds in the city coming fromdistinct regions. (The map was extracted and modified by the author from the map of the data
center of the Management and Planning Organization (MPO) of West Azerbaijan Province, Iran.
https://azgharbi.mporg.ir/)45

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Ta rgava r a nd speci f ica l ly Su may, however, who used to l ive i n rock ymountainous villages and dry lands, preferred to stay in the city. On the other
hand, infrastructure development in the Kurdish residing borderlands wascomparatively slow in the post-conflict years, which was another discouraging
element for the Kurds not to choose reverse migration.18
All in all, the migration process to the city took place rapidly; however, thesense of belonging to the place of origin still remained. Even today, the peasants
who did not own agricultural lands commute to their villages quite frequently
at least in order to attend funerals, as the city still does not have a graveyard
specific to Sunni Muslims. Though there is no legal obstacle to burying Sunnis
in Shi’a cemeteries, the majority of Kurds prefer to bury the deceased membersof their family in their ancestral village.
2. Settlement in the city
The mass migration of the Kurds to the city in early 1980s resulted in theshaping of semi-ghettos in the western parts of the city. Poor neighborhoods like
Islam Abad in the northwestern suburbs of the city grew fast starting in theearly 1980s. Some Kurdish residing villages on the western side of the city like
Alvaj, Dizaj Siyavash and Tarzlu, were integrated into the city by its rapid
expansion.
Map 3 illustrates the expansion pattern of Urmia city over time; it indicatesthat the western parts of city are mostly spontaneous settlements expanded
after the 1980s and 1990s, with inadequate provision of facilities. These areas
are mostly populated by Kurds from various backgrounds.19 Another wave of
migration happened as a result of increased border control in the Kurdish
residing suburbs. Informal border trade, especially gasoline to Turkey and Iraq,
was the main source of non-sustainable income for the Kurds by the late 2010s.
A strict border control policy caused another mass migration of Kurds from thenorthern parts of Urmia and Salmas, as labor forces.
Today, the spontaneous settlements and increasing crime rate have shaped
the typical image of the Kurds among Azeris. However, such an image neglects
the internal complexity and the dynamics of Kurdish society over time.
A lt hough t he cu lt u ra l backwa rd ness i n t he sem i-ghettos has led to a
reproduction of poverty and illiteracy among the second generation of many
migrant Kurds, the situation of the Kurds who live in mixed neighborhoods with
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Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji Kurds in Urmia city, Iran

Azeris, or among Kurdish families with higher cultural capital, is different. This
group depicts a different progressive picture of the Kurd and Kurdishness inthe city.
Based on the strategic urban development plan of Urmia city, some newly
constructed settlements, near Kurdish neighborhoods which were initiallydesigned for predominantly Azeri governmental staff like teachers, (Shahrak-eFarhangiyan) or members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (Shahrak-e
Sepah), now are taken by migrant Kurds. This was mainly due to the dramaticchange in the ethnic balance of the town in favor of Kurds. Many of theemerging Kurdish middle class preferred these Kurdish residing neighborhoods
to downtown. A 35-year-old Kurdish bank clerk explained his reason to settle in
the newly established Isar town as:
My first incentive was to stay close to my family members who live close
by. S econd , t hese newly est ablished reg ions a re cheaper t ha n t hedowntown. We Kurds like to have a big house with a yard, which is difficult
to afford in the downtown. 20
Depending on the neighborhoods in which the Kurds live, the rural lifestyle isin transition at different paces. Naturally, there are considerable differencesamong the middle-class and semi-ghetto Kurdish residing neighborhoods inchanging traditional ways of life. A vivid sign of this difference can be seen in
the way women dress. While in poor neighborhoods and among less educatedwomen wearing traditional Kurdish clothing is common, educated and middleclass women see it as a sign of backwardness and a symbol of the rural
lifestyle. Thus, we observe different urbanization patterns depending on theclass and neighborhood.
The same can be said about how tribal ties are blurring among urban Kurds.
Similar to how Koohi-Kamali describes the urbanization process of Soranispeaking Kurds after the Land Reform, tribal affiliations among the Kurmanji
Kurds in Urmia are gradually fading away. 21 Intra-Kurdish distinctions, whichused to be mainly hierarchical, have slowly transformed into regional identities
based on the place of origin, e.g. Kurd of Margavar vs. Kurd of Sumay. Today,
except among the most prominent families who struggle to maintain theirperceived nobility in various ways, such as by marriages of convenience, class47

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Map 3. The expansion map of Urmia city from 1921 to 2004.
Source: Mohandesan-e moshaver-e Tarh va amayesh, Tarh-e tajdid nazar-e tarh-e jame’e
Sh ahr-e Urmi a: Barra si va sh en akht-e sh ahr, ( Urmia , Ministry of Housing a nd Urba n
Development, National Organization of Land and Housing, 2 010/13 89), Vol.1, 3 ( Ethnic
distribution has been modified by the author based on ethnographic fieldwork).

48

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Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji Kurds in Urmia city, Irandistinctions have eclipsed tribal or regional differences. For example, marriagesof young Kurds of Urmia city, today, no longer necessarily follow hierarchicalties or tribal traditions. However, the legitimacy of the chieftainship still varies
based on the place of origin. 22
Among the Kurds of the Sumay Baradust region, who have mostly settled in
the poor neighborhoods of Urmia, tribal identity has been maintained more thanin other regions. 23 Moreover, during the last two decades, it has been the state’s
policy to revive the chieftainship and strengthen tribal identity in order tocontrol and mobilize the Kurdish population against the armed oppositionalgroups through chieftains. While such re-tribalization attempts have beensuccessful among some sub-tribes, specifically in the rural context, the majorityof urban Kurds have abandoned their tribal identity. Therefore, as Bruinessen
indicates, we no longer can explain the urban Kurdish life using the elements oftraditional tribal life. 24 A 29-year-old shopkeeper who was born in Urmia, but
originally hails from the Sumay region, explains:
Nowadays, everyone is his own Arbab [head of village]. We no longer needto listen to the chieftain or ask for his permission for any of our personal
issues. We used to get permission from the chieftain for any marriage
inside the tribe. For my eldest sister’s marriage, my father insisted upon
the same tradition. But for the younger siblings, we convinced him not tofollow such a backward tradition. 25
Nonetheless, Kurds as city dwellers―even the younger generation―havepreserved a sense of belonging to their ancestral lands as a part of theiridentity.

III.

Mixing: How ethnicity works in everyday life

1. Grounds for the construction of ethnicity
Though Urmia has been a multi-ethnic city famous for the high level oftolerance among its various ethnic groups, the abrupt change in its ethnic
composition in the post-Iranian Revolutionary years (after 1979) was not without
consequences. While the first generation of migrants were more tolerant ofbeing treated as lower status citizens by both the state and Azeris, many49

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educated youths in the second generation did not find the same situation
comfortable enough to live with. Growing ethnic dissatisfaction is evident among
the young educated members of the emerging Kurdish middle class. Today, thisgroup, even the ones who were born in the peripheries, no longer identify
themselves by their place of origin, but by calling themselves “Kurds of Urmia”.
Such a new form of identification suggests that they claim equal citizenshiprights as the Azeris. This perceived discrimination has its roots in an informal
policy of the Islamic Republic that excludes the Sunnis and Kurds from thepolit ica l a nd governmenta l structure. As one high-ra nking Azeri city
governmental employee remarked:
The regime no longer trusts the Kurds or other Sunnis after their betrayalof the territorial integrity of the country in the post-revolutionary years
when we needed to maintain internal integrity being at war with Iraq. 26
The stigmatic citizenship of the Kurds does not come only from the state. It
has also been rooted among most Azeris, who have stereotyped the Kurd image
in a dichotomic way: either as poor uneducated laborers living in poor
neighborhoods who are stigmatized as nomadic mountain dwellers, or wealthy
up-start drug smugglers lacking cultural capital. During my ethnographic datacollection, I rarely faced an Azeri having a clear and fair image of the Kurds
and their internal factions. Though this constructed image is mostly invisible indaily interactions in public, its impact could be traced in the private sphere,
such as with the scarcity of inter-ethnic marriages or in the crossing of ethnic
boundaries in friendship circles.
The stigmatized citizenship attributed to the Kurds in the city together with
the institutional discriminations they face in their everyday lives has motivatedsome educated Kurds to fashion different sorts of resistance. In this regard, theformer tribal or regional identities which have been abandoned by some as asign of the rural, regain a new status to represent Kurdish ethnic identity intheir interactions with Azeris. 27
The creation of Kurdishness as an ethnicity, here, can be traced distinctly at
institutionalized and personal levels. At the institutionalized level, politicized
Kurdishness has been constructed not only in contention with Azeris, but alsowith Sorani Kurds. As there is a historical contest between Soranis and
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Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji Kurds in Urmia city, Iran

Kurmanjis, the political actors have attempted to engage in constructing a
distinct form of Kurmanji Kurdish activism in response to the perceived
deprivation in relation to both Azeris and Soranis. Due to the lack of freedom
for established political Kurdish groups, it is difficult to categorize different
tendencies of those who engage in a sort of political resistance. The ideologies of
ethnic activists vary from supporting the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party) as a
Kurmanji militia group, to engaging in local politics or Kurdish culturalactivities in the city, taking a lower security risk. 28
Construction of Kurdishness among ordinary Kurds who do not directly
engage at the institutionalized level happens differently. Kurdish satellite TV
channels and social media consumption have brought a sense of trans-statesolidarity for many Kurds. The common sense of deprivation and suppression
have contributed to the formation of a transnational solidarity rooted in
Kurdishness. This emerging sense of ethnicity is not necessarily in line with thepolitical parties’ path towards Kurdish nationalism. While imagined Kurdish
identity of the ordinary people is constructed based on territorial nationalism,
organized or institutionalized activism, in most cases, is limited to opposing thestate or other Kurdish groups.
2. Blurred ethnic lines in daily occupations
As discussed earlier, the emerging forms of Kurdayeti (Kurdishness) arebeing produced and reproduced in the urban context. However, this does notnecessarily mean that the distinctions based on ethnicity are always or
frequently present in the daily of the Kurds or Azeris. In this section, I will try
to illustrate how ethnic lines in an everyday context in Urmia city are getting
blurred, whether intentionally or un-intentionally, from both sides.
The sa l ience a nd appea ra nce of et h n icit y i n t he Ku rd ish - dom i na ntneighborhoods highly differ from those of the mixed neighborhoods with Azeris.
Naturally, the Kurdish language, culture and women’s traditional dress isdominant in the Kurdish enclaves. While women, who rarely commute to thecity center, barely speak Azeri, the majority of men are bilingual. Unlike in themixed neighborhoods, they learn the language in their adulthood when they
engage in different economic activities in the city center. In other parts of thecity, the dominant language and lingua franca is Azeri. Most of the Kurds learn
the language starting in their childhood, from their Azeri friends or through51

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daily communication at school. 29 In daily interactions in the city, when two
Kurds encounter, most of the time they start to communicate in Azeri until
they realize that they both are Kurds. A Kurdish restaurant owner explained
the role of language usage in his daily life:
We Kurds can speak many languages. I see this as an advantage comparedto the Azeris who do not know our language. For me, language is a tool forcommunication. Therefore, I learned Azeri and can speak it without anaccent. 30
When I asked how he learned to improve his Azeri speaking without having
any accent, he replied:
I practiced a lot. When I was a teenager, I practiced Azeri at home every
day to speak it without an accent. I did not want to be distinguished from
Azeris in the city.
As the conversation indicates, most of the Kurds engaged in business in
downtown speak almost native Azeri without an accent. This tendency might
have been developed as a response to the linguistic stigma. Another strategy
which is used mostly by the ethnic activists is to speak in Persian, as thenational language, rather than learning Azeri. Claiming that the city in multiethnic, they try to show their resistance against the symbolic violence that they
have undergone from Azeris.
Religion, on the other hand, barely is considered as a distinctive identity pillar
in daily life for the Kurds in Urmia. This high level of religious tolerance in thecity could be interpreted as the result of the co-existence of different ethnoreligious groups in Urmia on the one hand, and the residing of a considerable
number of Sunni Azeris in the city, on the other. 31 Having in-between identities,
Sunni Azeris play a vital role in blurring ethnic identities between the Kurds
and Azeris. In the Imam Shafe’i mosque, a Sunni mosque located in the city
center, for instance, the Kurdish clergyman of the mosque gives one sermon in
Kurdish and another in Azeri for Sunni Azeris. Marriages between these twogroups are also common, which shows that ethnicity alone cannot explain
divergence, or convergence, between the Azeris and Kurds.
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Similarly, my ethnography in a traditional bazaar illustrated that, in mosteconomic and daily interactions, both Kurds and Azeris prioritize theireconomic incentives over ethnic affiliation in their daily lives. There are many
Azeri shopkeepers, for instance, who have hired Kurdish salesmen in order tomake communications easier with their Kurdish customers. The same applies
to the Kurds, as a Kurdish jewelry shop owner noted:
I really do not care whom to hire in my shop as a salesman, Azeri or Kurd.
The only concern I have is the network through which I found them andthe level of trust I can have in them. Nowadays, who can consider ethnicity
as a source of trust?32
However, the blurred ethnic lines in everyday life should not persuade us toneglect that this tolerance might be a result of some coping strategies developed
over time among both groups. People seem to be consciously avoiding thediscussion of sensitive topics related to the politics of ethnicity, especially during
moments in which the city becomes highly polarized, such as during local
elections.
3. Momentary ethnic mobilizations
The mobilization of Urmia’s citizens over ethnicity has happened easily onsome occasions. In this section, I will discuss two occasions as instances of amomentary mobilization of the Kurds in Urmia: the ethnic riots that happened
in Urmia in 1999 following the arrest of Abdullah Ocalan―the charismatic
leader of the Kurds in Turkey―by Turkey’s intelligence service, and the ethnic
polarization of the city during local elections in recent years.
In the late 1990s, a Kurdish middle class which would actively engage inpolitical activism was in its nascent stage. However, after Ocalan’s arrest in
Nairobi by the Turkish intelligence service, the PKK―which had an official
office in Tehran and Urmia at the time―held a demonstration in front of theTurkish consulate in Urmia. 33 According to several interviewees, few Kurds in
Turkey at the time knew about the PKK and its leader; however, within a few
days, the demonstration turned violent. The angry demonstrators set fire to theTurkish consulate. While there were few Kurmanji ethnic activists in the city atthat time, this incident had a strong impact on the mobilization of the Kurds,
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文and increased their solidarity with their co-ethnics in Turkey. A 36-year-old
Kurdish author reflected on those days:
I was a teenager by that time, and I remember that I was walking in thestreet when I noticed a demonstration was going on. At the time, I had notheard about Ocalan or the PKK, and had no idea about them. However, theethnic sentiments were so high that I found myself, a couple of days later,in the front line of the demonstrators attacking the Turkish consulate. 34
After this incident, the ethnic awareness in the city dramatically increased
both among the Kurds and Azeris. Later, with the strengthening of Azeri
activism starting in 2006, its Kurdish counterpart in Urmia gradually became
more widespread. 35 The local elections did not have much symbolic importanceeither for the Kurds or for the Azeris in the previous decade. With increasing
ethnic sentiments on both sides, however, ethnicity vividly entered into politicalcontests starting with the city council elections of 2002, when a Kurdish womanof Beygzade tribal origin used Kurdish clothing in her political campaign.
Playing the ethnic card, she was successfully elected as both the first Kurdish
and first female member of city council.
Starting with the next city council and parliamentary elections, the electoral
campaigns gradually were drawn on ethnic lines. Nader Ghazi Pour, an Azeri
conservative representative of Urmia electoral district in the parliament since2008, was a key figure in intensifying the Azeri-Kurdish contests by bringing aradical ethnic discourse into his campaigns. During the last parliamentaryelection, in 2016, the city witnessed a deep ethnic division, with both sides
intensively engaged in manipulating ethnicity to mobilize the masses in order toachieve their political goals. Hakem Mamakan, a well-known young Kurdish
candidate, for instance, freed four pigeons during one of his speeches inMargavar as a symbolic action to show his concern for freeing the four parts ofdivided Kurdistan. On many other occasions, he wore the traditional Kurdish
clothing of the Harki tribe; however, in Sumay, his place of origin, such clothing
is not popular. His Azeri counterparts, too, engaged in similar actions in orderto mobilize the masses by manipulating their ethnic affiliation. Hadi Bahadori,
the elected parliament member of Urmia, appeared in traditional Azeri clothingin an open house parliament session, repeating the demands of Azeri ethnic
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activists.
Such heated debates over local elections do not take place in Azeri- or
Kurdish-dominant cities. This shows how in the mixed city of Urmia, politicalactivists on either side engage in politicizing ethnicity and playing on the ethnic
fault lines. An Azeri 52-year-old interviewee explained his views on theethnicization of local elections as follows:
Starting from a few years ago, our city started to experience ethnic
division during the election campaigns. Before that, we did not care muchabout politics and parliamentary elections. But nowadays, it seems that wehave to support our co-ethnic during the election time. Every two years,
during electoral campaigns, we all become aware of our ethnic affiliation. 36
The local elections, in general, have more symbolic importance for the Kurds
than for the Azeris. Being deprived of having a share in the local political order,
the Kurds see the elections as their only chance in taking some share of power.
This common sense of deprivation, which is shared among the Kurds, helps
them to overcome their internal divisions and mobilize based on ethnic
affiliation during the local elections. A Sorani Kurdish 30-year-old director, who
was born and lived in Urmia, described his own stance on the elections asfollows:
Since I finished high school, almost all my close friends have been Azeris.
The Kurmanji community here is not very active in the cultural field;
therefore, I do not have many friends among them. Furthermore, I feelculturally closer to the Azeris than to the Kurmanji Kurds; the same
applies to my other family members … However, during local elections, we
indeed support t he Kurma nji ca ndidates . My fa mily members run
campaigns for them. We believe that if any sort of ethnic conflict were tohappen in the city in the near future, it would be the Kurmanji Kurds who
would support us, not the Azeris. 37
Though mobilization based on ethnic lines is a common phenomenon in thecity, other interests cut across ethnic affiliation on some occasions. For instance,
Seyyed Salman Zaker, the former judge of Urmia’s central prison, gained
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considerable support from the Kurds despite being Azeri. The reason lies
behind his promise to make efforts to reduce the death penalty of several drug
smugglers to lifetime imprisonment. As several Kurdish families had somefriends or family members in prison, they supported his candidacy despite hispolitical affiliation and ethnic origin.

IV. Acknowledging Multiple Identities of the Kurds
Looking for Kurdishness through an ethnographic lens, as presented in theprevious part, helps us to acknowledge that the Kurds, as ordinary people living
in society, do not necessarily define themselves with an ethnic identity in all
circumstances. They have distinct, multiple social identities and forms ofappearance and absence of ethnicized moments, depending on the needs of theirstruggle for recognition. Therefore, naturally, they may even undermine
ethnicity in favor of other interests on some occasions, and vice versa in
ethnically mobilized moments.
Considering the variety of social occasions in which ethnicity becomes salientor blurred for the Kurds under study, it would be a simplification and reificationof Kurdishness if we generalize it to all aspects of the Kurds’ lives. At thispoint, one may ask what would be the implication of seeing Kurdishness as acategory appearing and disappearing in daily life. It may seem to some readersthat with such an argument, I am trying to imply that Kurds are not politicaland that they will not become effectively politicized because ethnicity does notplay an essential role in their everyday life. That would be a misunderstandingof the aim of this paper. On the contrary, the fieldwork demonstrates that theKurdish society under study has a high potential for mobilization. History has
shown the great potential of the Kurds for mobilization in each of the four
countries in which they reside. But the problem occurs when the occasions ofsuch mobilizations are being seen as the only occasions explicitly showing
Kurdishness. The complexity of the situations cannot be reduced or explained
through events only. From what I have observed, we cannot reduce the Kurdsof Urmia to one aspect they may from time to time exhibit, or limit all AzeriKurdish daily relations to occasional tensions, and all Kurds as political actors.
This led me to recognize how the notion of multiple identities, discussed by
Stuart Hall, is relevant to the study of Kurdishness. 38 By recognizing multiple
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Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji Kurds in Urmia city, Iranidentities, I do not intend to undermine the importance of the times whengroupness happens for the Kurds. Nor do I want to deny the structural andinstitutional factors that play a significant role in motivating them to mobilize.
The point is, that being exposed “only” to the political discourses of “above” atthe state or Kurdish nationalistic party level results in reification of “the Kurd”
as a political actor, and prevents the researcher from seeing the Kurds’ multiple
identities. As Hall says, we oscillate between the different social identities that
we possess, consciously or unconsciously; they are contingent and cross-cut one
another. In a micro-analysis like this study, the tribal identities which are theprimary identity in the rural area convert to regional identities, contrastingwith those of other regions, or turn to ethnic or class differentiations.
Recognizing such multiple identities, of course, is not limited to the Kurds andcould be generalized for all ethnic groups. Then the point that needs to be
fo c u s e d o n i s t o c omprehe nd t he re a s o n s t h at m a ke t he mome nt a r yethnicization of the Kurds more frequent and powerful than that of the Azeris.
As the ethnographic fieldwork illustrated, the structural symbolic violence that
Kurds are subject to, both in the form of suppressive policies of the state and a
stigmatic citizenship imposed on them in daily life by Azeris, contribute to thissituation. Therefore, the high potential of the Kurds to become ethnicized
depends on to what extent their citizenship rights are protected.
The dominant approach in the study of Kurds, today, is to initiate theresearch from the Kurdish nationalism as a concept, instead of the Kurds asagents of this concept. This has confined the study of Kurdishness to Kurdish
nationalism and reduced the debates in looking for its origin and historicaldevelopment. 39 Abbas Vali attempted to go beyond the historicist approach by
portraying Kurdish nationalism as a necessary result of an “othering” process
which was needed to construct the national identity of Iranian, Turkish andIraqi. While his work is a valuable contribution to counterargue the primordialand constructivist’s discourse, he treats Kurdish nationalism as if it is anecessary element of being a Kurd, which has failed to happen. He, thus, tries
to theorize reasons behinds its failure.
This paper, however, by bringing the ordinary Kurds in everyday life into
attention, argues that the Kurds have multiple social identities. When they are
subject to being discriminated against and their citizenship rights are being
neglected, whether by the state or another dominant ethnic group, they have a57

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論文high potential for mobilization based on ethnic demands. Vali appropriately
initiates his discussion on the conditions of the formation of Kurdish nationalism
in each of the states the Kurds resided in during the early decades of the 20th
century.40 However, for him, all dynamics are happening at the state policymaking level and in its negotiations and contentions with the Kurdish elites.
I argue that Vali’s approach, while explaining the structural problems in therealm of politics, ignores the realm of everyday life. Therefore, he treats
Kurdish nationalism as if it has certain shared characteristics among all Kurds
living in different states. Avoiding transcending Kurdish nationalism and looking
for its failure or success was exactly the departure point of this study. Taking
Kurdish nationalism as a moment of groupness shaped around ethnicity, I tried
to find the root causes of the ethnicization of their identities on some occasions.
In this regard, I consider both voting for a Kurdish candidate in a local election
in Urmia and the solidarity of the Kurds in support of Ocalan as the struggle
for recognition in the local political realm, but in different forms.

V. Conclusion
Arguing that the predominant shaped image of the Kurds is a highly politicalone, the aim of my ethnographic fieldwork in Urmia city was to break with thereified image of “the Kurds”, a predominant trend in media and even within
academic works, and seek to identify Kurdishness not only in politicizedsituations, but also in the daily lives of the Kurds.
Investigation of everyday contacts, and the roles of language, religion, politicalinstitutions and the media, can give us a broader view of what it is like to be “aKurd”. Through the ethnography of daily life, I came to realize how ethnicity is
contingent, appearing and disappearing depending on the circumstances. While
the role of religion, as an identity pillar for the Kurds, is in a significant decline,
language, manifesting itself in the use of various linguistic strategies, could playa major role in preventing or allowing ethicized interactions. While boundarymaking between the Kurds and Azeris is not tangible in the everyday publicsphere, in the private sphere they seem to be effectively separated.
The political realm, however, is highly ethnicized, revealing itself on occasions
such as local elections and in transnational Kurdish solidarities. But this should
not mislead us into ignoring the many other occasions in daily life in which
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Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji Kurds in Urmia city, Iranethnicity does not appear. Therefore, this paper illustrated the complex
configuration of Kurdishness in Urmia city by not only focusing on the politicalfield and politicized moments, as most Kurdish studies do. The ethnographic
approach gave me a powerful tool to argue that, unlike how it is portrayed in
the political realm, Kurdishness in its highly-politicized form is not ever-present
and does not naturally appear in the everyday lives of the Kurmanji Kurds.
Even in the highly polarized political field of Urmia, ethnicity can be invisible inmost daily interactions. Kurds in the bazaar, for instance, do not seem to caremuch about the ethnicity of their customers or their coworkers, as long as theireconomic interest is secured. The same applies to the settlement patterns in
Urmia city. A non-ethnographic study of ethnicity in the city may result in
reducing the ethnic distribution pattern in Urmia city to a high level ethnicizedpolitical realm. However, as an ethnographer, I give far less value to thatargument compared to the social and economic interests of individuals.
Thus, by acknowledging multiple identities of the Kurds in their daily lives,
this paper argues that Kurdishness should not be conflated with Kurdish
nationalism. It is not necessarily politicized in all aspects of the lives of ordinary
people. On occasions that it manifests itself in political form, it may follow
different incentives depending on the local political fields. Such a worldview canbe a way out of reproduction of Kurdish identity solely based on Kurdish
nationalism, which is highly reductionist.
Acknowledgment
This work was supported by Grant-in-Aid for JSPS (Japan Society for the
Promotion of Science) Fellows, Grant Number 18J12831.

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論

文

Notes
1

2
3

4

5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13

14

15

See, for example: Alam Saleh, Ethnic Identity and the State in Iran (Springer, 2013);
Rasmus Elling, Minorities in Iran: Nation alism and Ethnicit y af ter Khomeini(Springer, 2013).
Huseyin Tunc, “Kurdayetî and Kurdish Nationalism: The Need for Distinction.” Zanj:
The Journal of Critical Global South Studies 2, no. 1 (2018): 43-64.
Isma’el Agha Simko’s role as a Kurdish nationalist leader is highly controversial. Whilemost Kurdish historians depict him as a charismatic nationalist leader, Azeri writers
interpret his movements as that of a brigand of both Kurds and Azeris. See, Ahmad
Sharifi, Ashayer-e Shekak va Sharh-e Zendigi-ye An-ha be Rahbari-yi Ismaeel Agha
Simko (Shikak Nomads and History of Their Life under the Leadership of Isma’el
A gh a Simk o), ( Mah ab a d: S ay yed an, 1969); Tohi d Mal ek za deh-ye D ilm a qani,
Azerbaijan dar Jang-e Jahani-e Avval ya Fajaye-e Jiloluq. (Azerbaijan in WWI and the
Jiloluq Disaster), (Hashemi, 2007).
Most of the studies on Iranian Kurds treat Iranian Kurdistan merely as the Soranispeaking parts. For a comprehensive review of the studies on Iranian Kurds see:
Ahmad Mohammadpur and Mehdi Rezaei. “Kurdish Studies in Iran Revisited: An
Overview of the Theoretical and Methodological Approaches,” Iran Namag 1, no. 4(2017): 172-208.
Martin van Bruinessen, “Kurds and the City,” Joyce Blau, l'Éternelle Chez Les Kurdes,
Paris: Institut Kurde de Paris (2013): 273-95.
Joane Nagel, “Constructing ethnicity: Creating and recreating ethnic identity andculture.” Social problems 41, no. 1 (1994): 152-176.
Henry E. Hale, “Explaining Ethnicity.” Comparative Political Studies 37, no. 4 (2004):
459.
Eric J. Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality(Cambridge University Press, 2012), 11.
Ernest Gellner and John Breuilly. Nation s and Nation alism ( New York: Cornell
University Press, 1983), 48-49.
Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism, 9-11.
Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism, 11.
Michael Moerman, “Accomplishing Ethnicity” in Ethnomethodology: Selected Readings,
ed. Roy Turner (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1974), 54-68.
Reza Shah’s plan to settle various tribes in villages is called the policy of “Takhte Qapu”.
For a detailed study, see: Ann K.S. Lambton, Landlord and Peasant in Persia: A Studyof Land Tenure and Land Revenue Administration. (IB Tauris, 1991), 151-177.
See: Shahin Ra’nayi, Eslahat-e arzi dar Kurdistan 1341-1353: Manteq-e esteqrar,
Payamad-ha-ye ejtemayi va Taba’te siyasi (Land Reform in Kurdistan: 1962-1974: Its
Logic and Political Consequences), (Tehran: Shirazeh, 2018).
Economic incentives, reliance on animal husbandry and the distances from the bigger
cities may explain the endurance of the traditional lifestyle. Today, some tribes lead asemi-nomadic life, continually moving between the village and high-altitude areas. In the
Sorani-speaking regions, however, this process was much faster, such that we barely see
the existing of tribal ties today. See: Omid Irandust and Seyed Fahim Qaderzadeh.
“Motale’e-ye Keyfi-e Senkh Shenasi-e Sabk-ha-ye Zendegi: Motale’e-ye Javanan-e Shahr-e
Mahabad” (Qualitative Study of Typology of Lifestyles: A Study of the Youth of
Mahabad City) Jame’e Shenasi-ye Karbordi 25, no. 3 (2014): 135-161.

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16 For detailed studies on the roots and consequences of the Kurdish movement in theaftermath of the Iranian Revolution, see: Hamidreza Jalayipur, Faraz va forud-e
Jonbesh-e Kurdi 1367-1357. (Ups and Downs of the Kurdish Movement: 1979-1988),(Tehran: Lohe no, 2006); Nader Entessar, “The Kurds in Post-revolutionary Iran andIraq,” Third World Quarterly 6, no. 4 (1984): 911-933; Abbas Vali, “Reflections on
Kurdish Society and Politics in Rojhelat: An Overview.” Kurdish Issues: Essays in Honor
of Robert W. Olson, (Costa Mesa: Mazda Publishers, 2016).
17 See: Asghar Nazarian and Elnaz Hampanezhad. “Tahlil-e Farayand-e Roshd va Takvin-e
Shahr-e Urmia ba Bahregiri az Hampushani-ye Aks-ha-ye Havayi dar Sistem-e Etelaat-e
Joghrafiyayi (GIS)” (Cultural Analysis of Development of Urmia Using Overlapped Aerial
Photos of GIS). Joghrafiyaye Sarzamin 10, (2013): 47.
18 The Kurdish residing regions of West Azerbaijan province in general and Urmia countyin particular are among the less developed regions of the country. For an educational
assessment, see: M. Mousavi et al., “Sanjesh-e daraje-ye tose’e yaftegi va mahrumiyyat-e
manateq-e amuzesh va parvaresh-e Ostane Azerbaijan-e Gharbi,” (Assessing thedevelopment and depravation degrees of the educational districts in West Azerbaijan
Province), Journal of Motaleat-e barnameh rizi-ye Amuzeshi 4, no.7 (2014): 83-103; For ahealth care indices assessment, see: Pejman Hamouzadeh et al., “Ranking West
Azerbaijan districts regarding utilization of structural indices of health care”. JQUMS
17, no. 2 (2013): 41-49.
19 Though there is no official census in Iran indicating ethnicity, I specified the Kurdish
residing parts of the map based on my ethnographic data collection as well as consultingwith ten real state agencies from each of the Kurds and Azeris to shape the map.
20 Interviewed on October 13, 2018 in Urmia city.
21 Farideh Koohi-Kamali, The Political Development of the Kurds in Iran: Pastoral
Nationalism. Springer, 2003.
22 For a comprehensive study on the traditional forms of marriage among the Kurds in
Hakkari province of Turkey, see: Lale Yalçin-Heckmann, Tribe and Kinship among theKurd s ( Peter La ng, 19 91), 211-2 5 6 . The t radit iona l ma rr iage patter ns for t heunderstudied Kurmanji Kurds of Urmia is similar to their co-ethnics in Hakkari.
23 In this regard, the head of the Pesagha-Abdoyi branch of the Shikak tribe, Gargarin
Simitko, still maintains a considerable power hegemony. His legitimacy mostly comesfrom his familial lineage, as he is a descendent of the nationalistic figure of the Kurmanji
Kurds in the region, Simko Shikak, who rebelled against the central government from1918 to 1922.
24 Martin van Bruinessen, “Kurdish Identities and Kurdish Nationalisms in the Early
Twenty-First Century.” 21 Yüzyılda Milliyetçilik: Teori Ve Siyaset (2016): 349-373.
25 Interviewed on November 2, 2018 in Urmia city.
26 Interviewed on September 21, 2018 in Urmia city.
27 This phenomenon is similar to what Azad Barmaki and Hasani argue about in the caseof Qashgayi tribe in southern Iran. See: Taghi Azad Barmaki and Seyyed Qasem
Hasani. “Analysis of the Historical Transformation of Tribe to Ethnicity in Qashqai”.
People and Culture 1, no.2 (2015): 107-133.
28 The most prominent and influential institution was Andisheh-ye Ahmad-e Khani
cultural institute. Established in 2001, the institute was a pioneer in cultural activities,
including Kurmanji Kurdish language classes, theatre and poetry circles. It was closedby the government in 2014, accused of engaging in illegal political activities. Today,
cultural activities are held in the institution of Islamic guidance and advertisement in

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Urmia city as well as in several non-organized circles.
29 The national and educational language in Iran is Persian, and all other regional
languages are considered only as spoken languages, including both Azeri and Kurdish.
30 Interviewed on February 8, 2019 in Urmia city.
31 Only a small population of Sunni Azeris reside in West Azerbaijan Province, locallycalled Kuresunni. Historically, Kuresuniis the name of a tribe located in the north ofSalmas district, mostly following the Hanafi school of Sunni Islam. They are Turkish
migrants to the region from the 16th century. See: Pierre Oberling, “Kora-Sunni”.
encyclopedia, Iranica. 2005. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kora-sonni. Accessedon February 14, 2018.
32 Interviewed on February 17, 2018 in Urmia city.
33 “Ba tajammo dar barabare Sefarate Torkiye va daftar-e sazman-e melal: Kord-haye Iranbe dastgiri-ye Ocalan eteraz kardand (By demonstrating in front of the Turkish
Embassy, Iranian Kurds showed their objection toward Ocalan’s arrest)” Hamshahri
Newspaper, May 20, 1999, no. 1771.
34 Interviewed on December 15, 2018 in Urmia city.
35 For more information about the rise of Iranian Azerbaijani activism in the post Iranian
Revolutionary years, see: Gilles Riaux, “The Origins of the Protest Movement Against
Ethnic Hierarchy.” in Identity, Conflict and Politics in Turkey, Iran And Pakistan, eds.
Gilles Dorronsoro and Oliver Grojean, (Oxford University Press, 2 018), 111-12 8;
Fereydoun Safizadeh, “The Dynamics of Ethnic Identity in Iranian Azerbaijan.” The
Journal of Pedagogy, Pluralism and Practice 5, no. 1 (2013): 55-73.
36 Interviewed on December 9, 2018 in Urmia city.
37 Interviewed on December 11, 2018 in Urmia city.
38 Stuart Hall, “Old and New Identities, Old and New Ethnicities,” in Culture, Globalizationand the World-System, ed. Anthony D. King. (London: University of Minnesota Press,
1991), 59.
39 Abbas Vali’s valuable edited volume “Essays on the Origins of Kurdish Nationalism,”brings together some contributions from the best-known figures of the field who
represent different viewpoints towards Kurdish nationalism. While the book is an
important contribution to the study of Kurds, the contributors’ theoretical engagements
are traditional, unlike Vali who presents his new conceptualization of Kurdish
nationalism by claiming that it goes beyond constructivism. See: Abbas Vali, ed. Essays
on the Origins of Kurdish Nationalism. No. 4. (Mazda Pub, 2003), 64-75.
40 Vali, Essays, 103-111; Abbas Vali, “The Kurds and their ‘others’: fragmented identity andfragmented politics.” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East
18, no. 2 (1998): 82-95.

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Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji Kurds in Urmia city, Iran

Abstract

Rethinking Kurdishness in an Everyday
Context: A Case Study of the Kurmanji
Kurds in Urmia city, Iran
Mostafa Khalili
Kurds are among the most studied ethnic groups in the world today. However,Kurdish studies are overwhelmingly focused on political events and conflicts inthe countries in which Kurds reside. This research is an attempt to demonstrate
how the study of less-politicized Kurds, with a focus on their everyday lives,
could identify contradictions within the Kurdish reified image presently
dominant in political and academic circles. The focus group of this research are
the Kurmanji-speaking Kurds in Urmia city of Iran.
Following Hobsbawm’s call to study the notions of nation and nationalism not
only from “above”, in state or political group discourses, but also from “below”,
in the way in which they are practiced or internalized among the people, thisstudy utilized ethnographic fieldwork and participant observation to seek ananswer to the question of what it is like to be a Kurd in daily life in a multiethnic context.
The findings illustrate that while traces of ethnicity are barely visible ineveryday interactions, we cannot neglect their importance and potential forpolarization within the city. Individuals’ strategic choices to deal with their
Kurdishness highly differ depending on factors such as generational gap, class,educational level, tribal background and gender. This shows how ethnicity is
contingent upon the subjects of this study, appearing and disappearing
depending on the circumstances.
By acknowledging multiple identities of the Kurds in their daily lives, thispaper a rg ues t hat Ku rd ish ness shou ld not be con f lated wit h Ku rd ish
nationalism. Kurdishness is not necessarily politicized in all aspects of the livesof ordinary people. On occasions in which it manifests itself in a political form,
it may follow different incentives depending on the local political fields. Such a65

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worldview can be a way out of reproduction of Kurdish identity solely based on
Kurdish nationalism, which is highly reductionist.
Keywords
Kurdishness, Kurdayeti, Kurdish nationalism, Kurmanji Kurds, Iranian Kurds,
Everyday ethnicity.

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