page_title: Zazas
section_title: Zazas and Kurmanji-speaking Kurds
hierarchical_section_title: Zazas / Ethnic consciousness / Zazas and Kurmanji-speaking Kurds
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Laboureurs de Diarbekir (Kurdistan) Kurdes Zazas
context_page_description: The Zazas are a people in eastern Turkey who speak the Zaza language. Their heartland consists of Tunceli and Bingöl provinces and parts of Elazığ, Erzincan and Diyarbakır provinces. Zazas generally consider themselves Kurds, and are often described as Zaza Kurds.
context_section_description: Kurmanji Kurds and Zazas have for centuries lived in the same areas in Anatolia. In the 1920s and 1930s, Zazas played a key role in the rise of Kurdish nationalism with their rebellions against the Ottoman Empire and later the Republic of Turkey. During the Sheikh Said rebellion in 1925, the Zaza Sheikh Said and his supporters rebelled against the newly established Turkey for its nationalist and secular ideology. Many Zazas subsequently joined the Kurdish nationalist Xoybûn, Society for the Rise of Kurdistan and other movements where they rose to prominence.
  In 1937 during the Dersim rebellion, Zazas once again rebelled against the Turks. This time the rebellion was led by Seyid Riza and ended with a massacre of thousands of Kurdish and Zaza civilians, while many were internally displaced due to the conflict. Zazas also participated in the Koçgiri rebellion in 1920.
  Sakine Cansız, a Zaza from Tunceli was a founding member of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), and like her many Zazas joined the rebels, including the promiment Besê Hozat. Many Zaza politicians are also to be found in the fraternal Kurdish parties of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) and Democratic Regions Party (DBP), like Selahattin Demirtaş, Aysel Tuğluk, Ayla Akat Ata and Gültan Kışanak.
  On the other hand, some Zazas have publicly stated they do not consider themselves Kurdish including Hüseyin Aygün, a CHP politician from Tunceli.
  A scientific report from 2005 concluded that Zazas share the same genetical pattern as other 'Kurdish groups' and did not support the hypothesis of Zazas originating from Northern Iran.
caption: "Zaza Kurds in Diyarbakir (Kurdistan)[18]
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