The Purple Color of Kurdish Politics , livre ebook

The Purple Color of Kurdish Politics
This compelling collection highlights a range of personal experiences of imprisoned Kurdish women politicians and their dedication to the collective feminist struggle against gender inequality, patriarchal social structures, and anti-Kurdish repression in Turkey. Through their prison writings, twenty-two deeply committed Kurdish women define their personal forms of resistance within a securitized society and its unremitting prison system. Relying on radical feminist principles, Kurdish women identify daily practices of implementing notions of gender equality and provide critical insights into their successes and failures to transform Turkey s political structures.
-Vera Eccarius-Kelly, Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Siena College in Albany, New York
Twenty-two stories are woven together by G ltan K anak to reassert the enduring value of Kurdish women s collective resistance. The stories, translated by twenty-two scholars and activists, take the reader beyond mere political struggle to the vibrant interconnected memories and inner lives of Kurdish women political prisoners.
-Shahrzad Mojab, Professor at the University of Toronto and co-author of Women of Kurdistan

First published 2018 as K rt Siyasetinin Mor Rengi by Dipnot Yay nlar
First English language edition published 2022 by Pluto Press
New Wing, Somerset House, Strand, London WC2R 1LA and Pluto Press Inc.
1930 Village Center Circle, Ste. 3-384, Las Vegas, NV 89134
www.plutobooks.com
Copyright Dipnot Press, G ltan K anak 2022
The right of the individual contributors to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 0 7453 4709 7 Hardback
ISBN 978 0 7453 4708 0 Paperback
ISBN 978 0 7453 4711 0 PDF
ISBN 978 0 7453 4710 3 EPUB








This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental standards of the country of origin.
Typeset by Stanford DTP Services, Northampton, England
Simultaneously printed in the United Kingdom and United States of America
Contents
List of Abbreviations
Translation Coordinators Preface
Preface to the English Translation by G ltan K anak
Women s Organizing in the Kurdish Party Tradition by G ltan K anak
1. How Will You Find That Many Women? by Aysel Tu luk
2. Mother, Child, Prison by Burcu elik zkan
3. We Never Thought of It That Way by a lar Demirel
4. Hurry Up and Fix Things by Diba Keskin
5. Never Give Up by Dilek Hatipo lu
6. We Have Your Keys. Come and Get Them by Edibe ahin
7. Women s Work Viewed as Frivolous by Evin Keve
8. You re Going to Eat with the Men? by Fatma Do an
9. History Has No Love for Women Who Stop and Keep Quiet by Figen Y ksekda
10. Three Times Elected, Three Years Barred from Serving by G lser Y ld r m
11. Being a Woman Is Hard, Even Dangerous by G ltan K anak
12. Are Men Going to Walk Behind a Woman? by Leyla G ven
13. A Lion Is a Lion, Woman or Man by Mukaddes Kubilay
14. Nobody s Daughter-in-Law by Nurhayat Altun
15. Women Should Handle Finances by Sara Kaya
16. This Woman Is Tough as Nails by Sadiye S er Baran
17. From Prison to Parliament by Sebahat Tuncel
18. Imprisoned for Providing Services by Servin Karako
19. One Woman Became 80 by Y ld z etin
20. Is Sir Chiefwoman in? by Zeynep Han Bing l
21. They ve Turned It into a Women s Municipality by Zeynep Sip ik
22. Breaking Down the Doors by Selma Irmak
Freedom for Aysel Tu luk
Translators and Coordinators
Index
List of Abbreviations
PARTIES AND GROUPS IN THE KURDISH POLITICAL TRADITION
BDP
Peace and Democracy Party
DBP
Democratic Regions Party
DEHAP
Democratic People s Party
DEP
Democracy Party
DTH
Democratic Society Movement
DTK
Democratic Society Congress
DTP
Democratic Society Party
HADEP
People s Democracy Party
HDK
People s Democratic Congress
HDP
Peoples Democratic Party
HEP
People s Labor Party
KCK
Kurdistan Communities Union PKK Kurdistan Workers Party
OTHER ORGANIZATIONS
AKP
Justice and Development Party
CHP
Republican People s Party
D SK
Confederation of Revolutionary Trade Unions of Turkey
DYP
True Path Party
ESP
Socialist Party of the Oppressed
HD
Turkish Human Rights Association
KA.DER
Association for the Support and Training of Women Candidates
MHP
Nationalist Movement Party
SHP
Social Democratic People s Party
Translation Coordinators Preface
Ruken Isik, Emek Ergun, and Janet Biehl
Turkey s political environment is notoriously difficult for activists seeking to affirm the human rights of Kurds, the country s largest ethnic minority. Official government policy is to reject the validity, if not the existence, of Kurdish identity itself. But that has not prevented Kurdish people from entering the political arena and being elected to office, whether as mayors of municipalities or members of the parliament in Ankara, the capital city. In recent years, however, as repression has tightened in Turkey, pro-Kurdish activism has almost guaranteed imprisonment.
In this book, 22 Kurdish women politicians, imprisoned since 2016, recount their revolutionary achievements and struggles in that difficult political environment. Indeed, Kurdish women have been fighting against multiple forces of oppression both within and beyond the boundaries of the official apparatuses of the state. The violent intersections of Turkish nationalism, colonialism, militarism, and capitalism with local patriarchal arrangements have created particularly difficult and dangerous conditions of resistance for Kurdish women. Yet they continue not only to survive but also to thrive as political subjects whose radically creative amalgamation of anticolonial, anticapitalist, ecological, and feminist philosophies and practices of democracy are inspiring for those who dream of a world of plurality, equality, justice, and peace for all. The color of that dream is purple, which internationally symbolizes feminism. And this book describes the ways in which a group of Kurdish women politicians have fought for that dream at the daring intersections of feminist politics with Kurdish party politics in Turkey.
Although the 22 contributors are victimized by multiple systems of oppression, they are not victims. As G ltan K anak, who edited the original Turkish edition from within prison, explains, We managed to participate in politics by overcoming many barriers. We had to confront the various faces of male domination that exclude women from public life. * But confront them they did: We carried women s words and demands to political platforms by defeating the prejudices of men, the family, and the society. It s been a challenging struggle.
We chose to translate the book because the stories of the political experiences of the 22 women are not only inspiring and uplifting, but also challenging, instructive, and insightful for women of the world who want to claim their place on the political arena that is too often ruled by the discriminatory, exclusionary, and assimilative forces of misogyny.
Just as the original Turkish edition was produced collectively, our translation too is the result of a collective process of feminist solidarity. It began in 2020 when Ruken reached out to Emek and Janet. As translation coordinators, we have complementary areas of expertise and skill sets. We then brought together 22 remarkable translators from a variety of academic and activist backgrounds and geographic locations. For all of us, translating this book has meant standing in solidarity with its authors as well as those committed to Kurdish women s liberation. That makes the translation a risky project for those who live under more precarious conditions: for instance, one of the translators who works as an academic at a state university in Turkey must remain anonymous for now because of the risk of potential government retaliation.
During the translation process, we used an email group, engaged in several phases of peer reviews and revisions, and conducted two workshops especially to decide how to translate certain words consistently, such as Kurdish heval and Turkish arkada . Both these words could be translated as friend or comrade, and both claim gender-egalitarian camaraderie among political subjects dedicated to Kurdish resistance. For simplicity s sake, we went with friend for arkada and kept all Kurdish words as they were, but readers should keep in mind that in the Kurdish context heval and arkada refer to a highly politicized form of friendship. During the various phases of our collaboration, despite some differences and disagreements, we stuck with our shared vision of feminist solidarity and found common ground on most matters.
The collaboration process that made this translation possible also depended on the support of other individuals to whom we re deeply grateful: Beyhan Demir, Ay e D zkan, Evin K anak, Burcu elik zkan, and Emirali T rkmen. We also thank the Freedom for Aysel Tu luk and Ill Prisoners Platform for permission to reproduce their call for action. Finally, we re grateful to Neda Tehrani of Pluto Press for helping to bring this project to fruition. Ruken and Emek are also thankful to Janet for contributing her original drawings to the book. In editing, we ve slightly reduced the length of the essays for space considerations.
The Purple Color of Kurdish Politics is a product of women s solidarity, so is its translation, and we hope that you, its readers-whoever you are, wherever you are located, and whatever languages you speak-will stand in solidarity with Kurdish women and become part of the anticolonial and anticapitalist feminist