The Status of Women in Kurdish Society and the Extent of Their Interactions in Public Realm

Abstract

Apart from the traditional Kurdish gender regime, which originates from the Kurdish tribal structure and which to some extent restricts the visibility of women in society, the status of Kurdish women is considered to be relatively high in comparison with that of their neighbors, since Kurdish women enjoy relative tolerance in society. This includes the possibility of reaching high professional positions, their presence in public spaces, and entertaining guests in the absence of their husbands. Certain socio-economic and political transformations took place in recent decades, which improved Kurdish women’s social standing, turning it into a symbol representing fundamental change in the gender role model in the Middle East. Although there are some studies on the status of Kurdish women in different individual Kurdish regions throughout the Middle East, not many reviews have compared the four parts of Kurdistan simultaneously, and there are hardly any specific analyses dealing with Kurdish women’s interactions in public spaces. This review aims to investigate the status of women in Kurdish society in different Kurdish regions according to a comparative approach. Although the path of Kurdish female emancipation was initiated first in the region of Rojhalat in 1946 and the Kurdish region of Iraq was granted some opportunities toward national liberation in 1991, the Bakur in Turkey can be considered a successful movement, establishing a sustained approach to the liberation of Kurdish women from patriarchal structures. During the Rojava Revolution in northern Syria, this movement proved itself able to build an indigenous alternative to Western-type egalitarian societies.