Introduction to Kurdish Literature

Service Description

Introduction to Kurdish Literature: Key Figures, Schools, and Works Course Overview • Level: Semi-academic / Introductory • Duration: 10 Weeks (1 Hour per week) • Language of Instruction: English Description: This course explores the historical development of Kurdish literature from its oral roots and classical poetic traditions to the emergence of modern press, poetry, and novelistic discourses across diverse dialectal regions, historical cultural centers, and the global diaspora. It highlights how literature has served as a primary medium for identity-formation, cultural preservation, and intellectual expression. Week 1: History of Kurdish and the Development of Kurdish Literature Week 2: Introduction to Kurdish Oral Tradition & Folk Literature Week 3: The Birth of Classical Kurmanji Poetry Week 4: Ehmedê Xanî: The Milestone of Kurdish Epic Week 5: The Baban School and the Modernist Turn Week 6: The Dawn of Modern Prose: Early Press, Journals, and Narrative Fiction (1898–1920s) Week 7: The "Hawar School" and the Exile Cultural Renaissance (1930s–1940s) Week 8: Poetics and Politics of Awakening: Cegerxwîn and Modern Kurdish Verse Week 9: The Rise of the Kurdish Nove Week 10: The Contemporary Kurdish Novel: Exile, Memory, and Polyphony across Borders (1980s–Present) * The course starts during the first week of October and concludes in the second week of December, spanning 10 weeks (10 sessions). The exact days and times will be scheduled based on the availability of both the instructor and the learners. * Silk Road Academy can issue invoices so learners can request reimbursement from their affiliated universities or institutions. * Class days and times may be adjusted in accordance with the request of enrollees. * Registered participants will receive full access to recorded session videos and all course materials. Serdar Şengül is a Professor of Anthropology and Cultural Studies based in Türkiye. His research lies at the intersection of the sociology of literature, Persianate studies, and Kurdish intellectual history, with a focus on pedagogy, translation, and processes of cultural mediation. Combining archival research, close textual analysis, and qualitative methodologies, his work examines the formation of literary traditions and transregional intellectual networks across Kurdish, Persian, and Turkish contexts from the early modern era to the twentieth century.