Denial of Kurds by Turkey
The Republic of Türkiye has an un-official policy in place that denies the existence of the Kurds as a distinct ethnicity. The Kurds, who are an Iranic people speaking various dialects of Northwestern Iranic languages, have historically constituted the demographic majority in southeastern Türkiye (or "Turkish Kurdistan") and their independent national aspirations have stood at the forefront of the long-running Kurdish–Turkish conflict. Insisting that the Kurds, like the Turks, are a Turkic people, Turkish state institutions do not recognize the Kurdish language as a language and also omit the Kurdish ethnonym and the term "Kurdistan" in their discourse.[1] In the 20th century, as the words "Kurd" and "Kurdish" were prohibited by Turkish law, all Kurds were referred to as Mountain Turks (Turkish: Dağ Türkleri) in a wider attempt to portray them as a people who lost their Turkic identity over time by intermingling with Arabs, Armenians, and Persians, among others.[2] More recently, Türkiye's opposition to Kurdish independence has defined how it has conducted itself throughout the Middle East, particularly with regard to the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
20th century[edit]
1920s–1960s[edit]
The euphemism "Mountain Turks" (Turkish: Dağ Türkleri) for the Kurds was invented by General Abdullah Alpdoğan and initially used to describe a people living in the mountains who did not speak their own language but a Turkish dialect.[31] Tevfik Rüştü Aras, the Turkish foreign minister between 1925 and 1938, defended the idea that the Kurds should disappear like the Indians in the United States.[32] Kâzım Karabekir, a former commander of the Turkish Army during the War of Independence, said the Kurds in Dersim were in fact assimilated Turks and they should be reminded of their Turkishness.[33] The Turkish Minister of Justice Mahmut Esat Bozkurt, stated that there is no other nation which could claim rights in Turkey than the Turkish race, and that all non-Turks would only have the right to be a servant or slave.[31]
21st century[edit]
Censorship in academia[edit]
A 2020 report by the İsmail Beşikçi Foundation on the censorship that exists in Kurdish studies in Turkey found that both censorship and self-censorship are frequent when writing about Kurds and their history, geography, culture and language for fear of being penalized. Words like including "Kurdistan", "colony" and "anti-colonial" also remain a taboo in writing about Kurds.[48]
Kurdish "Turkishness"[edit]
In March 2021, the Turkish Ministry of National Education released a schoolbook on the Kurdish-majority Diyarbakir Province that makes no mention of Kurds or the Kurdish language at all. It also claims that the language spoken in the city Diyarbakır is similar to the Turkish dialect spoken in Baku, Azerbaijan.[49] In August 2021, authorities changed the name of a 17th-century mosque in Kilis from "Kurds' mosque" to "Turks' mosque" prompting criticism from the Kurdish community.[50]
On the discourse of Erdoğan in regards to Kurds, Mucahit Bilici writes that:[51]