Kurds are the fourth-largest ethno-national group after Arabs, Persians and Turks in the Middle East. The statelessness of such a major group in the post-Ottoman world led to their ontological insecurities in the hands of majority-led nation-states. Kurdish nationalism emerged as a reaction to such ontological insecurities in the 20th century. This talk will discuss the emergence and contemporary variations of Kurdish nationalism at the nexus of ideology and geopolitics across the Middle East.

Serhun Al is a visiting political scientist at the Ohio State University. His research interests include nationalism, ethnic conflict, and security studies. He is the author of Patterns of Nationhood and Saving the State in Turkey (2019) and the co-editor of Comparative Kurdish Politics in the Middle East (2018).