Occupying Space in the Kirkuk Bazaar: an intersectional analysis

ABSTRACT

Scholars have long argued that gender impacts how space can be occupied in traditional locations, such as bazaars. However, in deeply divided societies an added factor of privilege in relation to ethnosectarian identity has to be considered. This article uses an intersectional lens to understand how people occupy space in the bazaar in Kirkuk, Iraq. It pays particular attention to the intersection of ethnosectarian identity (Kurd, Sunni Arab, Turkmen) and gender. The article contributes to the understanding of how the layers of symbolic violence that people face (or do not face) in their daily lives affect their attitudes and behaviours in the public space. Theoretically, it builds on the traditional forms of intersectional analysis and applies them to deeply divided societies, adding unique insight into how intersectionality can be used to identify power structures and how these in turn influence interactions in the everyday, with implications for peace and conflict. It thus explores the different experiences people have based on both gender and ethnosectarian identity, in order to shed light on the often-ignored heterogeneous nature of group actions analysed in conflict-affected societies.

KEYWORDS:

• Intersectionality
• everyday
• Iraq
• space
• peace

Introduction

The way individuals occupy and feel they can occupy public space is shaped by their identities and the social structures in which they are embedded. In the public space, factors such as gender, ethnicity, religion, class, and so on, mediate the experiences of individuals as well as their interactions with others. In deeply divided societies, however, even the most commonplace social interactions can be charged with meaning and become highly significant. The symbolic violence that often pervades social relations and that individuals experience in their daily lives can be further exacerbated in conflict societies, which in turn engenders even more fragmentation and social tensions.

Based on observations and survey research, this article relies on intersectional analysis to better understand how people use and appropriate space in the bazaar of the deeply divided city of Kirkuk, Iraq. It pays particular attention to the variety of experiences linked to the intersection of ethnosectarian identity (Kurd, Sunni Arab, Turkmen) and gender. It looks at how gender and ethnosectarian belonging shape the way space is occupied. In doing so, it highlights the dynamics of discrimination and privilege in Kirkuki society and the impact they have on people’s perceptions of themselves and of others in everyday encounters in the bazaar. Grounded in the local and the everyday, the analysis presented in this article brings an understanding of how ethnosectarian identity and gender influence how space is occupied and in turn how this influences peace and conflict in the everyday. It builds on understandings of how the layers of identities influence individual behaviour in conflict-affected societies. At the same time, the article builds on the limited local turn in the literature on Iraq, and Kirkuk specifically, a literature that for the most part still remains firmly situated within the liberal peace approach.

Men and women occupy space in markedly different ways in the Kirkuk bazaar and face varying levels of inclusion and exclusion. One reason for this is that prevailing gender norms allow men more freedom in the public space than women. However, neither among women nor among men is space experienced in a manner that is identical or homogeneous. While gender is important, the degree of privilege associated with a person’s ethnosectarian identity also influences how comfortable and free they feel they can be in the bazaar and in their exchanges with others. The bazaar is thus not only a gendered public space, but also a place where ethnosectarian considerations play an important part in shaping the lived experiences of men and women. Privilege largely defines the kind of relationship individuals have with public spaces, and this can be related to both gender and ethnosectarian affiliation.¹

The article develops as follows: The first section outlines the methodological design of this study. The second section provides contextualisation of the history and the political conditions of the city, which influence social interactions between the different ethnosectarian communities. The third briefly discusses the gender dynamics in Iraqi society in the context of prolonged conflict and insecurity, while the fourth presents the theoretical underpinnings of the article, which integrate intersectional analysis and the concept of the everyday to capture the ways in which relations of power and privilege influence how people occupy space in daily life. Finally, the fifth section presents and analyses the findings before concluding.

Methods

This article uses the everyday as a methodological entry point to understand how people occupy and feel they can occupy space. The everyday allows for an understanding of the power dynamics of society, as actions within the everyday are connected to the wider society and the local political order.² The everyday is useful to understand the imbalance of power, which can be particularly pronounced in deeply divided societies. To understand how both gender and ethnosectarian identity influence this power imbalance, this article utilises theories of intersectionality. Thus, the article utilises the everyday to understand how the intersection of gender and ethnosectarian identity influence behaviour, interactions, and agency in the daily lives of people in a deeply divided society where these fields of difference play a prominent role.

When examining the everyday to understand the dynamics that influence people’s interactions in deeply divided societies, the choice of space becomes important, as space itself impacts behaviour.³ The space chosen should not be exclusive or formal, nor should it favour one group outside of already existing power structures within society. It should, however, mirror these structures.

For this study, Kirkuk’s old bazaar was chosen as a site for examining this interaction, as this is a traditional meeting place in Kirkuk. Given its large number of shops, variety of goods and relative low prices, it attracts a large number of Kirkuk’s population. Located in the centre of the city, around the ancient citadel, it is a rare location in Kirkuk where people from ethnosectarian homogenous neighbourhoods travel to and interact. Nonetheless, it is not a civil sanctuary,⁴ rather it is a space where the existing power structures of the society are reinforced within the everyday. Thus, an intersectional lens of analysis enables an understanding of how the reinforcement of these power structures influences both behaviour, interactions, and the occupation of space within the everyday. An additional benefit of using the bazaar as a site of analysis is that in bazaars, social, political, and spatial hierarchies can be observed, as different social classes and ethnosectarian groups interact. Bazaars are more than just places of economic exchange, they have cultural significance and are also ‘centers of civic participation where diverse social, economic, ethnic, and cultural groups combine, collide, cooperate, collude, compete, and clash’.⁵

For this research a total of 511 surveys (consisting of nine demographic and 25 other questions) were carried out in early March 2019, using the Mobenzi platform by four local multilingual enumerators (two men and two women) who were hired through the civil society organisation Kokar and given full training. The surveys focused on questions relating to how identity influences behaviour and were theoretically developed around the concept of symbolic capital. The survey questions were reviewed by two colleagues from Kirkuk prior to being finalised to ensure local understanding of the questions. To understand the role economics plays in interactions, surveys were divided between shopkeepers (n 253), and customers (n 258). The gender balance in the customer survey was 48.1% women and 51.9% men, whereas, and reflecting the fact that there are significantly less women shopkeepers, the balance for shopkeepers was 93.7% men and only 6.3% women. The ethnosectarian makeup of both surveys is fairly representative of Kirkuk (Figure 1) based on the election results.⁶ Customers were approached as they passed by, whilst shopkeepers were approached on a shop-by-shop basis. As all communities use the bazaar and work or own shops, this method is seen to have prevented selection bias. The surveys themselves were carried out in quiet areas within the bazaar. Although this did not offer as much privacy as if conducted in someone’s home, we felt it did offer the respondents the ability to better contextualise their answers within the space of the bazaar and we were confident with the level of privacy offered.

Figure 1. Ethnosectarian makeup of survey.

Surveys as a methodological approach were chosen for their anonymity, as answers are more likely to be honest by guaranteeing the participants complete anonymity, which is important as both inter-community relations and identity-based privilege can be considered contentious subjects in Kirkuk. Surveys were conducted on a tablet with all three languages (Kurdish, Arabic and Turkmen) available. Multiple fields of difference – such as ethnosectarian group, income level, gender, education, age, and so on – were marked on the survey in order to analyse the findings with regards to the role of gender, ethnosectarian, and socio-economic privilege. However, the participants were given the opportunity to complete this section themselves, which meant the participant was able to complete the survey without having to identify their ethnosectarian identity to the enumerator. Survey research was also chosen as it can be useful in understanding the many ways people understand themselves, the social dynamics, and the nature of the conflict.⁷⁸ In addition, this article is influenced by observations made by one of the authors through multiple trips to Kirkuk over a 10-year period, which are of importance as through participating in the everyday practices one can observe the ongoing work of both conflict and peace on the ground.⁹ At the same time, it must be noted that interviews with elites from the political and security sectors in Kirkuk over the same period have influenced understandings of privilege. The other author’s positionality as a female researcher from a Middle East and North Africa country with a cultural and linguistic background different from the mainstream have influenced reflections on how gender, privilege, and language affect the use and appropriation of the public space.

Contextualising interaction in Kirkuk

Kirkuk is home to three main ethnicities – Arabs, Kurds, and Turkmen – that all have a historical stake in the city and province dating back hundreds of years. Assyrians also play an important historical role, but their numbers have drastically decreased in recent times. At the time of World War I Kirkuk was a functioning multiethnic community. However, following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the later creation of Iraq, and the installation of the Hashemite monarchy to rule over the country, Arab ascendency began. The Hashemites gave nomadic Arab tribes grants and land to farm. At the same time Arabs, as well as Assyrians and Armenians, were brought to Kirkuk to work in the oil industry.¹⁰ This Arabisation process escalated with the formation of the Republic of Iraq, when Kurds (unless loyal to the party) were largely excluded from the oil industry. Many Kurds were subsequently expelled from the region altogether, whereas Arabs were enticed with special privileges and bonuses.¹¹

Saddam Hussein further strengthened Arab control of Kirkuk through changing its electoral borders to exclude mainly majority-Kurdish neighbourhoods and brutally targeting the non-Arab demographics, such as in the Anfal campaign where thousands of Kurds were killed using chemical weapons. Following Operation Desert Storm in 1991, in which the US-led coalition forces expelled Iraqi troops from Kuwait, the Kurds took advantage and seized Kirkuk; however, Iraqi forces soon regrouped and recaptured it. Despite the loss, Kurds managed to effectively create an autonomous Kurdish region in the Kurdish provinces of northern Iraq, due to the creation of a no-fly zone by the coalition forces. Responding to this threat, Saddam increased the Arabisation process to maintain his hold over Kirkuk. Through the long process of Arabisation, the numbers of Kurds and Turkmen in Kirkuk drastically decreased, whilst the number of Arabs increased.¹²

Since the 2003 US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq there has been an increased competition for the control of Kirkuk city and province. Both Turkmen and Assyrians see Kirkuk as a symbol of their position as a significant ethnicity in Iraq. Kurds see Kirkuk as part of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI), and there have been calls by some for the city to be made the capital.¹³ At the same time, having Kirkuk under Baghdad’s control is an important part of Iraqi nationalism and the territorial integrity of Iraq for many Arabs. These varied views demonstrate the large stake that all the factions in Kirkuk have in gaining as much control as possible, and for this reason conflict has emerged over the political control of Kirkuk. Furthermore, the Kurdish desire for Kirkuk to join the KRI has caused conflict as for many Arabs and Turkmen it would result in complete Kurdish control and would financially support Kurdish secession. The history of Arabisation and the lack of a valid census have made resolving Kirkuk’s political situation difficult, as claims about the size of a given ethnosectarian community can easily be contested. Although a process was developed (Article 58 of the TAL and Article 140 of the Constitution) to deal with the status of Kirkuk, successive governments have intentionally blocked its implementation.¹⁴ Additionally, the deadline of Article 140 was missed and then extended by the federal supreme court, rather than voted in parliament, where it would have failed due to the lack of support from non-Kurds.¹⁵

Until 2014 the Kurdish Peshmerga and the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) jointly controlled security in Kirkuk. However, as the Islamic State (IS) took control of large swathes of Iraqi territory, the ISF withdrew from Kirkuk to join the battle, thus allowing the Kurds to take full control of the city and most of the province.¹⁶ Once again, this intensified other ethnosectarian groups’ fear that the Kurds were planning to take Kirkuk by force. This further increased in June 2017 when the president of the KRI, Masoud Barzani (2005–17), announced a referendum on the independence of the KRI (which included Kirkuk). Consequently, the Iraqi Parliament voted to remove Najmiddin Karim, Kirkuk’s Kurdish Governor, and Rakan al-Jabouri, a Sunni Arab, became acting governor. The referendum, held on 25 September, showed overwhelming (just under 93 per cent) support for independence. However, this actually resulted in reducing Kurdish control of Kirkuk. The Iraqi Prime Minister, Haider al-Abadi (2014–18), declared the referendum unconstitutional, and the Iraqi Parliament voted to send troops to the disputed territories and impose a host of sanctions against the KRI. In October 2017 Abadi sent in the ISF and the Popular Mobilisation Forces to take control of Kirkuk and other disputed territories, as well as the oil fields within them. Due to an agreement with elements of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), most of the PUK-controlled factions of the Peshmerga withdrew to the KRI, and the central government was able to take control of Kirkuk relatively easily with minimal fighting before the rest of the Peshmerga in Kirkuk also withdrew to the KRI. Although Kurds have lost some of their dominance in Kirkuk, they still dominate the provincial council, and their control of the strategic governorship is expected to return.¹⁷ The above demonstrates the competition between ethnosectarian groups in Kirkuk, which in turn influences interaction between groups, but it is also important to understand gender dynamics and how they may influence interactions.

Gender in Iraq

Gender and women’s rights have long been entangled with the dynamics of nation-state building in Iraq. Women’s bodies, their behaviour, and their very presence in the public space have constituted sites of ethnosectarian struggles and gendered representations of the nation.¹⁸ Following the 2003 invasion, the status of Iraqi women and their legal, political and socio-economic rights have continued to deteriorate.¹⁹ Moreover, conflict and insecurity have brought even more restrictions on women’s access and ability to appropriate public space, which remains largely male-dominated.²⁰ In particular, the intensification of tensions between ethnosectarian groups – each having their own visions of state and society and the role women ought to have in them – has further strengthened conservative patriarchal gender norms.²¹ Conflict and ethnosectarian tensions have resulted in emerging trends of hyper-masculinity, leading to an increase in violence against women, both in the private sphere in the form of domestic violence and in the public space.²² Conflict has exacerbated conservative gender roles that confine women to domestic activities whereas men are considered to be responsible for protecting and providing for the family.²³ However, in situations of displacement, there has been a slight renegotiation of traditional roles whereby women have come to be increasingly in charge of keeping their children safe.²⁴ Iraq’s protracted crisis has made public spaces often unsafe for women, as gender-based violence and sexual harassment remain common.²⁵ This has severely restricted their freedom of movement and expression in public, thus continuing existing trends of pervasive inequality and gender-based discrimination. Although the 2005 Iraqi Constitution promises gender equality at the legal level, in practice women’s rights are routinely transgressed.²⁶ This suggests that interactions in Kirkuk cannot be viewed at the level of ethnosectarian identity alone. Gender also has to be taken into account, making an intersectional lens imperative.

Intersectionality and everyday experiences of space

Space has traditionally been viewed merely as the physical environment that hosts peoples’ lives, their activities, and their relations. Against this static view of space as a simple container for human activity, a more dynamic conception emphasises the ways in which space is constructed and produced through people’s representations of it and through the social interactions that occur in it.²⁷ Space is thus constantly transformed by the people who occupy it – through their identities, actions, encounters, and exchanges – into a meaningful human place that encompasses all the complexity of human relations and modes of being.²⁸ These relations and interactions mean that space is fundamentally political and discursive since it is negotiated, claimed, appropriated, and shared by individuals and groups.²⁹ As a result, structures of power and privilege as well as people’s perceptions of themselves and of others are embedded in and constitutive of space as place.³⁰ This in turn influences how individuals and groups occupy, behave, and engage with others in a given space. It influences for example how people dress, how they talk, and – in a multilingual space – what languages they use. In other words, it influences whether and how they display or hide aspects of their identities (such as religious and ethnosectarian belonging).

Inasmuch as the ways in which people experience space are infinitely diverse and complex – depending on multiple aspects of their identities and social positions – adopting an intersectional approach can help to better understand how certain categories of identity affect how people occupy and feel they can occupy space. Intersectional analysis was developed from the work of Spelman³¹ and black feminists in the US, such as Crenshaw³² and Collins.³³ It originated from the need to understand how complex inequalities influence power relations with an early focus on what it means to be both a woman and a person of colour. It has since grown as an analytical tool to examine complex inequalities and the influence these have on power relations. Feminist peace and conflict scholars see intersectionality as central, as they aim to analyse ‘gender, sexuality, race, and class relations as power structures within any given empirical setting’.³⁴

Intersectionality refers to the ways in which various dimensions of identity (such as gender, ethnicity, race, class, ability, religion) intersect to create unique lived experiences, resulting in specific constellations of privilege and discrimination.³⁵ Given that individuals occupy different social positions depending on their particular backgrounds, they live through and are affected by social phenomena (such as peace, conflict, reconciliation) in distinct ways. However, as different aspects of identity affect the ways in which people perceive their position in society, they also inevitably influence how people act and interact with others, and intersectionality as praxis points to the numerous ways in which people – as individuals or as part of groups – mobilise aspects of their social and political identities in their daily lives.³⁶

As an analytical approach, intersectionality deepens our understanding of those lived experiences and social interactions. In doing so, it allows us to better account for the multiplicity and the diversity of human experience. By focusing on the intersection of different factors that shape lived experience and actions, intersectionality challenges approaches that tend to single out one category of analysis as the key explanatory variable, thus overlooking intra-group differences and the fluidity of social identities.³⁷ As it challenges essentialist and homogenising explanations, the intersectional approach offers the possibility to transcend mainstream discourses and narratives about inter-group relations, especially in deeply divided societies. By illuminating the complex power structures in which individuals and groups are enmeshed due to specific intersecting identity categories,³⁸ intersectional analysis discovers and exposes instances of discrimination and domination that may otherwise go unnoticed. Intersectionality has recently become a far more common lens of analysis in peace and conflict studies, although it is less common on studies on Iraq. However, we build on its more traditional use of understanding inequalities, as we look at the impact of fields of difference (and the privilege or lack of privilege that comes with them) to understand people’s behaviour and the way they interact in the everyday. This provides a unique insight into relations within the everyday, which can be of use to peacebuilders.

In a divided city like Kirkuk where space has historically been disputed and claimed by various groups, people’s everyday experiences of shared spaces such as the bazaar are embedded in structures of power and privilege that result from the intersection of different categories of identity. We theorise privilege through the concept of social capital, as in the deeply divided city of Kirkuk the social connections that come purely through ethnosectarian identity are particularly pronounced. Connections, whether direct (family, friend, acquaintance) or indirect (ethnosectarian identity) to the provincial council, leading political parties, security forces, and so on, privilege some over others in how they can occupy space.³⁹ It must also be noted that as a post-conflict/conflict-affected city and a disputed territory, Kirkuk is highly securitised. There are several security forces operating in the city, which have a strong connection to ethnosectarian identity, and thus privilege.⁴⁰ At the time this research was conducted, Kurds were seen to have the most privilege, which is connected to their numerical and political dominance since 2003.⁴¹

To capture ordinary experiences of space, the concept of ‘the everyday’ is particularly useful. Taking the everyday as an entry point is not merely about adding another level of analysis, e.g. the local level, or adding more actors, but of holistically embracing a distinct ‘mode of thought’ that is premised on ‘the abundance and the continuous emergence of life’.⁴² It is a way of being conscious of the infinite ways in which political life overflows the categories and the frameworks that are set for it and which condition our perceptions and understandings. A focus on ‘the everyday’ thus underlines the significance of seemingly insignificant practices, encounters, situations, and so on. This is especially important in a deeply divided society like Kirkuk where these can be particularly charged with meaning, as they can lead to ‘othering’ or acts of symbolic violence which in turn antagonise relationships between groups.

Combining intersectional analysis with the everyday thus allows us to better understand how relations of power and forms of domination and discrimination are often produced and reproduced in daily life through established social norms, structures, and practices shared by everyone – including those subjected to them.⁴³ This in turn allows a better understanding of how these relations and structures of power and privilege influence how people occupy space. Consequently, attention to everyday experiences of shared spaces in conflict-affected societies – which highlights ordinary manifestations of privilege and the expressions of symbolic violence they often contain – provides a basis for alternative understandings of the dynamics of peace and conflict that go beyond macro processes and elite-level interactions.⁴⁴ Adopting an intersectional approach that integrates the notion of the everyday allows us to see peace and conflict not as clear-cut and mutually exclusive phenomena, but rather as intertwined phenomena that can extend to everyday life and to ordinary spaces (such as a bazaar in the case of this study), thus forming a continuum in which (symbolic) violence and peaceful interactions can exist simultaneously.⁴⁵

While this article focuses on the intersection of just two categories of identity – namely gender and ethnosectarian affiliation – it is important to note that intersectional analysis is by definition potentially an inexhaustible inquiry into the endless parameters that determine personal experience and make it truly singular. One can always explore the impact of more aspects of people’s identities on lived experiences, with each additional category of identity making the target group narrower and the analysis ever more refined. That said, in Kirkuk, the categories of gender and ethnosectarian affiliation are nevertheless arguably the most relevant fields of difference and the ones that have the most significant impact on people’s lived experiences in the bazaar.

It is also important to note the risks of essentializing identities associated with broad generalisations based on gender and/or ethnicity (for example about ‘Kurdish women’, ‘Turkmen men’) in an analysis of how these categories of identity affect everyday access to and appropriation of space. It should therefore be stressed that the findings of this study should not be taken as a fixed portrayal of different groups, or a judgment on identity. Rather, they are used as an indicator of how perceptions of privilege influence the ease with which individuals approach the public space. Put differently, the purpose is not to arrive at essentialist conclusions about men and women or Kurds, Arabs, Turkmen, but to understand precisely how elements of privilege contribute to socially constructing them as such, and how these social constructions affect their ways of being and interacting in a public space that is in turn itself constituted by these interactions and encounters. As such, this discussion of ethnosectarian privilege is more interested in the dynamics of ethnosectarian identity and how these affect the appropriation of public space than in sectarianism as political tool to construct ‘the other’ and exclude them as such.⁴⁶ Another closely related point is that privilege associated with ethnosectarian identity is not static. Rather, privilege and perceptions thereof tend to fluctuate depending on change in the broader social and political dynamics to which it is connected. Consequently, if similar research were to be conducted at different points in time, it would most likely yield different results, reflecting transformations in the local context and the fluid nature of ethnosectarian privilege. With this contextual and theoretical understanding, we can now move on to analysing the findings from the survey.⁴⁷

Results

In deeply divided societies, the dynamics of gender and ethnosectarian identity influence a person’s access to, presence in, and appropriation of space. In Kirkuk’s main bazaar, women and men occupy space in different ways echoing broader trends in Iraqi society of women’s limited access to the public space. However, the intersection of gender and ethnosectarian identity provides more subtle insights into the experiences of both women and men. At the time this research was conducted, there was a general perception in Kirkuk of Kurds as the group with most influence and privilege in Kirkuki society due to their connections to influential institutional, political, and security actors in Kirkuk. This sentiment is confirmed by people themselves, as survey results show that 43.4% of respondents believe that Kurds are treated the best in the bazaar, compared to 21.3% for Sunni Arabs, 17.4% for the Turkmen, and 10.1% for Shi’a Arabs.

Feelings of freedom

The data shows clear differences between men and women regarding what they feel free to do while in the bazaar. Women for example tend to feel less comfortable than men with expressing their opinions and discussing with others. They are also less likely to consider the bazaar as a space where they can relax and socialise, with only 26.6% feeling comfortable to do so. In contrast, 50% of men feel that they can relax and socialise in the bazaar. While women are less likely than men to consider the bazaar as a space for interacting and socialising with others (12.9% say that they do not socialise in the bazaar, compared to 6.0% for men), they are nonetheless as likely as men to interact with different groups in the bazaar. In contrast, a majority (60.5%) of women reported that they do feel free to walk around in the bazaar. The bazaar thus represents a space where the presence of women is not problematic because it is perceived to be justified (e.g. they are in the bazaar to run errands).⁴⁸ This explains why women tend to feel free to walk and wander around, but not to stop and linger in the bazaar in the way that men do when they sit at a teahouse or mingle with other men. The data thus confirms that the presence of women in the public space continues to require a purpose. Nonetheless, the bazaar does offer opportunities for women to socialise and interact with people from other groups. Moreover, according to the survey data the ethnosectarian identity of shopkeepers is not a leading factor as to where people choose to shop, rather price and quality are more relevant. Additionally, our survey data shows that the bazaar is one of the main places where women interact with members of other groups, more so than at work.

Adding the dimension of privilege associated with ethnosectarian identity brings more nuance to conclusions reached in the analysis focusing on gender. It allows for a better understanding of how the intersection of gender and ethnosectarian identity affects experience, perception and behaviour in a given space.⁴⁹ The data show for instance that Kurdish women are more likely to feel comfortable to relax and socialise in the bazaar (31.6%) compared to Sunni Arab women (9.7%). This difference in the experience of the two groups of women may be linked to an added dimension of privilege associated with the influence that Kurds have or are perceived to have in Kirkuk and suggests a feeling of being at ease in the public space on the part of Kurdish women that is not shared to the same extent by women from other ethnosectarian groups.

Feelings of safety

How individuals occupy space is also connected to their feelings and perceptions of safety. A gender-based comparison shows differences between men and women with regards to feelings of safety in the bazaar. The percentage of men who report that they always feel safe in the bazaar (42.5%) is slightly higher than the percentage of women (40.3%). However, with regards to feeling safe for the most part the difference between men and women is more pronounced, as 38.1% of men say that they feel ‘safe for the most part’ while only 21.0% of women say the same. This trend continues with feelings of being unsafe in the bazaar: Women are more likely to report that they feel unsafe, with 29.0% of them saying that they feel often unsafe and 9.7% saying that they never feel safe, while for men these figures are lower; only 13.4% say that they often feel unsafe and 6.0% say that they never feel safe (Figure 2).

Figure 2. Feelings of safety in the Kirkuk bazaar.

Among women, variations along ethnosectarian identity lines can also be observed (Figure 2). For example, 49.1% of Kurdish women say that they always feel safe in the bazaar, in contrast to 27.3% of Turkmen women. Also, 15.2% of Turkmen women say that they never feel safe, which is quite high when compared to Kurdish women (8.8%). This suggests that Turkmen women are more likely to perceive the bazaar as a hostile or unwelcoming space, whereas Kurdish women are more likely to feel safe in this space. Sunni Arab women are most likely to report that they often feel unsafe in the bazaar (35.5%). These variations across ethnic groups become clearer when the distinction is made between whether women tend to feel ‘mostly safe’ or ‘mostly unsafe’ in the bazaar. Aggregating the figures for ‘always feel safe’ and ‘safe for the most part’ shows that Kurdish women are more likely to feel safe in the bazaar (64.9%), followed by Turkmen women (60.6%), then Sunni Arab women (58.1%). In turn, aggregating ‘often unsafe’ and ‘never safe’ shows that 41.9% of Sunni Arab women tend to feel more unsafe in the bazaar, followed by 39.4% of Turkmen women, and 35.1% of Kurdish women. Overall, it appears that, of the three ethnosectarian groups, Sunni Arab women tend to feel most unsafe in the bazaar, while Kurdish women tend to feel most safe.

Freedom of expression

Women are also not as comfortable as men with discussing the political situation in Kirkuk and Iraq in the bazaar. For example, 77.4% of women say that they avoid all sensitive topics that may cause conflict, compared to 56.0.% of men. Men are also more likely to discuss the future, and the security situation, of Kirkuk, while women tend to avoid getting into these types of discussions. This is the case even as the perceptions of risk related to discussing the political situation are higher for men than for women (61.2% of men consider discussing the political situation to be risky, compared to 48.4% of women). However, there are differences between women depending on their ethnosectarian affiliation. For example, Kurdish women are least likely to avoid discussing sensitive issues in the bazaar, with 68.4% of Kurdish women saying that they avoid broaching topics that can cause tensions, compared to 83.9% of Sunni Arab, and 84.9% of Turkmen women. Kurdish women are also more likely to broach the contentious topic of Kirkuk’s political situation in the bazaar (17.5%), far above Sunni Arab women (3.2%), and Turkmen women (6.1%). This once again shows women’s differentiated tendency to express themselves in the public space. As members of a group perceived to have great influence in Kirkuk, Kurdish women may have more confidence to be politically outspoken in public space.

Wearing identity signifiers

In a deeply divided society, wearing identity signifiers (such as clothing, jewellery, etc.) can be a way to occupy space and signal one’s presence in it. In the bazaar of Kirkuk, men are more likely to wear identity symbols every day (9.0% compared to 3.2% for women). Furthermore, more women than men report never wearing identity signifiers in the bazaar (55.7% of women compared to 46.3% of men). Also, less women than men wear signifiers only on special holidays (40.3% of men compared to 37.9% of women). Taken together, these indicators suggest that in general men have a higher propensity than women to occupy the public space through identity signifiers (Figure 3).

Figure 3. Wearing identity signifiers in the bazaar.

However, the data also shows variations among women. 28.1% of Kurdish women say that they never wear symbols that reveal their ethnosectarian identity in the bazaar, compared to 83.9% Sunni Arab women and 72.7% of Turkmen women. In addition, 12.9% of Sunni Arab women and 21.2% of Turkmen women say they wear identity signifiers only on special holidays, compared to 63.2% of Kurdish women. Among men, once again, Kurds are the least likely to say that they never wear identity signifiers in the bazaar (35.1%), followed by Turkmen men (57.9%) and Sunni Arab men (63.6%). Both among men and among women, these figures echo the broad perceptions of Kurdish privilege in the public space. As mentioned above, in general men are more likely to wear identity signifiers than women. When comparing Kurdish women to Turkmen men, this trend is confirmed if one looks only at the daily wearing of identity signifiers, as 10.5% of Turkmen men say that they wear identity signifiers every day, while only 5.3% of Kurdish women do. However, when one looks at the tendency to never wear these signifiers or to wear them only on special holidays, for example, that trend is disrupted. With men in general being more likely to wear identity signifiers, one would expect that Turkmen men would be less likely than Kurdish women to say that they never wear identity signifiers in the bazaar. The data, however, shows the opposite trend, with 57.9% of Turkmen men saying that they never wear identity signifiers compared to only 28.1% of Kurdish women. Also, 31.6% of Turkmen men say that they wear them only on special holidays compared to 63.2% of Kurdish women. This means that Kurdish women are significantly more likely to wear identity signifiers than Turkmen men. This connects to the celebration of Kurdish holidays such as Nawroz or Kurdish Clothes Day, where wearing Kurdish clothes is commonplace.⁵⁰ The data shows that Kurds are more likely to celebrate holidays in public, and on these occasions, tensions are more likely, which all connects back to how groups feel they can occupy and dominate a space.⁵¹ The comparison between Turkmen men and Kurdish women thus demonstrates the inadequacy of distinctions based exclusively on either gender or ethnicity to understand how individuals occupy the public space through identity signifiers. It points to how some groups feel freer than others to wear these signifiers and highlights how in some instances ethnosectarian privilege prevails over gender-based privilege.

Hiding identity

Closely connected to wearing identity symbols in the bazaar as a shared public space is the degree to which individuals feel the need to hide their identities. 74.2% of women report that they never hide their ethnicity in the bazaar, compared to 65.7% of men, suggesting that men are more likely than women to hide their identity in the bazaar. This tendency for men to hide their identity more than women can be observed across all groups and departs from the abovementioned general trend of male privilege in a male dominated society. This adds nuance to the analysis of how women occupy space in the bazaar, as findings indicate that women are both likely to feel less comfortable in the bazaar, as mentioned above, and at the same time less likely to hide their identity. Among women, the different ethnic groups are in general equally likely to say that they never hide their identity in the bazaar. However, there are some small differences: the share of Turkmen women who hide their ethnic identity all the time in the bazaar is 6.1%, while for Kurdish women it is 3.5%. Sunni Arab women also have the highest rate of hiding their ethnicity very often (9.7%) (Figure 4).

Figure 4. Hiding identity in the bazaar.

The sharpest contrast, however, is between Turkmen men and Turkmen women: 52.6% of Turkmen men say that they never hide their identity in the bazaar, compared to 72.4% of Turkmen women. While the experience of Turkmen women follows the pattern of other women, the experience of Turkmen men appears to be an outlier. This is also reflected in the data suggesting that the experience of Turkmen men also diverges from the experiences of other men (only 52.6% of Turkmen men say they never hide their identity, compared to 66.7% for Sunni Arab men and 66.2% for Kurdish men). Thus, Turkmen men tend not only to hide their ethnic identity more than Turkmen women, but also more than other men, which mirrors trends of limited ethnosectarian privilege for Turkmen. This tendency to be rather discreet in the public space may be due to their overall position in the country as a minority with somewhat limited influence.

Occupying space through language

Language use can also be viewed as a way for individuals to negotiate and appropriate space. This is particularly the case in multicultural contexts where the public space is shared by various groups with different languages and linguistic practices. By speaking their own language, individuals ipso facto point to and underline their group affiliation. The more they speak their language, the more they increase their community’s visibility and the greater the space they claim for it in relation to other communities. The Kirkuk bazaar, for example, becomes a socio-linguistic space through the languages spoken in it. Language and linguistic practices are identity markers and a means through which identity is performed. At the same time, the public space is constructed and transformed through the languages that are spoken in it in the everyday.⁵²

As a multicultural and multilingual discursive space, the Kirkuk bazaar is a place where the dynamics of ethnosectarian privilege have a bearing on linguistic practices. An analysis of linguistic proficiency shows that 91.9% of Kurdish men and 79.0% of Kurdish women can speak Arabic. In contrast, only 18.0% of Arab men and 24.2% of Arab women⁵³ can speak Kurdish. Kurds are also more likely to be proficient in Turkmen, compared to Arabs (43.2% of Kurdish men and 56.1% of Kurdish women can speak Turkmen, whereas only 15.4% of Arab men and 39.4% of Arab women can). Turkmen men and women are more likely to be proficient in Arabic (89.5% of Turkmen men and 97.0% of Turkmen women can speak Arabic), and to a lesser extent in Kurdish (47.4% of Turkmen men and 39.4% of Turkmen women can speak Kurdish). Thus, although Kurds are perceived to have more privilege and influence in Kirkuk, Arabic remains the dominant language as it is the language that many can speak. This is largely due to the fact that Kirkuk has in the past undergone a process of Arabisation and Arabic is the main language in the country.

When dealing with a shopkeeper from another ethnic group, Kurds are more likely than Arabs to use the other person’s language (Figure 5). 20.6% of Kurds say that they use the other person’s language, compared to only 8.3% of Arabs. In the same vein, 56.9% of Arabs say they speak their own language when dealing with a shopkeeper from another ethnic group, more than twice as much as Kurds (26.0%). Kurds are also more likely than Arabs to say that they use a language that both they and the other person understand (35.1% for Kurds and 26.4% for Arabs) or a mixture of languages (18.3% for Kurds and 8.3% for Arabs). This is in line with the trends in language proficiency – where Arabic is the dominant language, and Arabs constitute the group with the lowest proficiency in Kirkuk’s other languages – and reinforces the observation that occupying space in the bazaar through linguistic practices does not follow prevailing perceptions of Kurdish ethnosectarian privilege. This suggests that independently of gender-based and ethnosectarian-based privilege, Arabs can claim space in the bazaar through their native language. However, it is important to note that limited proficiency in the other languages of Kirkuk can also be seen as an act of self-marginalisation. The data suggests, for example, that Arabs are far less likely to interact socially with other groups. In contrast, Turkmen are the group with the most difficulty in claiming space through their native language. They are the least likely to speak their own language when dealing with a shopkeeper from another ethnic group (11.5%). They are also more likely than Arabs and slightly less likely than Kurds to use the other person’s language (17.3%) and the most likely to use a language that both understand (51.9%) or a mixture of languages (19.2%). In the case of Turkmen, trends in language proficiency – whereby Turkmen is the least dominant language – mirror trends in ethnosectarian privilege in Kirkuk, and Iraq, according to which Turkmen enjoy limited privilege.

Figure 5. Language use when dealing with shopkeepers from another community.

Although men and women are as likely to use their own language in addressing a shopkeeper from another ethnosectarian group, women appear to be less disposed than men to use the other person’s language (12.9% for women compared to 19.4% for men). However, women are more likely to use a language both they and their interlocutor understand, even if it is not their own (43.6% for women compared to 29.1% for men). A sharper contrast can, however, be observed between Kurdish women and Kurdish men (Figure 5). The percentage of Kurdish women who say that they use their own language when dealing with a shopkeeper from a different ethnic group (33.3%) is higher than that of Kurdish men (20.3%), despite comparable levels of proficiency in other languages. Moreover, only 12.3% of Kurdish women say that they use the other person’s language, compared to 27.0% of Kurdish men. These trends may indicate that Kurdish women are more likely than Kurdish men to engage in affirming Kurdish identity and negotiating space for it through language use. Although other explanations for this difference are certainly possible, such an interpretation is in line with other findings that suggest the tendency of Kurdish women in particular to assert ethnosectarian identity in public.

On the other hand, while Arabs generally speak their own language to a person from another community (which is to be expected given the historical dominance of Arabic in Kirkuk), Arab men are more likely than Arab women to speak their own language (64.1% for men and 48.5% for women) and less likely to speak the other person’s language (5.1% for men and 12.1% for women). Although this is in line with trends in language proficiency for Arabs, the variation between Arab men and Arab women suggests that Arab women may be less likely to capitalise on the linguistic dominance of Arabic, which can connect to the fact Arab women are seen to have the least overall privilege. This underscores the peculiarity of the case of Kurdish women who, despite proficiency in other languages and despite the linguistic dominance of Arabic, are more likely to use their own language. These linguistic practices, together with other factors, mainly the tendency to wear identity signifiers, suggest that Kurdish women are more likely than others to assert their ethnosectarian identity in the public space, which is likely related to the ethnosectarian privilege that comes with it.

While not in any way claiming to be conclusive, this analysis of language use as a way of occupying space in the context of a deeply divided society and a disputed territory is highly relevant to peace and conflict scholars and practitioners, as it highlights not only the importance of understanding how linguistic practices might engender sensitivities, tensions, and symbolic violence, but also how they can provide possibilities for improved interaction and exchange in the everyday.⁵⁴

Conclusion

This article demonstrates the importance of applying an intersectional analysis to better understand how different aspects of people’s identities – here gender and ethnosectarian identity – interact to produce structures of privilege that shape experiences of appropriating and occupying a shared public space in everyday life. It builds on the important early work of black feminists and the growing trend of utilising an intersectional lens in peace and conflict studies, adding unique insight into how intersectionality can be used to identify power structures and how these in turn influence interactions in the everyday, with implications for peace and conflict. As an analytical approach, intersectionality allows us to better account for the multiplicity and the diversity of human experience and challenges approaches that tend to single out one category of analysis as the key explanatory variable, thus overlooking intra-group differences and the fluidity, and complexity, of social identities. Through illuminating the complex power structures that permeate the everyday, intersectional analysis has allowed us to identify and analyse instances of discrimination and/or self-censoring behaviour as well as domination/symbolic violence that may otherwise have gone unnoticed. Thus, intersectionality is utilised not only to understand inequalities, but also privilege. Understanding these power dynamics and their influence on both peace and conflict in the everyday is essential in order to understand the drivers of conflict and pathways to peace at the local level.

This article has furthermore attempted to show the complexity of human experience and the fluidity of social relations that are at play when people occupy public space in the everyday. The findings in this article point to how, in some cases, gender-based privilege takes precedence over ethnosectarian privilege and vice versa. In other words, in attempting to capture everyday experiences of space, the analysis has been confronted precisely with ways in which lived experiences overflow the categories set for them. A better grasp of the complex ways in which individuals and groups occupy space in multi-ethnic and deeply divided societies in the everyday provides insights into the dynamics of peace and conflict, showing for example how both can be rooted in everyday interactions. With a greater understanding of the multi-faceted nature of peace and conflict, actors engaged in peacebuilding can explore alternative ways to support peaceful interactions and relationships beyond elite-level as well as identify drivers of conflict and (symbolic) violence linked to differentiated or unequal access to public space as a result of various forms of privilege.

The article also builds on understandings of the role of space as a site of analysis and demonstrates that spaces such as bazaars can offer unique insights into how wider power dynamics manifest themselves in deeply divided societies. Through our use of intersectionality, investigating privilege and inequality, and our analysis of how people (inter)act at the everyday level, this article makes an important contribution to the field of peace and conflict studies. It demonstrates the importance of understanding how identities, which are multi-faceted and constructed relationally, influence behaviour in relation to acts of everyday peace and conflict, and the importance of analysing both privilege dynamics and behaviour at the everyday level in order to give a more nuanced reading of what drives both peace and conflict within the everyday. Thus, adding an important strand to the literature on the local turn that focuses on power, behaviour, and interactions, and provides valuable insights for policymakers working towards promoting local peace.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Shivan Fazil and Khogir Wirya, as well as Kokar for their assistance in conducting the survey. Thanks is also owed to the two anonymous reviewers and the journal’s editors for their helpful feedback. All errors remain the authors’ responsibility alone.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Dylan O’Driscoll

Dylan O’Driscoll is an Associate Professor at the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations (CTPSR), Coventry University, where he leads the Peace and Conflict Research Theme. He is also an Associate Senior Fellow at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

Amal Bourhrous

Amal Bourhrous is a Researcher with the Middle East and North Africa Programme at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

Notes

¹ Dylan O’Driscoll, ‘Everyday Peace and Conflict: (Un)Privileged Interactions in Kirkuk, Iraq,’ Third World Quarterly (2021).

² Cynthia Enloe, ‘The Mundane Matters,’ International Political Sociology 5, no. 4 (2011); Isabel Dyck, ‘Feminist Geography, the “Everyday”, and Local–Global Relations: Hidden Spaces of Place-Making*,’ The Canadian Geographer / Le Géographe canadien 49, no. 3 (2005).

³ Ivan Gusic, ‘The Relational Spatiality of the Postwar Condition: A Study of the City of Mitrovica,’ Political Geography 71 (2019).

⁴ Eric Lepp, ‘Civil Sanctuary: Clearly Marked Spaces of Civility in Divided Urban Settings,’ Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding (2022).

⁵ Theodore C. Bestor, ‘Markets: Anthropological Aspects,’ International Encyclopaedia of Social and Behavioural Sciences (2001): 9227.

⁶ Kirkuk’s ethnosectarian makeup is largely contested. As a census has been blocked for political reasons relating to Article 140 it is difficult to discuss the numbers with any certainty. As the political parties are all connected to ethnosectarian identity, it is possible to gain a rough idea of the population makeup through the election results. This is, however, not a perfect means to understand the diversity of the population.

⁷ Percentages in all figures may not add up to or may exceed 100% due to rounding.

⁸ Jon E. Fox and Cynthia Miller-Idriss, ‘Everyday Nationhood,’ Ethnicities 8, no. 4 (2008).

⁹ Lisa Wedeen, ‘Ethnography as Interpretive Enterprise,’ in Political Ethnography: What Immersion Contributes to the Study of Power, ed. Edward Schatz (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009).

¹⁰ Dylan O’Driscoll, ‘Conflict in Kirkuk: A Comparative Perspective of Cross-Regional Self-Determination Disputes,’ Ethnopolitics 17, no. 1 (2018).

¹¹ Arbella Bet-Shlimon, City of Black Gold: Oil, Ethnicity, and the Making of Modern Kirkuk, (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2019).

¹² Liam Anderson and Gareth Stansfield, Crisis in Kirkuk: The Ethnopolitics of Conflict and Compromise, National and Ethnic Conflict in the 21st Century (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009).

¹³ Ahmed Hussein, ‘Mps Collecting Signatures to Question Talabani,’ Iraqi News, 12 March 2011.

¹⁴ Article 58 of Transitional Administrative Law (TAL) called for the normalisation of the disputed territories, followed by a census and then a referendum on the future constitutional status (whether Kirkuk would join the KRI or not). Article 140 of the Iraqi Constitution calls for the implementation of Article 58 of the TAL by the 31 December 2007.

¹⁵ Anderson and Stansfield, Crisis in Kirkuk: The Ethnopolitics of Conflict and Compromise.

¹⁶ O’Driscoll, ‘Conflict in Kirkuk: A Comparative Perspective of Cross-Regional Self-Determination Disputes.’

¹⁷ Dylan O’Driscoll and Bahar Baser, ‘Independence Referendums and Nationalist Rhetoric: The Kurdistan Region of Iraq,’ Third World Quarterly 40, no. 11 (2019).

¹⁸ Zahra Ali, Women and Gender in Iraq: Between Nation-Building and Fragmentation (Cambridge University Press, 2018).

¹⁹ Nadje Al-Ali and Nicola Pratt, What Kind of Liberation? Women and the Occupation of Iraq (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009).

²⁰ Toby Dodge et al., ‘Iraq Synthesis Paper: Understanding the Drivers of Conflict in Iraq,’ LSE Middle East Centre (2018), https://www.lse.ac.uk/ideas/Assets/Documents/Conflict-Research-Programme/crp-synthesis-paper/Iraq-synthesis-paper-understanding-the-drivers-2018.pdf.

²¹ Ali, Women and Gender in Iraq: Between Nation-Building and Fragmentation.

²² Dylan O’Driscoll, ‘Emerging Trends of Conflict and Instability in Iraq,’ (Brighton, UK: Institute of Development Studies, 2018).

²³ International Organization for Migration, ‘A Gendered Perspective: Safety, Dignity and Privacy of Camp and Camp-Like Settings in Iraq,’ (2016), https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/IOM_Iraq_-_A_Gendered_Perspective_report_0.pdf.

²⁴ O’Driscoll, ‘Emerging Trends of Conflict and Instability in Iraq.’

²⁵ Oxfam, ‘Gender in Brief – Iraq,’ (2015), https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/GiB-Iraq-CARE-Oxfam-1_0.pdf.

²⁶ National Democratic Institute, ‘Opening up New Opportunities for Women in Iraq,’ (2018), https://www.ndi.org/sites/default/files/Focus%20Group%20Report%20-%20Dec%202018%20%28English%29.pdf; ibid.

²⁷ Doreen Massey, For Space (London: Sage, 2005).

²⁸ Annika Björkdahl and Susanne Buckley-Zistel, eds., Spatialising Peace and Conflict: Mapping the Production of Places, Sites and Scales of Violence (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016).

²⁹ Barbara Johnstone, ‘Language and Place,’ in The Cambridge Handbook of Sociolinguistics, ed. Rajend Mesthrie (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011).

³⁰ Annika Björkdahl and Stefanie Kappler, Peacebuilding and Spatial Transformation: Peace, Space and Place, Studies in Conflict, Development and Peacebuilding (Abingdon: Routledge, 2017).

³¹ Spelman Inessential Woman: Problems of Exclusion in Feminist Thought (Boston: Beacon Press, 1988).

³² Crenshaw ‘Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics,’ The University of Chicago Legal Forum 140 (1989); ‘Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color,’ Stanford Law Review 43, no. 6 (1991).

³³ Collins ‘It’s All in the Family: Intersections of Gender, Race, and Nation,’ Hypatia 13, no. 3 (1998).

³⁴ Annick Wibben et al., ‘Collective Discussion: Piecing-up Feminist Peace Research,’ International Political Sociology 13, no. 1 (2019): 87.

³⁵ Patricia Collins and Sirma Bilge, Intersectionality (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2020).

³⁶ Ibid.

³⁷ Elena B. Stavrevska and Sarah Smith, ‘Intersectionality and Peace,’ in The Palgrave Encyclopaedia of Peace and Conflict Studies (Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2020).

³⁸ Collins and Bilge, Intersectionality.

³⁹ O’Driscoll, ‘Everyday Peace and Conflict: (Un)Privileged Interactions in Kirkuk, Iraq.’

⁴⁰ ‘Conflict in Kirkuk: A Comparative Perspective of Cross-Regional Self-Determination Disputes.’

⁴¹ Circumstances surrounding Kurdish dominance in Kirkuk have changed. However, at the time the research was conducted, there was a distinct understanding from the population that Kurds would retake the governorship, as due to a Kurdish/Kurdish-affiliated majority in the provincial council it is in their power to elect the new governor. It was also expected that the Kurdish Peshmerga would return to the city giving Kurds further control over the security of the city. However, currently, neither of these have transpired and Kurdish dominance has weakened.

⁴² Xavier Guillaume and Jef Huysmans, ‘The Concept of “the Everyday”: Ephemeral Politics and the Abundance of Life,’ Cooperation and Conflict 54, no. 2 (2019): 279.

⁴³ Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of the judgment of Taste, New Edition ed. (London: Routledge, 2013).

⁴⁴ Matt Davies and Michael Niemann, ‘The Everyday Spaces of Global Politics: Work, Leisure, Family,’ New Political Science 24, no. 4 (2002); O’Driscoll, ‘Everyday Peace and Conflict: (Un)Privileged Interactions in Kirkuk, Iraq.’

⁴⁵ Björkdahl and Kappler, Peacebuilding and Spatial Transformation: Peace, Space and Place.

⁴⁶ Fanar Haddad, Understanding ‘Sectarianism’: Sunni-Shi’a Relations in the Modern Arab World (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020).

⁴⁷ O’Driscoll, ‘Everyday Peace and Conflict: (Un)Privileged Interactions in Kirkuk, Iraq.’

⁴⁸ Fatima Sadiqi and Moha Ennaji, ‘The Feminization of Public Space: Women’s Activism, the Family Law, and Social Change in Morocco,’ Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies 2, no. 2 (2006).

⁴⁹ O’Driscoll, ‘Everyday Peace and Conflict: (Un)Privileged Interactions in Kirkuk, Iraq.’

⁵⁰ On the significance of wearing holiday garb as an identity signifier in Kirkuk, see for example Rudaw, ‘Kirkuk University Prevents Celebration of Kurdish Clothes Day,’ Rudaw 8 March 2018. And ‘Kurds in Kirkuk Defiantly Celebrate Traditional Clothing Day,’ Rudaw 11 March 2019.

⁵¹ For example, the insistence of Kurds on raising Kurdish flags during Nawroz celebrations is a recurring bone of contention and has been a source of tension between Kirkuk’s communities, especially Turkmen and Arabs who see in it a provocation and an attempt to assert control and Kurdish identity in Kirkuk as disputed territory. See for example Ekurd Daily, ‘Turkmens Protest against Raising Kurdistan Flag in Iraq’s Kirkuk,’ Ekurd Daily 29 March 2017; Oussama Mahdi, ‘Kurds Celebrate Nowruz in the Castle, Raise the Flag of Kurdistan: Tension in Kirkuk and Fears of a New Strife among Its Components [in Arabic],’ Elaph 18 March 2019.

⁵² Language use in the public space is political and has implications for dynamics of inclusion and exclusion in Kirkuk, as communities struggle for presence and visibility in the linguistic landscape. See for example Dilan Sirwan, ‘Arabic Only: Kirkuk Erases Kurdish from Official Signage,’ Rudaw 26 March 2021.

⁵³ Here Sunni and Shi’a Arabs are treated as one group as they both have Arabic as their first language.

⁵⁴ See for example the criticism faced by a project on coexistence in Kirkuk that omitted the use of different languages. Kirkuk Now, “Kirkuk: Project for Coexistence Overlooks Languages of Local Communities “ Kirkuk Now 27 June 2022.