Kurdish Collection

While materials on the subject of Kurdish Studies have been consistently collected at Penn Libraries, Kurdish language materials less so. Indeed, Kurdish collecting is inconsistent across the academic and research library landscape. This is largely due to the status of the Kurdish language and publishing in the Middle East, and by extension the peripheral position Kurdish and Kurdish Studies holds in Middle East Studies. Over the past few years, we’ve deliberately acquired more Kurdish language sources as well as materials in other languages of the region about Kurds.

Kurdish collecting necessitates looking at publishing across Middle East, particularly in the four countries with the largest Kurdish populations: Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey, as well as in diaspora. To cover the geographic and linguistic heterogeneity of Kurdish populations, we work with a variety of vendors. Subjects covered in Kurdish collecting include literature, history, music, folklore, politics, and human rights, and are represented in different formats including books, journals, and film.  

While collections in Kurdish and Kurdish Studies are located throughout the library, our Zilberman Family Center for Global Collections Stacks are a good place to start if you’re looking for Kurdish language or other Middle Eastern languages. Kurdish language literature is specifically in the PK6908 call range. Other English language titles would be throughout Van Pelt. As a number of our Kurdish items are at Libra, our off-site storage facility, being able to navigate the catalog well is key to accessing all of our collections! Within the catalog, using “Kurds” as a subject will yield results, you can also filter by language. Both Kurdish and Zaza show up languages in the catalog facets, however, one challenge in searching is that Kurmanji and Sorani Kurdish aren’t. While there are various challenges to searching Kurdish materials, the Middle East Studies Librarian is always happy to help!