A Microhistorical Exploration Through Fiction
Eylül 2026 - Ağustos 2027
AĞRI, IĞDIR
The project addresses the need to counter linguistic and socio-cultural neglect arising when local phenomena are relegated to the margins by overly broad paradigms, while the particularities of local experience are overlooked by radical political programmes.
Conceived as a project of collective memory and engagement with the past, it seeks to bring elements of oral and literary culture into dialogue and make them visible through the literary form of the novel, Zamansız Mevsimler (Timeless Seasons). The project also aims to reach audiences whose social and intellectual environments tend to remain distant from analytical and theoretical writing, using an accessible oral and literary narrative form.
The project takes Ağrı/Doğubayazıt and Iğdır as sociological subjects for a literary exploration of microhistory. Through the metaphor of time travel, it seeks to bring to light traces of the socio-cultural world of the Karduchians, regarded in the project as proto-Kurdish communities, two thousand years ago. In parallel, it examines the phenomenon of self-assimilation and explores possible perspectives for addressing it.
As part of the project, a series of public outdoor talks will be organised in Ağrı/Doğubayazıt and Iğdır, alongside meetings with the cultural and arts departments of relevant municipalities, universities, local cultural organisations and Dengbêjs and Çîrokbêjs, who are living bearers of the region’s oral memory and storytelling traditions.
These encounters will be complemented by seminars, forums, symposia and other public events, transforming individual meetings into opportunities for collective exchange and cultural production. The project aims to foster an ongoing public discussion that brings together artistic and literary practice, local knowledge and academic perspectives within a participatory process of collective remembrance and engagement with the past.
Mehmet Sabri Yakut
Mehmet Sabri Yakut was born in 1974 in Doğubayazıt, Ağrı. He spent his childhood and early youth in Erzincan and developed an interest in literature and the arts at an early age. Alongside his literary work, he has also written theoretical texts.
His research and writing have focused particularly on cultural hegemony, drawing on a range of sociological and theoretical texts and translating these explorations into accessible publications, including pamphlets. He has published numerous theoretical essays and articles in social science journals such as Demokratik Modernite and Dipnot.
His book Zamanın Misafirleri (Guests of Time) was published by J&J Publishing. His novel manuscript, Zamansız Mevsimler (Timeless Seasons), is currently at the publication stage.