Redrawing the Boundaries between Kurdishness and Turkishness.

Turkey has recently been taking steps towards greater democratization and increased recognition of Kurdish rights, whilst also facing a steeply rising tide of Turkish nationalism and anti-Kurdish sentiment. The process itself in fact involves a historical dimension, requiring the dominant identity, namely 'Turkishness', to engage critically both with its past and with modernity, as well as with the sphere of 'Kurdishness' especially the official construction of Turkish history and the place of 'others' within it. It also necessitates 'solidarity trading zones' to be established and for hegemonic relations to be re-ordered. Through employing an 'epistemology of interaction', namely the Second Language Learning Thesis (SLLT), the paper will explore these interlinked spatial and temporal processes by examining strategies of exclusion and strategies of involvement, border re-making, solidarity-building between the two identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]