INTRODUCTION

An enormous amount of work has been published on the Kurds since the first edition of this historical dictionary appeared in 2004. For example, the European Journal of Turkish Studies published largely in French a thematic issue on the current state of Kurdish studies entitled "Power, Ideology, Knowledge— Deconstructing Kurdish Studies" in 2006. I wrote a short bibliographic essay on these developments and published it as "Review Essay: Kurdish Scholarship Comes of Age," Middle East Policy 15 (Fall 2008), pp. 173-77. The present bibliography seeks to reflect more fully this explosion of new publications in English since the beginning of 2004, while also including the bibliography from the first edition of this dictionary. Although the Kurds have no independent state to record or encourage academic study of their situation—and history is usually written by the victors, which the Kurds have not been—there is still a relatively large bibliography of works on the Kurds in Western as well as Middle Eastern languages. Among the former, studies exist in English, French, German, and Russian, among others. From the latter, work has been done in Turkish, Arabic, Kurdish, and Iranian. Since this historical dictionary is intended for English readers, most (but not all) sources cited in this bibliography are in English. The author has added a few entries in other languages when in his opinion they were particularly important. The author is acutely aware of how arbitrary and subjective these few choices have been. At least, he hereby emphasizes how much important work on the Kurds exists in languages other than English but has not been included here! In addition, the author's bibliography consists mainly of more recent material rather than older ones. Nevertheless, the author has included some older items when they seemed particularly important to him. The author also has omitted a number of broader studies that included an individual chapter or two on the Kurds along with other groups. The author has included only a few primary or official sources here because for the most part there has been no independent Kurdish state to compile them. On the other hand, primary and official sources concerning the Kurds certainly do exist in the government documents of Great Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and the United States, among others. In addition, of course, primary and government documents concerning the Kurds also exist in the archives of those Middle Eastern states in which the Kurds live, namely Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria. Thus, the author has included a few important official documents from the United States and Iraq. What is more, since its inception in 1992, the de facto state of Kurdistan in northern Iraq—which is now officially referred to as the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG)—has produced a wealth of contemporary data. The Ma-habad Republic of Kurdistan in Iran (1946) produced documents as well. In earlier times, various Kurdish emirates and other entities also left records. Finally, different Kurdish organizations—often ephemeral—have produced innumerable documents. Clearly, one could compile a large additional bibliography from all those sources mentioned in this and the previous paragraph, but to do so was beyond the parameters of this bibliography. The author is pleased to emphasize the earlier bibliographic work of Lok-man I. Meho. Meho has compiled two excellent bibliographies: The Kurds and Kurdistan: A Selective and Annotated Bibliography, 1997, and (with Kelly L. Maglaughlin) Kurdish Culture and Society: An Annotated Bibliography, 2001. Meho's first bibliography contains 814 mainly historical and political entries in English published largely after World War II. His second bibliography lists 931 entries in such areas as anthropology, archaeology, art, communication, demography, description and travel, economy, education, ethnicity, folklore, health conditions, journalism, language, literature, migration, music, religion, social structure and organization, urbanization, and women, among others. In this second bibliography, 60 percent of the entries are in English, 15 percent in Arabic, 15 percent in French, 5 percent in German, and the remaining 5 percent in other languages, including Russian. Both bibliographies are annotated. Given the general nature of many works on the Kurds, their classification into separate categories proved difficult and in the end sometimes arbitrary. Some of the best work on particular states or other topics appears in works listed here as general history. Thus, the author encourages readers to consult the works listed under the general category as well as under any more specific heading in which they are interested. Among others, the author still would especially recommend Martin van Bruinessen, Agha, Shaikh and State: The Social and Political Structures of Kurdistan, 1992, and David McDowall, A Modern History of the Kurds, 1996, revised third edition 2004, as the best analyses in English on the Kurds. Wadie Jwaideh, The Kurdish National Movement: Its Origins and Development, an almost legendary doctoral dissertation originally completed in 1960, was finally published in 2006. It also contains numerous interesting photographs but covers material only up to 1960. Among many popular studies, perhaps the best is Jonathan C. Randal, After Such Knowledge, What Forgiveness? My Encounters with Kurdistan, 1997. Many scholars today also regard the prolific writings (largely but not exclusively in French) of the Kurdish-French academician Hamit Bozarslan as preeminent in the field. Michael L. Chyet, Kurdish-English Dictionary/Ferhenga Kurmanci-Inglizi, 2003, has compiled a monumental work of scholarship, which presently stands as the definitive statement in its field. Susan Meiselas, Kurdistan: In the Shadow of History, 1997, second edition 2008, has compiled a most useful collection of often rare photographs with useful commentaries by Martin van Bruinessen. Mention also must be made of the new Centre for Kurdish Studies at the in the United Kingdom. This is the first academic program devoted to Kurdish studies in the West. Gareth R. V. Stansfield, who teaches there, and his colleagues have done so much for Kurdish studies in recent years. The Kurdish Library in Stockholm has an impressive collection and plans to digitize in a few years. The Institut Kurde de Paris maintains the largest Kurdish library in the West and is also arguably the oldest such organization in existence in the West. Finally, numerous good websites dealing with the Kurds are also available. Kurdishmedia.com is perhaps the best. Two excellent online news services appearing approximately five times per week are the Mesopota-mian Development Society (MESOP), mesop.de, and the Washington Kurdish Institute (WKI), kurd.org.