Announcements
DSM Project “Don’ Tell Us Fairy Tales! Cultural Dialogue Between Women in Trabzon and Diyarbakır” is finalized with Istanbul performances in March
Prepared in Turkish, Kurdish and English the exhibition has been opened on Saturday, January 14, at 16.00 and remain open until February 7.
Kurdish Reading Club hosts Remezan Alan on 13 November 2011.
Diyarbakır Reading Club meets with Kemal Varol and discusses his novel "Jar" on November 2, 2011.
Diyarbakır Reading Club discusses George Orwell's "1984" on Wednesday, October 26.
Kurdish Reading Club is meeting on October 29th at 15.00 to discuss Helîm Yûsiv's "Jinên Qatên Bilind."
DSM started the project “Don’t Tell Us Fairy Tales! Cultural Dialogue Between Women in Trabzon and Diyarbakır”
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The absent communities of Diyarbakır return to their city

A major exhibition displaying Diyarbakır’s former multicultural character opened at the Sümerpark Amed Art Gallery in Diyarbakir on January 14.
Created by Osman Köker of Birzamanlar Yayıncılık, the exhibition is titled “Cultural Diversity in Old Diyarbakır” and reunites the lost peoples of Diyarbakır with the new inhabitants of the city through more than 200 photos from the early 20th century. The photographs show scenes from daily life as well as the physical architecture of those days.
The data is supplied by travellers and researchers who show that at the beginning of the 20th century the population of the city, consisting mainly of the walled city, was about 35,000 and that half of the population were made non-Muslim communities. In addition to the largest group of Armenians, these communities included Syriacs, Chaldeans, Catholic and Protestant Armenians, Orthodox and Catholic Greeks, and Yezidis. And commercial annuals shows that the non-Muslim groups had a strong say in the economic life of the city. From the 1914 edition of Annuaire Oriental, it is clearly seen that all 12 jewellery firms, 10 of 11 stonemasons, all 9 copper traders, all 10 firms producing silk fabric, 29 of 38 merchants dealing in cotton, gallnut, silk, grains, and wool and so on were Armenian. In the city there were Catholic and Protestant schools in addition to Armenian and Syriac ones. The newspapers published in Armenian, various theatre companies, and Armenian and Syriac bands attest to the colorful life of the city.
Prepared in collaboration with Birzamanlar Yayıncılık, Anadolu Kültür and Global Dialogue, the exhibition is also supported by the Metropolitan Municipality of Diyarbakır.

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