Embodying Peace after War: Yazidi women’s perspectives from Iraq

Four Yazidi women in northern Iraq spent 2022 using photography to give voice to their everyday experiences of embodying peace, (in)security and struggle as their community rebuilt itself after years of war and displacement. Here we present their images and words.

Embodying Peace, Navigating Violence: A network of auto-ethnographers in Iraq and Palestine was an Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded project, jointly run by Dr Sofya Shahab and Dr Chloe Skinner from the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) in 2022-2023.

Rethinking Security partnered with IDS to disseminate their research into the ways in which women embody peace, struggle and (in)security in Iraq and Palestine. A group of Yazidi women from the Nineveh Plain in northern Iraq undertook a photovoice project to document their everyday experiences of embodying peace and struggle in their post-war context.

Here we share the results of this very personal research in which the photographers give their own descriptions of the images they have chosen and why they are so meaningful to them and their experience.

Iraqi Women’s Perspectives

There are many strong, powerful women, but this portrait captures the one woman that I one day hope I may be like. She always works hard for what she believes and gives her all to be successful in everything she does, yet she is always there for me when I need her. It is as if she doesn’t know what it is to be tired. Despite all these pressures she has found a way to empty it from her mind by knitting something she learnt from the beneficiaries she supports through her work as she noticed how their mental health improved after working on handicrafts. She holds in her hands a blanket she made for her father after two months of working on it.

Taken by Afrah Khedher Murad

For me this photograph captures the most beautiful moment. The two women remind me of my mother – the same dress, the same shape. When I first noticed them I saw how free they seemed, enjoying themselves under the sun. But the truth is they have done a lot in their youth from cooking and baking, to taking care of their children and husbands. However, now in this moment they have their own time to sit together and to not think what is happening at home. I feel that no matter how much I work, I can never reach or achieve what my mother and grandmothers have done to keep their family satisfied.

Taken by Afrah Khedher Murad

This was the first picture I took, because it was taken at a moment that encompasses an amazing feeling that I had while riding a bike. I don’t have the words to describe it, only that it was as if I was flying. There was some fear and my heart was pumping fast in my chest but it was also full with happiness. Riding a bike in Bashiqa is the boldest thing I have ever done and I felt so proud in myself for this moment. My dream is that some day I will be able to ride my bike through the streets just like people use their cars.

Taken by Afrah Khedher Murad

This photograph is of a woman from Bashiqa who lives in Dohuk. She spends one hour and a half every day to reach her work in Bashiqa. Although the travel costs almost half of her salary and she has to leave her two children in school and nursery she won’t give up as she is determined to support her family and to not only depend on her husband. Although the distance makes her work more challenging her enthusiasm and passion carry her through each day.

Taken by Afrah Khedher Murad

Small home enterprises have become increasingly common among women in Bashiqa. This woman is spending her free time making candles. It gives her the opportunity to be productive in something she enjoys and she is gaining a little money from it. She decided to give this a chance as a business and hopes that it will grow because when her work with a humanitarian organization stopped, she felt that she could not stay at home doing nothing. The sense of powerlessness and frustration was too much. She described how she felt that “my mind started to freeze, filled with emptiness and feeling that I’m less than my husband. My whole education went for cooking and taking care of the kids and home”. So she decided to open her own business and she is very happy and proud of herself for doing it as it gives her a sense of worth.

Taken by Afrah Khedher Murad

This is me tall and standing, like the trees and buildings around me. I have a strong foundation that can handle the seasons and the different stages of my life. Some parts of me are falling apart, and other parts are growing or regrowing, but I’m full of hope and love, I’m happy and grateful.

Taken by Awaz Saaed Kichan

Sky reminds me of limitlessness, it is so wild, colorful, crazy, magical, merciful, different, and powerful. I feel I am all of these and I want to be all of these. Looking into the sky, especially at sunset gives me so much peace and comfort like everything is going to be just okay! Like I just need to relax and let it go, that I’m perfect the way I am, and I am limitless.

Taken by Awaz Saaed Kichan

A woman from my community is a very cheerful and youthful spirit who lives according to what she loves, as we can see in a picture of her wearing the folkloric dress of Christian. She is a woman who does not have an academic degree, but she works and takes responsibility for herself and participates in peace teams to express herself.