Annual Meeting 2024

At the end of November/beginning of December this year we plan to
organize our annual meeting similar to our
Jemal Nebez Prize special event last year, when we gained valuable experience
with a relatively large hybrid event, i.e. a mix of a physical and online event.
Precisely because we know how much preparation is needed for this, we decided to start early early on.

We will report on the progress of the preparations here.

2023 Annual Meeting (Online)

In December 2023, due to our Award event, we skipped our annual meeting and said that we would hold it at a later time which we did on February 4, 2024

Contents, Summary

Date of the Catch up meeting: 2024-02-04 from 17:10 to 18:45 p.m.

Participants:
Hannelore Küchler, Jan Gosau, Sirwan Renas, Markus Kuchler, Yado Rahmani, Veman Lineva, Raman Hama Saeed, Rezan Abdollahi, Hesamadin Khakpur, Sahar Salhian, Salar Pashai, Hamid Karimi, Fexriye Adsay

Other participants took part via our Zoom account.

Moderator Veman Lineva

1. Welcome & more

Hanne Küchler, Jan Gosau, Markus Kuchler, Sirwan Renas:

● After a warm welcome to everyone and everyone, Hanne Küchler, as chairwoman and founder of the Jemal Nebez Foundation, first shared that she was very happy about the outcome of the previous internal meeting, where Sirwan Renas had just been appointed as the 3rd member of the JNF board.

● Jan Gosau, as the second member of the board and deputy, added that they had been in complete agreement with each other when they asked Sirwan to join the management of the foundation.

● Markus, as chairman of the advisory board, added that he had also welcomed Sirwan's joining the JNF management board.

● Sirwan confirmed that he was happy to accept the appointment and looked forward to to work for the Jemal Nebez Foundation, as he had done in various capacities over the past two years.

Moderator Veman Linevan then opened the Foundation's 2023 Annual Public Meeting by inviting Jan to be the first to speak.

2. Appointments and personnel changes in 2023

Jan:
● Schilan Kurdpoor became a member of the JNF Advisory Board in May 2023.

● In August, Yado Rahmani took on an innovative managerial role, which he has since carried out via the Internet, supported by Sirwan. These are coordination and organizational tasks that are currently being described and named in more detail in order to firmly anchor them in our foundation.

● In December, Salar Pashai resigned from the foundation at his own request as Berlin office manager.

3. Jemal Nebez Library

Hanne:
● So far, a large portion of the books and journals published by the Jemal Nebez Library have been entered in Excel spreadsheets. These still have to be checked,
and further processed before they can be put on the Internet in the future.

● The Jemal Nebez Library also includes the future Jemal Nebez Archive, which will contain our namesake’s personal papers, diaries, letters, photographs, files and manuscripts.

● Both - the work that has already been done for the Jemal Nebez Library and the imminent cataloguing of the estate for the archive - are to be presented to experts and then the next steps to be determined
.
Raman:
● Raman Hama Saeed, a master's student in cultural studies at Freie Universität Berlin FU) in Berlin, who has been working as a freelancer for the foundation since May 2023, reported that his professor showed continued interest in our long-term project (library and archive).

● Raman was told that if the foundation sought contact, they would help him establish such contact with the librarians at the FU.

4. Jemal Nebez Award

Sirwan:
● Sirwan Renas talked about how he organized the Jemal Nebez Award Commission. He explained his approach to the composition of his team, taking into account the diversity in all parts of Kurdistan, the Kurdish diaspora, the Kurdish communities and gender diversity, and introduced the individual commission members and their expertise.

● He mentioned that the sum dedicated to the laureate was increased to 4000 euros.

● Sirwan added that after his move to the Foundation's board of directors, another organizer of the next prize would have to be found and hoped that it would be someone from the current Jemal Nebez Prize Committee.

● Before closing, Sirwan mentioned that most people had welcomed the Jemal Nebez Award and considered Zara Mohammadi to be a deserving person to receive this award. He admitted that there were people who criticized this award. He replied to these critics that this prize was not exclusively an intellectual one. He explained that different activities and aspects played a role in this. He referred to the relevant information available on the Foundation's website. He encouraged everyone to study this website and contact the Foundation if they had any suggestions and criticism.

5. New books in 2023

Hesamadin:
● Hesamadin Khakpur spoke as translator of a book by Jemal and as a colleague of Kamil Sharifpoor, who translated another book by Jemal at Hesamadin's side.

● Hesamadin gave general and necessary information about the content of the two books. He also mentioned peculiarities that play a role in translations from the Arabic into Kurdish.

● Hesamadin also spoke as the initiator of a small print run in his home region of the two books that he and his colleague had translated. According to Hesamedin these two books by JN are now available in almost all bookstores in Rojhelat. They are also available at the Ghazalnus center in Sileymani/Bashur as well as from ‘49kiteb’ in Europe.

● He offered to translate other works by Jemal Nebez into Arabic, if there were any.

6. JNF Scientific Seminar s

Yado:

● Yado (Yaser) Rahmani, as the main coordinator and organizer of the newly introduced JNF scientific seminars, presented the project and its main objectives by showing informative slides, written in both English and Kurdish. This information is posted on our subsite Events/Online Seminars.

● He shared details about the seminars held in 2023 featuring distinguished scholars and their topics:

-Hesamadin (Hiwa) Khakpour, Ph.D. in Arabic Literature and Translator, on August 7, 2023, presented his thoughts on the feasibility of an intellectual project based on the thinking of Jemal Nebez, especially in today's world.

-Sirwan Renas, Ph.D. Student in Political Theory at the University of Pennsylvania, presented "A Comparative Analysis of Ernest Renan and Jemal Nebez’s Conceptions of Nation" on Aug 7, 2023.

-Kurish Azizi, Post-Doctoral Researcher in Water and Environmental Sustainability at Arizona State University discussed ‘Environmental Challenges and Adaptations, from Current Academic Trends to Kurdistan’s Experience’ on Sep 23, 2023.

-Hamid Karimi, Assistant Professor in Computer Science at Utah State University, addressed ‘Information Age and Social Media: Opportunities and Consequences’ on Jan 6, 2024.

● Additionally, Yado mentioned the upcoming seminars:

The next seminar will examine ‘Kurdish Cultural Heritage and Looting’ by Haci Akman, Professor in Archaeology, History, Cultural Studies, and Religion at the University of Bergen. This will be followed by a session on ‘Vision or Reality? The Kurds in the Policy of the Great Powers, 1941–1947’ by Burhan Yasin, Professor (Emeritus) in the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at Lund University

● Yado also introduced Jemal Nebez Foundation’s YouTube channel, https://www.youtube.com/@JemalNebezStiftung-Berlin

7. Jemal Nebez Foundation on social media

Rezan:

● Rezan Abdollahi provided general information about all the social media platforms on which the Foundation is active.

● She introduced the foundation's Instagram, Facebook, X (Twitter) and YouTube accounts.

● While presenting these accounts, Sirwan provided the links of all platforms in the Zoom chat and Rezan suggested that all participants in the meeting share the links with their friends and colleagues.

● She introduced the admins of these accounts: Facebook (currently Rezan – formerly together with Salar Pashai), X/Twitter (Fexriye Adsay), YouTube (Yado Rahmani) and Instagram (Veman Lineva).

8. Financial Report 2023

Jan Gosau:

● The Foundation's general financial figures for 2023 were explained, as published on the Foundation's subsite Transparency.

● Subsequently, a cost breakdown of the Jemal Nebez Award 2023 was shown, which is also posted on the Foundation’ subsite Transparency. For the prize money, the foundation received a special donation of about 2000 EUR. As the Foundation increased its own prize money to 2000 EUR in this context, the prize money was raised to altogether 4000 EUR, to be paid in 2024. (The payment was settled in the course of February 2024.)

9. Budget 2024, Projects

Jan (continued):
● The budget (2024) was drawn up on the basis of the figures in the 2023 financial report and a view of the current situation, see the PDF designated JNF Budget 2024 on our Transparency subsite

● Expenses for the library are reduced to the rent of the storage space and some minimal expenses. No amount has been earmarked for the cataloguing itself for 2024, as we first want to obtain an expert opinion on how best to proceed. This also applies to the pending processing of the unpublished estate, which will be included in the archive.

● In the current year (2024) year we still have to transfer the prize money to the family of Zara Mohammadi. We expect the website to cost about the same as last year, but we hope to be able to get by with it. Within our 2024 budget, we set aside smaller amounts of money for our book projects/publications, as well as for events, seminars, the memorial and the maintenance of social media.

10. Open discussion,
focus on priorities and the current situation

● Dr. Hamid Karimi suggested that he could help the foundation with its social media activities.
● Raman Hama Saeed suggested that the library could be connected to some universities.
● Dr. Hamid Karimi also asked if Jemal Nebez's books were available in the U.S. and if he could order them from the U.S.
● Fexriye Adsay suggested that our foundation would benefit from collaborating with the Ismael Beshikchi foundation. As she said, this foundation has a representative in Germany.
● Sirwan Renas Salihzade asked those present to help the foundation with translations. If they are not able to do so themselves, there would be the possibility of approaching other capable people about it.

11. Closing remarks

Sirwan:
● Sirwan Renas thanked everyone for their interest in the Jemal Nebez Foundation.
By referring to the way in which the foundation defined itself, namely founded by Kurds for Kurds, Sirwan addressed a topic that Jemal Nebez was probably the first to devote himself to intensively, namely who actually was a Kurd. Sirwan said that being Kurdish was not exclusively an ethnic identity. Rather, it included all those who care about the rights of the Kurds and the fate of Kurdistan.

● Sirwan thanked Salar for his contribution to the Foundation. It would be nice if he could continue to stay in touch with the friends and community of Jemal Nebez and be able to work within the foundation again in the future.

● Sirwan also expressed his gratitude to Markus for his services to the
Foundation.

Date: 2024-04-01
The summary of the contents was created collaboratively.

Hanne Küchler, Jan Gosau, Sirwan Renas
Board of Directors

Look at our Online Annual Meeting 2022

Saturday - Dec 3, 2022 - Time: 1 - 3:30 pm GMT

As announced in the invitation, we waived the recording of the online annual meeting. Accordingly, it was not recorded.

Online present: 26 participants, in the office: 13.

Moderation: Salar Pashai

Summary and Sequence

Part I

Dr. H. Küchler, Executive Board

Introduction/Retrospective of the year 2022, see post 1.

The first contribution summarizes how the Jemal Nebez Foundation is currently positioned and what is required from it by the authorities.

The Jemal Nebez Foundation especially welcomes the online participation of Îbrahîm Gurbuz, the head of the Ismail Besikci Foundation. We are happy about the contact with the Ismail Besikci Foundation and hope for a good future cooperation.

Jan Gosau, Industrial Engineer, 2nd Executive Board Member

On the financial situation/development in 2022 - from narrow income/donations presentable projects in conformity with the statutes have arisen on the shoulders of the active members, see post 2

Markus Kuchler, Chairman of the Advisory Board

In the current year the advisory board has succeeded in particular in giving valuable suggestions for the organizational further development of the JNS, see post 3.

Welcome of the newly elected fourth member of the advisory board, Dr. Sara Minelli, at the same time confirmation of her election, see post 4

Sara then addressed the annual meeting in person. She made clear that in her the Advisory Board had a new member with an affinity for Kurdish culture. Sara is young and multicultural. The good choice was warmly welcomed.

Sirwan Renas, Organizer of the Jemal-Nebez-Award Commission

Activity report and outlook. About the composition of his team, see post 5

After being appointed in the spring of 2022 the main task was to find group of independent but like-minded people – all up to the task to search for suitable candidates for the Jemal Nebez Award – who would together form the Jemal Nebez Award Commission. The next task ahead is for the commission to agree among themselves on who of the candidates suggested (either within the commission, i.e. by individual member; or suggested from others from the outside) is to be contacted to become the first JNS awardee. The commission scheduled a closing date for suggestions (Dec 31, 2022) and and some deadlines for 2023. The commission internally committed itself to have named the first JNS Awardee by Newroz 2023 and then to follow through with this award.

Salar Pashai, Coordinator & Processor, Long-Term Library/Cataloging Project

Because of the looming time problem, Salar spoke only briefly. Importantly, the Foundation is looking for local temporary staff to help with basic cataloging tasks in the library. Salar said he would like to talk to such volunteers and hopefully build a strong team soon.

Salar also spoke briefly about his visit in the spring of 2022 to Binkey Zhin in Jemal's hometown of Bashur. They have cataloged their archives, including books, periodicals, and newspapers, using special software developed in-house; and they have an online catalog on their website. During Salar’s stay in Sileymani, a specialized conference was also held in Binkey Zheen, dealing with particular cataloging issues important to the oriental writing system of Kurdish. The JNS thanks Binkey Zheen for the kind reception.

Part II

Mehmed Salih Bedirxan, Literary scholar,
Coordinator of the book project "Lalo Kerim" in Latin script,
Special knowlegde of Kurdish (including Zaza and کوردی).

Report on his involvement with the JNS in 2022, see post 6.

Goal: To make Jemal Nebez and his work known in Bakur and in Turkey.

The story "Lalo Kerim" and other texts of Jemal related in content, which did not exist in Kurdish in Latin script before, are now ready for printing. Mehmed Salih Bedirxan has helped in several ways with the "Lalo Kerim" project, including translation, and not least proofreading. And he established the contact with Avesta Publishing House for us. We are very much obliged to him.

Bernas Qerejdakhî, translator of Jemal Nebez from Arabic into Kurmanji in Latin script.

"Struggle of the Kurds", 1956
"On the Kurdish Problem", 1969

The Jemal Nebez Foundation thanks Bernas for his oral contribution during the annual meeting, in which he emphasized the importance of these books for all of the Kurmanji region, for Rojava as well as Bakur, see post 7.

The Foundation would be pleased if Bernas were to consider now – as he is in the final phase of his work – also writing a short preface or epilogue for each of the books, from his special perspective as a translator, upon completion.

Dr. Hessam Khakpur, translator of Jemal Nebez from Arabic into Kurdish in Oriental script کوردی, together with Kamil Sharifpur.

"Struggle of the Kurds" 1956
"On the Kurdish Problem" 1969

Both translations are completed and proofread. First contact with a printing house in Bashur has been established. On the initiative of Dr. Hessam, a designer has thankfully been found in Rojhelat, who has designed a suitable cover for both books, which we may also use for the two translations by Bernas in Latin script. If not for print, then for an e-book publication on our part.

Dr. Hessam sent us a text of his which he wrote recently, it is here now included as post 8

This text deals with the thinking of Jemal, of which knowing more is highly important for Kurds in the present time, Dr. Hesam explained. He also thinks that the two translations into Kurdish have come at a good time because of the current situation.

Dr. Hessam spoke to us directly from Kurdistan at the annual meeting and someone recorded his contribution. We are pleased to have received the video link from him to make it available here.

He talks about the main points that Jemal had analyzed in the two books on the Kurdish question.

Jutta Neuendorff, webdesigner / project publications

In her short self-portrayal Jutta also tells about the time of her work while Jemal was still alive. At that time she created what she calls a "web business card" for him which was taken over by the Jemal Nebez Foundation and still exists today, see post 9

Dr. Irfan Hawrami, Seminar leader / Project events

About the topicality of an essay of Jemal from the year 1985, see post 10

In his paper, Dr. Irfan spoke about the importance of Jemal Nebez to Kurdology in general. He then talked about how in the case of the issue of Kurdish affiliation, Nebez's philosophical view had led him to the essential questions that continue to be relevant today.

Original title of Jemal’s essay: Kurdish affiliation Who is a Kurd? What does it mean to be Kurdish?
A contribution to the exploration of the identity of a divided stateless people
Seminar lecture given by Jemal Nebez on 1985.12.27 in Copenhagen, published by the Kurdish Academy of Science and Art, Stockholm 1987.

Part III

Dr. Küchler, Executive Board

Looking ahead, at 2023 and two further years, see post 11

Discussion

There was an advice, expressed from several sides, to the Jemal Nebez Foundation that it must definitely establish a presence in social media and make itself known in all possible ways.

A participant already active in the foundation then agreed to take over the Twitter communication for the foundation, but only in Kurdish in Latin script and in English; In کوردی in Oriental script, someone else would have to do it.

This directly addressed a peculiarity in the communication among Kurds, which greatly concerns a.o. the library project, namely that Kurds write in two writing systems. Solutions have to be found again and again, and always tailor-made ones. With regard to Facebook, the foundation has already overcome the problem somewhat, and will eventually succeed in finding a solution for the other social media. Only the start-up time takes a little longer, and some luck in finding suitable people also plays a role.

***

This summary of our online 2022 Annual Meeting will be sent to those attendees as an email circular who opted for it. It will also be posted on the JNS website.

Summary of 2021 Online Annual Meeting

Date 12.12.2021, Time 11:30 a.m.– 1 p.m.

Present (in alphabetical order of first names)

Edit Sasvari, Halo Berzinci, Hannelore Küchler, Hemed Saleh Bedrxan, Herman , Jan Gosau,

Kaveh Ghoreishi, Markus Küchler, Rezan Abdollahi, Salar Pashai, Sirwan Renas, Veman

Linevan, Zanyar Kurdewari

The recording of the online annual meeting unfortunately did not work as planned. For this reason, this summary should give all those who are interested in the Jemal Nebez Foundation, but could not participate, information about the course of the 1st Online Annual Meeting, the contents and the contributors.

Dr. Hannelore Küchler, Chairperson of the Board of Directors and Salar Pashai, Office Manager, were present on site in the office/library. In the two consecutive parts of the annual meeting, they both presented contents and introduced persons and moderated the annual meeting in parts.

Part I - Dr. Hannelore Küchler, 1st Board Member

11:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.

Report on the concrete situation of the Jemal Nebez Foundation, which was established as a foundation by and for Kurds. The foundation is independent and proud of it. The running costs of the foundation are secured. Currently, the foundation can only pay limited fees and relies on volunteers. Perhaps this will change in the future, if funding can be obtained through funding applications.

Volunteers are, for example, all those who hold a position in the foundation as defined in the statutes and who were introduced as follows in this 1st Annual Meeting of the Foundation.

Dr. Hannelore Küchler introduced herself as founder and 1st member of the board. She is the sole heiress of Jemal Nebez, and she contributed her inheritance and the same amount of her own assets to the Jemal Nebez Foundation.

The foundation was officially confirmed as a non-profit foundation by the Berlin Senate on March 30, 2020. Also confirmed was the appointment of the necessary organs for the foundation, the board of directors with deputy and the advisory board. The persons active here then introduced themselves:

Edit Sasvari, born and educated in Hungary, a neurologist practicing in Berlin, is a member of the Advisory Board and was elected Chair of the Advisory Board in 2020 in an election among the Advisory Board members. She stated that she was happy to take over the office at the time, but already had said then that she would like to hold it only for a limited time and actually would like to hand it back in 2022. Interested parties can read the tasks of the advisory board in the statutes, in § 8,9 and 10.

Markus Küchler, LL.M., lawyer, Stockholm/Sweden, member of the Advisory Board, is the eldest son of Hannelore's only brother, who emigrated to Sweden in the 1960s.

Markus is willing to assist the Foundation in its initial phase with his experience in the world of international corporations until the Foundation has found suitable persons in sufficient numbers.

Jan Gosau, Dipl.-Wirtsch.-Ing., is an entrepreneur and manages two production companies. He works for the foundation on a voluntary basis as 2nd board member.

He presented the current state of discussion on the Jemal Nebez Science Award. The Foundation is looking for a coordinator from the scientific community who will actively shape the announcement and the awarding of this prize.

Salar Pashai, Student in master Philosophy, is the face of the Jemal Nebez Foundation as office manager and contact person to Kurds near and far.

Part II - Salar Pashai

12:00 p.m.- 12:30 p.m.

Salar reported what was done regarding the library and the recording of the existing periodicals in the PC. For this purpose, he showed the excel list that was created.

He also presented the logo of the Foundation, which was artistically designed by our collaborative partner in London, and how it was integrated into our sign at the terrace entrance of the library.

The weekend before the online annual meeting, a memorial stone for Jemal Nebez was inaugurated with a small ceremony with about 20 people participating. Our collaborator in London also helped with the graphic preparation for the stone. Also for this the Foundation would like to express its sincere thanks once again.

The diversity of the complete works of Jemal Nebez is not sufficiently known, since Jemal wrote in several languages and there are only translations for a few of them. Currently, the Masterlist* team, i.e. Herman Salari, Veman Lineva, Rezan Abdollahi, and Sirwan Renas have started to change this. They are working on the translation of the Master* list from English/German into several languages .

Herman could not attend our online meeting, but Veman and Rezan reported details of how they shared the work in the team.

Sirwan is a research assistant at Missouri State University in the field of political science. He spoke about views and works of Jemal Nebez from the perspective of political theory, although the topic could only be briefly touched upon in this setting.

Rezan also has great interest in the views of Jemal Nebez, with a publication of her own on Jemal’s perception of socialism. She held up the book Biri Neteweyi in our meeting and stated how happy she was to finally have it and to be able to read it at last.

Subsequent invitation to Rezan, among others to please consider how to initiate an exchange about Biri Neteweyi via online seminars.

Under the title of Publication Project, Lalo Kerim's story and its prepared translation into Kurmanci were presented. For this project, Kaveh Ghoreishi, Mehmed Salih Bedrxan and Scherif Ozbek cooperated with the Foundation. Scherif was not able to attend our onlline meeting. Kaveh and Mehmed reaffirmed the importance of the project. The story Lalo Kerim does not yet exist in the Latin writing system or Kurmanci, and the high status of Lalo Kerim in Kurdish literary history, both are important reasons to go ahead with this publication project.

There is a distribution agreement with the Berlin-based online bookstore https://www.Ktebhen.com which is now something of a home address for Jemal's diverse work. New editions and new translations may be published in the not too distant future.

Part III - Questions and exchange

12:30 p.m. - 13:15 p.m.

Information about the Science Award should be added to the Foundation's website so that those interested in participating in the award process and award presentation can sign up.

As the team dealing with the Master* list wants to continue their work. It is now important to have an appealing design for the processing and presentation of the individual entries Drafts should be submitted for review as soon as possible.

Further publication projects, friends of Jemal’s in Berlin have agreed that Kifra al Akrad, which Jemal himself wrote in Arabic and which has recently been republished twice in Arabic, should next be published in both Kurdish versions. Hoshang Sabri, one of the oldest and a highly respected Kurd in Berlin, took it on himself to inquire who could do it.

The translation of the lecture The Kurds, their history and culture, held by Jemal in German and already translated into English, is to be done in 2022, into both versions of Kurdish. Salar and Sirwan are the organisers

The 2nd Online Annual Meeting is in all probability to be held on Sunday, Dec. 4, 2022, at the same time as before.

Minutes. Hanne + Salar

16.12.2021

* Note to the Master List*

The master list was created in 2013 when Jemal was still alive, it was in fact presented to him for his 80th birthday. All those of his works are included of which copies were to be found at his flat or at the office he shared with Hanne in Spichernstraße. These copies were sorted and numbered and finally listed in a Word document, together with corresponding photos of their covers. It was this master list that was then used - entry by entry - to create the “literature” presentaton on the corresponding sub-site of www.jemalnebez.org which website we will keep and an embellish as we go - in parallel to the foundation's website you are on now - www.jemal-nebez-stiftung.org