Journalist Nagihan Akarsel, a member of the Jineoloji Research Center and the Editorial Board of Jineoloji Journal, was killed in an armed attack in Sulaymaniyah (Silêmanî) in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq on October 4, 2022. From journalism to jineoloji studies, she became an inspiration to all women in the struggle for truth. Yet, three years after her killing, no one has been tried or held accountable for the attack.

As a figure who pursued the truth of women through her work in jineology, Nagihan Akarsel continues to illuminate women’s freedom struggle with her writings, poems, and novels.

Writer for Jineoloji Journal, Figen Aras, described Nagihan’s struggle and the impact she left behind: “We could feel the same search for truth in her poems and novels. It was clear from her writings that she spent all twenty-four hours of her day consumed by the cause of women’s freedom. This was very precious. Nagihan was a comrade who read the present, questioned the present, and also studied history, feeling the need for philosophical and scientific interpretations to build the link between history and the present. She was brutally murdered.”

Aras stated that the mentality behind Nagihan’s murder revealed the hostility of the male-dominated mindset toward women and said: “The male-dominated mindset displays great hostility toward women who think, who question, who search for their own truth and their own name. Because Nagihan had an energy. This energy created a profound impact on other women who read and followed her. It was a very creative and very hopeful energy.”

Nagihan was an inspiration to us all

Figen Aras emphasized that Nagihan’s writings reminded women of their free identity and said: “Those who read Nagihan could see the free woman within themselves and their own quests. She had a very sincere voice, a pen that gave hope. The values she created in the field of jineoloji were a great inspiration to all of us. Yet her martyrdom first caused immense anger among us. Transforming this anger into organization, into writing and speech, and into life through the philosophy of Jin Jiyan Azadî (Women, Life, Freedom) was very precious.”

Figen Aras said that “Nagihan’s life was on a path that united freedom and sociality with nature,” and added: “None of her writings ever excluded nature or society, nor did they lack ethics or aesthetics. The beauty of her soul and heart flowed into her pen, into the sincerity of her writing. It is a great loss, a great loss for women’s history as well. But such creative pens, such creative comrades, never truly die. Their martyrdom turns into a legacy for those who remain, a legacy of embracing the struggle even more strongly.”

Nagihan was always creating and questioning

Figen Aras stated that one of Nagihan’s greatest dreams and efforts was to establish a women’s library in Sulaymaniyah. Aras noted that after the massacre, this dream became reality and thousands of women have benefited from that library. Aras continued: “Nagihan was a person who constantly gave effort, constantly produced, constantly questioned, and constantly objected. But she did not stop there. She also asked: ‘What should an alternative life look like? How can the beauty of life that we speak of truly be realized?’ She put forth this claim with her body, her will, her soul, giving her time and liberating the very space she inhabited.”

They targeted the identity of the free woman

Aras spoke about the targeting of women and the systematic attacks and said: “The system, the state, or whatever structure it may be, has a deep fear of the leading woman's identity. Because the trust created by pioneering women, the promises they give, and the labor they put forth inspire all women.

Attacks are carried out to block this inspiration, to frighten the remaining women, to intimidate them, and to pull them away from the struggle. There can be no other reason for killing Nagihan.”

Nagihan’s legacy sparked greater interest in jineology

Figen Aras noted that after Nagihan’s martyrdom, women’s interest in freedom and in jineoloji studies increased even more. Aras said, “After Nagihan was killed, along with the feeling of embracing her, there developed an even stronger curiosity toward technology, a desire to read, to ask questions, and to engage.

In the third year of Nagihan’s martyrdom, we women are obliged to make promises, to read, discuss and promote jineoloji, to reveal our own science and our own philosophy of life, and to put forth the identity of free life.”

Nagihan struggled for the arrival of peaceful days

Figen Aras concluded her remarks by recalling the messages sent by Abdullah Öcalan: “We would have wanted Nagihan to witness these days. But she had already struggled, so that these days could come. Our duty is to continue and sustain our struggle for a democratic and peace-filled society.”