Şewçila, a tri-monthly literature and art journal, began publication in March 2011. The journal appears entirely in the Zazakî dialect of Kurdish and consists of poems, stories, and other such literary works, as well as essays on literature and art and interviews with new literary figures and various artists. The journal is prepared and published in Diyarbakır and has been primarily accessible in the provinces of Northern Kurdistan where the Kurdish Zazakî dialect is spoken, as well as in the large Western provinces of Turkey and a number of countries throughout the world through subscription. At present, 14 issues of the journal have been published.

The goal of the Şewçila journal is to promote the emergence of literary artists and a literary readership in the Zazakî dialect of Kurdish and to work for the formation and development of a modern literature in this dialect.

In its fourteen issues, the journal has published 104 poems (including four translations), ninety stories (including eleven translations), nineteen essays of literary criticism, five interviews, nine experimental works, fifteen works of artistic and literary analysis, one literary news story, one letter, and one fairy-tale.

In addition, it has published the work of ninety-nine writers (fourteen women and eighty-five men). Of these, twenty-two published translations while the rest published their own work. More than half of these writers were first-time authors who began their literary careers in the Şewçila journal.

Before Şewçila began publication there were only one or two women writing in the Zazakî dialect of Kurdish. However, since it began publication over ten more women authors have emerged, a significant number of whom have published their literary works in book form.

Because Kurdish has been forbidden for a long time (close to a century) in Turkey, those who wrote or even spoke in Kurdish faced severe punitive sanctions. Owing to these oppressive conditions, the Zazakî (also known as Kirdkî, Kirmanckî, and Dimilkî) dialect of Kurdish has been placed on UNESCO’s list of languages at risk of extinction. For this reason, the vital role of the Şewçila journal cannot be understated.

Editor: Roşan Lezgîn

Contact information: 

Address: Elazığ Cad. Diyar Galeria, C Blok, No:9 Yenişehir/Diyarbakır 

Telephone: (0 412) 223 03 69 

E-mail: rlezgin@hotmail.com