Since the 2014 Sinjar offensive, a series of international and national courts have pursued accountability for ISIS’s genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes against the Yazidi community. Landmark verdicts in Sweden, Germany and the Netherlands illustrate the growing reach of universal jurisdiction and the challenges of documenting survivor testimony.
Since the 1990s, Yazidi communities across Europe have created schools, curricula, and community centres that teach the Yazidi faith while supporting integration. Institutions such as the Yazidi Academy in Hanover, the Yezidi Studies Center in Leipzig, and locally‑adapted curricula in Pforzheim illustrate how religious education serves both cultural preservation and social inclusion.
The Yazidi architectural heritage of the Caucasus comprises a network of temples, shrines, and communal buildings that reflect centuries‑old religious practice and diaspora adaptation. From the monumental Quba Mere Diwane in Armenia to the Sultan Ezid Temple in Tbilisi, these structures embody distinctive motifs, funerary sculpture, and ongoing preservation challenges.
Yazidi Kurmanji, the dialect used for Yazidi religious texts, faces unique Unicode encoding hurdles due to script diversity, non‑standard letters, and limited resources. Recent discussions on Kurdish Sorani and specialized Kurdish letters have shaped practical solutions for digital preservation.
During the Ba’athist era (1972‑1985), state‑directed Arabization reshaped curricula in Yazidi collective towns, replacing Kurdish‑language instruction with Arabic and redefining religious education. This article examines policy motives, implementation, regional variations, and lasting effects on Yazidi communal life.
Yazidism, Druze, and Mandaeism are three minority religions often described as “closed faiths” because they restrict both entry and exit. This article compares their doctrinal stance on conversion, the social mechanisms that enforce closure, and regional variations in practice.
This article examines the structural parallels and divergences between Yazidi cosmology and Zoroastrian dualism, drawing on primary Yazidi texts, Zoroastrian scriptures, and recent scholarship to clarify misconceptions and highlight regional variations.
This article examines the linguistic journey of the most important Yazidi religious terms, tracing their roots from Old Iranian languages through successive Kurdish adaptations. It highlights scholarly debates, oral tradition evidence, and regional variations that shape contemporary usage.
Yazidi feqirs are trained through a lifelong apprenticeship that begins in childhood, progresses through intensive study of qewls and sacred melodies, and culminates in the Şêwirmendî ordination ceremony. The process blends family transmission, oral instruction, and ritual initiation, preserving the community’s priestly knowledge across generations.
This article maps the network of Yazidi religious sites and community centres across German cities, highlighting the lack of purpose‑built temples, the role of cultural associations, and the ways diaspora communities maintain pilgrimage traditions. It draws on official listings from the Central Council of Yazidis and regional associations.