Women ashik-poets in the ashik tradition of the Borchali Turks of Georgia

This study aims to examine the literary identities of women ashik-poets who emerged in Georgia's Kvemo Kartli and Borchalı-Karayazi-Karachop region from a holistic historical and cultural perspective through their lives and works. The values, thematic preferences, and social functions that women from Borçalı contributed to the ashik tradition and folk literature are discussed within the context of historical continuity. The thesis consists of four chapters. The first chapter presents general introductory information about the Azerbaijani Turks living in Georgia. The following chapters focus on three historical periods: before 1920, between 1921–1991, and after 1991. In each period, the lives and works of women ashik-poets are analyzed thematically. Women ashik-poets are among the key figures who have preserved and transmitted this cultural tradition both socially and regionally. In their poems, cultural memory is kept alive and passed on to future generations through themes such as patriotism, love, longing, individual freedom, and social justice. Supported by field interviews, compilations, and on-site observations conducted in the Borchalı region, this comprehensive study evaluates the literary production of women ashiks from a broad and analytical perspective. This thesis reveals how Borçalı women ashik-poets shaped cultural memory in the past and how this memory has been reproduced in the modern era. At the same time, it brings the voices of these women to light, placing an essential gender perspective at the center of the ashik tradition in terms of its past, present, and future significance.