Investigation over alleged discrimination of Iraqi Turkmens in Turkey and Iraq pre and after referendum

In order to examine the relationship between East and West, this study emphasizes the East-West distinction, starting from the Orientalist approach expressed in Edward Said's book "Orientalism" in 1978, and attempts to express the historical imperial interest relations that lie behind this distinction. Without a doubt, the Middle East comes at the beginning of the geographies where the distinction of East-West civilization shows itself most clearly by drawing boundaries. Since the nineteenth century, it has been the subject of the conflicts of interest of the imperial powers. The aim of this study is to examine the historical and discursive process against the Iraqi Turkmens. The practices of orientalism consist of cultural, constitutional and economic attitudes that regulate the Westerns' relations with the non-Western through the Western-Eastern division. This study will try to reveal to the Iraqi Turkmen how the geography of the Middle East, which internalized Orientalism practices within a period of two hundred years, created its own others. In this context, the political dynamics of the Northern Iraq referendum, before and after the referendum, will be particularly emphasized as a context in which these othering practices manifest themselves most prominently.