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Kurdish Documentary Cinema Map - KuDoC Map

The Kurdish Documentary Cinema Interactive Online Map (KuDoC-Map) is a collaborative project that was developed during the summer semester of 2025 at Philipps University of Marburg as part of the seminar “History of Kurdish Documentary Cinema” in the Department of Transcultural Media Studies of the Middle East. The project idea was developed by lecturer Nilgün Yelpaze together with students Elisa Zaccarelli, Alaa Saber, and Dilara Erdogu, and implemented in collaboration with researcher and web developer Fırat Erdoğmuş.

The aim of the project is to raise the profile of Kurdish documentary films, which, due to war, political conflicts, and a lack of institutional archiving, have so far been scarcely documented systematically. At its core is an interactive online map that visualizes films by production year and geographical context, thereby making developments in Kurdish documentary film production traceable.

In the first phase of the project, a database of approximately 75 films was created. The platform is designed as a growing, participatory archive that can be expanded in the future.