Choman Hardi

Born in Kurdistan-Iraq, Choman Hardi is is a poet, translator and academic. She sought refuge in United Kingdom in 1993 and was educated at Oxford, London, and Kent Universities. Choman’s post-doctoral research focused on the impact of genocide on Kurdish women in Iraq, Gendered Experiences of Genocide (Routledge, 2011). She has published collections of poetry in Kurdish and English. Her English collections, Life for Us (2004) and Considering the Women (2015), were published by Bloodaxe Books. Considering the Women was given a Recommendation by the Poetry Book Society and shortlisted for the Forward Prize For Best Collection. With Mimi Khalvati, Choman co-translated the Kurdish poet, Kajal Ahmed, for the PTC's World Poets' Tour in 2008. Her translation of Sherko Bekas's Butterfly Valley (ARC, 2018) won a PEN Translates Award.

After 26 years of living abroad, Choman moved back to her home-city to teach Literature and Gender Studies in the American University of Iraq, Sulaimani (AUIS). A year later, she founded the Center for Gender and Development Studies (CGDS) at AUIS. CGDS announced the establishment of an interdisciplinary gender studies minor, the first in Iraq, in 2017. With substantial support from the European Union, CGDS is now developing educational material in gender studies to provide resources in Kurdish and Arabic to universities in the MENA region.