The Chaldo-Assyrian Split: Explaining a Fragmenting Identity Through Social Movement Theory

The Chaldo-Assyrians are an ethnoreligious group indigenous to Iraq and surrounding areas. Victims of ongoing persecution they epitomize the resiliency of a minority group that through instances of genocide and religious discrimination have managed to survive in a politically repressive environment. Yet, the Chaldo-Assyrians have been and continue to be fragmented in contemporary Iraq. Those that claim an exclusively Assyrian ethnicity and those that claim an exclusively Chaldean ethnicity separate what is a united Chaldo-Assyrian community.