When a people's stories are at risk, who steps in to save them?

Zheen, which means “life” in Kurdish, is the name of an archive that Seddiq and his brother Rafiq have spent more than two decades building. An assemblage of books, manuscripts, newspapers, letters, diaries, and other documents dating back to the 19th century, it presents the twisting saga of the Kurds, often described as one of the world’s largest ethnic groups without a state. Collecting these artifacts is a calling that has taken the brothers across the parts of Turkey, Iran, Syria, and Iraq that compose greater Kurdistan—a mountainous region where up to 35 million people of different religions and customs identify themselves as Kurdish.