Refugee Crisis in Nemat Sadat’s The Carpet Weaver: A Gay Individual’s Search for Peace and a Safe Home

Abstract Book of the 5th International Conference on LGBT studies

Year: 2026

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Refugee Crisis in Nemat Sadat’s The Carpet Weaver: A Gay Individual’s Search for Peace and a Safe Home

Simran Simran

ABSTRACT:

Throughout Afghanistan’s history, war and political conflict have been central, causing injustice and instability across political, social, and economic spheres. For many years, Afghans have migrated to neighbouring countries like Pakistan and Iraq, as well as to the United States, seeking safety and better opportunities for their families amid rising violence from Mujahideen and Maoist groups fighting against the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan and Soviet forces—events that contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union. This paper examines Nemat Sadat’s debut novel, The Carpet Weaver (2019), which follows the journey of Kanishka Nurzada, a gay Afghan refugee boy. After his father was imprisoned and executed for treason, Kanishka Nurzada, along with his mother and sister, fled Afghanistan to the United States but was unknowingly trafficked and forced into unpaid labour in Pakistan. Despite living in severe hardship and a brutal work environment for two years in Haftaballa prison, he excelled at weaving exceptional carpets and eventually reached the United States safely with his family. The study explores how war, political upheaval, and social class influenced Kanishka Nurzada’s life in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and America as a gay Afghan refugee. Kanishka’s homosexuality and its cultural and religious implications make his quest to find peace and a safe home more oppressive than that of other Afghan refugees.

Keywords: Homosexuality, Conflict, Human Trafficking, Queer Refugee, Marginalisation