Prof. Richard Hovannisian to Speak on “The 90th Anniversary of the Burning of Smyrna”

FRESNO — Dr. Richard G. Hovannisian, Professor of Armenian and Near Eastern history at UCLA, will speak on “The 90th Anniversary of the Burning of Smyrna” at 7:30 PM on Friday, October 5, 2012, in the Industrial Technology Building, Room 101 auditorium, on the Fresno State campus (corner of Barstow and Campus Drive).
This year marks the 90th anniversary of the Smyrna Catastrophe when much of the city, the second largest in the Ottoman Empire, was destroyed by fire during the final phase of the Greco-Turkish War. The calamity marked the end of a strong Christian presence in the historic Aegean coastal regions and turned hundreds of thousands of Greeks and Armenians into refugees.
In this illustrated lecture, Prof. Richard Hovannisian will discuss the important role of Smyrna (Izmir) in modern Armenian history and the inferno that engulfed the city in September 1922. Hovannisian is the editor of the recently published Armenian Smyrna/Izmir, the eleventh volume of proceedings from the UCLA conference series “Historic Armenian Cities and Provinces.” He also traveled to Izmir and environs in June 2012 as the historian-guide for a NAASR Armenian Heritage Tour led by Armen Aroyan.
Hovannisian is the author of Armenia on the Road to Independence, the four-volume history The Republic of Armenia, and has edited and contributed to more than twenty-five books including The Armenian Genocide in Perspective; The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times; Remembrance and Denial; Looking Backward, Moving Forward; and The Armenian Genocide: Cultural and Ethical Legacies. Prof. Hovannisian is Professor of Armenian and Near Eastern History at UCLA and is the Chancellor Fellow in the Department of History and the Rodgers Center for Holocaust Education at Chapman University for fall 2012.
Armenian Smyrna/Izmir as well as many other titles from the “Historic Armenian Cities and Provinces” series will be available for purchase and signing by Prof. Hovannisian.
The lecture is free and open to the public. Free parking, no permit necessary, is available in Lots K, L, and Q, adjacent to the Industrial Arts building.
For more information on the lecture please contact the Armenian Studies Program at 278-2669.