Dr. Hrag Papazian to Speak on “The Migrants from Armenia” in Contemporary Turkey on November 1

FRESNO — Dr. Hrag Papazian, Kazan Visiting Professor in Armenian Studies, will speak on “The Migrants from Armenia” at 7:00PM on Tuesday, November 1, 2022, in the University Business Center, Alice Peters Auditorium, on the Fresno State campus. The presentation is the final presentation in Dr. Papazian’s three-part series on “Armenians and ‘Other Armenians’ in Contemporary Turkey.”

The third lecture is devoted to the migrant Armenians arriving in Turkey from Armenia since the 1990s. After discussing their migration history and their general conditions in Istanbul, the talk will examine their encounters and relations with the local Armenian community, characterized by both cooperation/solidarity and boundary-making. To explain the emergence of intra-Armenian boundaries this time between the migrant and local Armenians, the lecture will provide a brief analysis of the newcomers’ understanding/expectations of “Armenianness,” of which the Armenian state/homeland, an “Armenian traditional morality,” and a rigid symbolic boundary towards Turkishness, appear as central tenets.

Dr. Hrag Papazian is the Kazan Visiting Professor of Armenian Studies at Fresno State. He earned his doctoral degree in anthropology from the University of Oxford (2020) where his dissertation about Armenians in contemporary Turkey was awarded the David Parkin Prize. His thesis also received an honorary mention in the Society for Armenian Studies Distinguished Dissertation Award competition (2017-2020).

The lecture is free and open to the public. Parking is available in Fresno State Lots P6 and P5, near the University Business Center, Fresno State. A free parking code can be obtained by contacting the Armenian Studies Program.

For information about upcoming Armenian Studies Program presentations, please follow us on our Facebook page, @ArmenianStudiesFresnoState or at the Program website, https://fresnostate.edu/armenianstudies.