Dr. Simon Maghakyan to Speak at Fresno State on “The Future of the Past: Pathways for Saving Armenian Vestiges in Turkey”

FRESNO — Dr. Simon Maghakyan, the 20th Kazan Visiting Professor of Armenian Studies at Fresno State, will speak on “The Future of the Past: Pathways for Saving Armenian Vestiges in Turkey” at 7:00PM on Friday, November 8, 2024, in the University Business Center, 5245 N. Backer Ave.\, Alice Peters Auditorium, on the Fresno State campus.

The lecture will identify and assess domestic, interstate, and international opportunities and challenges for preserving Armenian heritage remnants in the Turkish Republic. It will then discuss three scenarios, detailing the agencies of key stakeholders, for the future of Turkey’s Armenian material past, making the case that a total erasure of all traces of Armenian heritage should not be accepted as an inevitable outcome.

Dr. Simon Maghakyan is a political scientist who researches heritage and security. He is a Community Scholar at the University of Denver’s Korbel School of International Studies, and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Oxford. His publications include a Hyperallergic exposé of Nakhichevan’s cultural erasure, acclaimed as “groundbreaking” by Forbes and “rock-solid” by The Guardian. His analyses have been featured by the BBC, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and Time. His forthcoming book, Sovereign Heritage Crime: Security, Autocracy, and the Material Past, is a critical heritage studies element of Cambridge University Press.

The screening and reception are free and open to the public. Free parking is available in Fresno State Lot P6, near the University Business Center. Permits are not required on Friday nights.

The presentation will also be live-streamed on YouTube at: https://bit.ly/armenianstudiesyoutube.

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.