California State University, Northridge’s Armenian Studies Program will host a one-day conference from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 31, in the Grand Salon at the University Student Union.
“The Armenian Genocide: Accounting and Accountability” is dedicated to the generations of 1915 and 2015 as a part of the United Armenian Council of Los Angeles’ Armenian Genocide Centennial Commemorative Events.
“The significance of hosting the conference at CSUN is three-fold,” said Vahram Shemmassian, director of CSUN’s Armenian Studies program within the Department of Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures. “CSUN has the largest number of students of Armenian background outside of Armenia, as far as four-year universities are concerned. The greater Los Angeles area is home to the second-largest community of the worldwide Armenian diaspora. Lastly, the conference also aims to further expose CSUN to the Armenian community at large, hopefully attracting more friends and supporters as a result.”
The morning session will include two panels. The first panel, “Language as a Victim,” will be moderated by Hagop Gulludjian and will feature the following speakers and topics: Vartan Matiossian, “Pleading no Context: On Uses and Abuses of the Word Yeghern;” professor Barlow Der Mugrdechian, “Western Armenian Language and Literature in Exile: Genocide and Its Consequences;” and Shushan Karapetian, “The Burden of Language as a Moral Obligation.”
The second panel will explore “Teaching Genocide,” with Rubina Peroomian moderating. Hasmig Baran will talk about “Content and Pedagogy of Genocide Education in the 21st Century: The Armenian Case”; Roxanne Makasdjian will talk about “Armenian Genocide Education in Secondary Schools Today;” and Kori Street will talk about “Educating for Change: Using Testimonies in Teaching about Genocide.”
Third and fourth panels will be held in the afternoon session.
Levon Marashlian will moderate the third panel, “Those Who Were Forced to Assimilate.” It will feature the following speakers and subjects: Khatchig Mouradian on “Un-Hiding the Past: Myth-Making and the ‘Hidden Armenians’ of Turkey;” Elyse Semerdjian on “‘The Girl with the Cross Tattoo:’ Field Notes on Crypto-Armenians;” and Vahram Shemmassian on “The Fate of Captive Armenian Genocide Survivors in Syria.”
The Armenian Bar Association will conduct the fourth panel, titled “Legal Responses to Genocide-Related Liabilities.” Garo Ghazarian will introduce the panelists. Armen K. Hovannisian will moderate the panel. The speakers and their topics include: Saro Kerkonian on “Justice for Genocide: Opportunities and Challenges in United States Courts;” Edvin Minassian on “Justice for Genocide: Opportunities and Challenges in Turkey’s Courts;” and Karnig Kerkonian on “Justice for Genocide: Opportunities and Challenges in International Courts.” The conference will conclude with a commentary by Richard G. Hovannisian.
The Department of Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures at CSUN is co-sponsoring the event, along with the United Armenian Council of Los Angeles, the National Association for Armenian Studies and Research, The Knights of Vartan – Los Angeles County Chapters, the Armenian Bar Association and the Armenian General Benevolent Union. The Ararat-Eskijian Museum of Mission Hills will exhibit American Near East Relief posters during the conference.
The nearest parking lot to the University Student Union is G3 on Prairie Street (on campus) at Zelzah Avenue, near Nordhoff Street. Parking permits ($6) can be obtained at the information booth or via machines. For further information, please contact Vahram Shemmassian at vahram.shemmassian@csun.edu or (818) 677-3456.
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1 Comment
I take issue with the deliberate misrepresentation by referring to the Turkish-Armenian conflict of WWI as genocide.
Holocaust verdict is supported by a competent tribunal, Nuremberg; where is the Armenians’ Nuremberg?
To call 1915 a genocide would be to equate much-discredited Armenian narrative to factual Jewish experience. It would be an insult to the silent memory of six million Jews who were killed just for being Jews. Whereas Armenians resorted to
— terrorism (1862-1922, Nalbandian)
— revolts (1877-1920, McCarthy) and
— treason (1914-1922, Pope) and
— caused 518,000 Turks and other Muslims to meet their tragic ends at the hands of Armenian revolutionaries.
Jews did not commit any of those heinous acts in 1930s or 1940s. So how can any fair person treat the two events similarly?
The UN, the US, the UK, Australia, Israel, Sweden and many other countries reject the use of the term genocide to describe the Turkish-Armenian conflict.
INTERNATIONAL LAW SAYS NO GENOCIDE
The landmark decision of the highest court in Europe, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) dated Dec 17, 2013 on Perincek vs Switzerland also supports this position. Convicting Switzerland for violating Turks’ rights to free speech and expression, ECHR verdict was based on solid facts and reasoning.
ECHR correctly stated that “[t]he existence of a ‘genocide’, which was a precisely defined legal concept, was not easy to prove… (ECHR) doubted that there could be a general consensus… given that historical research was, by definition, open to discussion and a matter of debate, without necessarily giving rise to final conclusions or to the assertion of objective and absolute truths”. Thus, the ECHR created a legal precedent of inadmissibility of any comparison between the court-proven Jewish Holocaust and the discredited Armenian political claims, as the latter lacks what the former clearly has: concrete historical facts, clear legal basis, and existence of the “acts had been found by an international court to be clearly established”.
Insisting on a non-existent genocide verdict, therefore, if not based on ignorance is defrauding the unsuspecting public.
HERE ARE THE ARMENIAN MURDERERS HIDDEN FROM PUBLIC
If one needs further proof of the fallacy of the Armenian Genocide, one can simply look at this photo athttp://www.ethocide.com/ which refutes the entire Armenian narrative. Do these people in the photo look like “poor, starving, unarmed, helpless Armenians? (Source of the photo: Houshamatyan of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, Centennial, Album-Atlas, Volume I, Epic Battles, 1890-1914 (The Next Day Color Printing, Inc., Glendale, CA, U.S.A., 2006).
Taken in 1906—nine years before 1915–it depicts cadets in full uniform at an Armenian Military Academy in Bulgaria, arrogantly brandishing their Russian-made MOSIN rifles. The Armenian Revolutionary Federation used these weapons since 1893 in Eastern Anatolia and the Caucasus, and the Balkans, murdering Muslim, mostly Turkish, civilians—including my grandparents and exterminating the Turkish population of the village of KIRLIKOVA (hence my last name.) My father, as a one-year-old baby, was the sole survivor under conditions still unknown.
LET THE HISTORICAL FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES
1914 : “……Armenian nationalist movement had blossomed since the turn of the (20th) century, armed and encouraged by the Russian, and several minor coups were repressed by the YOUNG TURK government before 1914. Denied the right to a national congress in October 1914, moderate Armenian politicians fled to BULGARIA, but extreme nationalists crossed the border to form a rebel division with Russian equipment. It invaded in December an slaughtered an estimated 120,000 non-Armenians while the Turkish Army was preoccupied with mobilization and the Caucasian Front Offensive Toward Sarikamish…”
[Source: The Macmillan Dictionary of The First World War, Stephen Pope & Elizabeth-Anne Wheal, Macmillan Reference Books, London, 1997, ISBN 0 333 68909 7 (and 2003, ISBN 085052 979-4,) page 34.]
1923 : “…In some towns containing ten Armenian houses and thirty Turkish houses, it was reported that 40,000 people were killed, about 10,000 women were taken to the harem, and thousands of children left destitute; and the city university destroyed, and the bishop killed. It is a well- known fact that even in the last war the native Christians, despite the Turkish cautions, armed themselves and fought on the side of the Allies. In these conflicts, they were not idle, but they were well supplied with artillery, machine guns and inflicted heavy losses on their enemies….”
[Source: Lamsa, George M., a missionary well known for his research on Christianity, The Secret of the Near East, The Ideal Press, Philadelphia 1923, p 133 .]
Peace through truth, honesty, and fairness.