Tamar Gürciyan
February 14 and Armenian Holidays
This year, Diyarnıntaraç will be celebrated on February 14, while the Surp Sarkis Feast will take place on February 15. I’m not sure if these holidays can be associated with St. Valentine, but for Armenians, these days represent not only hope, fertility, marriage, and purification but also have connections to the land and crops.
Dog Stories and Beyond
Following Chienne d’Histoire [The Barking Island], a wordless film from the perspective of the non-human, where we only hear the dogs’ voices, Avedikian’s documentary Histoire de Chiens [Dog Stories] was screened. This documentary, focusing on the relationships between Istanbul residents and street dogs 100 years after the 1910 dog massacre, differed from the first film in that it presented people’s perspectives on their relationships with dogs. The film momentarily eased the heaviness left by the first film with its style.
Armenian Carpets, Migration, and Solidarity
After the massacres of the Hamidiye Regiments in the late 19th century and after 1915, with the increase in the number of orphanages, Armenian women and orphans predominantly worked in the carpet workshops established by the missionaries. Carpet weaving was a craft that some orphan girls knew from their families. This craft provided them with a space of solidarity after they had lost everything in the face of savagery. In return, they were employed as cheap labor for the companies of American and European missionaries.
On Ariel Djanikian and “The Prospectors”
The historical framework of the novel “The Prospectors,” which emerged from a long process of research and writing, is based on Djanikian’s maternal family history, who is American. The writer’s paternal family is Armenian. While writing the novel, Djanikian examined forgotten sources, both old and new, particularly focusing on the Klondike region, and crafted a narrative that intertwines snippets of personal history with official history.
On the travel writings of Tlgadintsi
Harutyunyan, born in 1860 in the village of Tlgadin (Huylu, now officially known as Kuyulu) south of Harput, is generally known for his newspaper articles, travel notes, plays, and short stories. In these writings, Tlgadintsi not only critically conveys the condition of Armenian properties and monasteries perspective,but also depicts the details of daily life with an ethnographic finesse, and portrays, as Beledian described, an almost silent forewarning of the impending disaster.