Spaces of Remembering the Armenian Genocide: Conference and Film Screening

Scout Tufankjian, Nancy Kricorian, Silvina Der-Meguerditchian
Scout Tufankjian, Nancy Kricorian, Silvina Der-Meguerditchian

The capstone HGMS event of the 2016-2017 academic year.

Recap of the conference can be found here.

On April 28th, 2017, The Initiative in Holocaust, Genocide, and Memory Studies and the Future of Trauma and Memory Studies Reading Group at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign will host a one day conference titled “Spaces of Remembering the Armenian Genocide,” featuring presentations by Myrna Douzjian, Talar Chahinian, Nancy Kricorian, and Scout Tufankjian. The conference will close with a screening of Armenoscope: constructing belonging, which will be followed by a conversation with the docu-essay’s director, Silvina Der-Meguerditchian.

This event aims to foster interdisciplinary and transnational discussions on remembering the Armenian Genocide across time, space, and place. It will address how memories of this genocide travel across media and form (film, literature, art, and photography) and how they are referenced across intersectional lines to also bring to the fore other histories of collective violence.
The conference and film screening are free and open to the public. It will take place on the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign campus, with the main conference during the day in the Foreign Languages Building and the film screening in the afternoon in the English Building. Please see schedule below for links to campus maps and more information on speakers.
 
Conference Schedule:
 
9:00 am to 2:30 pm Conference in Lucy Ellis Lounge, Room 1080 Foreign Languages Building, 707 S Matthews Avenue

9:00-9:30 am Welcome, coffee and pastries provided
 
9:30-10:15 am Helen Makhdoumian and Dilara Çalışkan (UIUC)
"These Lands Bare Witness: Activating Armenian Genocide Memories."
Introduction: Tamara Chaplin (UIUC)
 
10:15-11:00 am Myrna Douzjian (Lecturer, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures at UC Berkeley)
“A Photograph Resists Archivization: Reading Hrayr Anmahouni and Anahid Kassabian's Solemnity
Introduction: David Cooper (UIUC)
11-11:45 am Talar Chahinian (Lecturer, Department of Comparative World Literature, California State University, Long Beach)
“In Search of a Lost Archive: The Orphaned Generation's Literary Response to the Genocide”
Introduction: Marcus Keller (UIUC)
 
11:45 am–1:00 pm Vegetarian lunch provided
 
1:00-1:45 pm Scout Tufankjian (Brooklyn-based photographer)
“The Armenian Diaspora Project”
Introduction: Brett Kaplan (UIUC)
 
1:45-2:30 pm Nancy Kricorian (New York City-based Writer and Organizer)
“Writing as Restoration Project”
Introduction: Helen Makhdoumian (UIUC)
 
3:00-5:00 pm Film Screening and Discussion, Room 304 English Building, 608 South Wright Street
 
Armenoscope: contructing belonging
A docu-essay by Silvina Der-Meguerditchian (Berlin-based Visual and Performance Artist and Artistic Director of the Houshamadyan Project)
Introduction: Dilara Çalışkan (UIUC)
To stay updated on the event, please visit the Facebook event and return to this website.
 https://www.facebook.com/events/1887933791486972/
Questions about the event can be directed to Helen Makhdoumian and Dilara Çalışkan at: traumaandmemory@gmail.com
For speaker bios, click here.