This talk will present ongoing research on the life and work of Yekaterina Bahaturian (1870-1944) who grew up in Shushi, then a provincial center of the Russian Empire.
This presentation will focus on several efforts since 2019 to continue and expand the long-running project of Armenian Genocide denial and will also discuss how it dovetails with the efforts of Azerbaijan to rewrite history as a means to dictate Armenia’s future but also its past.
This talk will first provide a biography of Vartouhie Calantar-Nalbandian and analyze her prison memoirs. It will also briefly discuss her partnership with husband Zaven Nalbandian in taking up the “Zarevand” penname in the mid-1920s in the U.S. for the writing of the book United and Independent Turania (Միացեալ, Անկախ Թուրանիա).
Dr. Lerna Ekmekcioglu and Dr. Melissa Bilal will follow the story of a friendship between two Armenian women in Istanbul that endured the hardships of WWI, the Armenian Genocide, and early republican Turkey’s repressive minority politics.