PRESS RELEASE
National Association for Armenian Studies and Research
395 Concord Avenue
Belmont, MA 02478
Tel.: 617-489-1610
E-mail: [email protected]
Contact: Marc Mamigonian
DR. DAVID GAUNT TO GIVE CALIFORNIA LECTURES
ON GENOCIDE OF ARMENIANS AND ASSYRIANS
Dr. David Gaunt, Professor of History at Södertörn University
College, Stockholm, Sweden, will give a series of lectures in California
entitled "Massacres and Resistance: The Genocide of the Armenians and
Assyrians Based on New Evidence from the Archives" from May 3 through 11
. The lectures will be co-sponsored by the National Association for
Armenian Studies and Research (NAASR) and the Assyrian American National
Federation (AANF) in conjunction with a number of Armenian and Assyrian
academic and community groups (listed below).
The lectures will be based on findings from Dr. Gaunt’s
recently-published book Massacres, Resistance, Protectors:
Muslim-Christian Relations in Eastern Anatolia during World War I
(Gorgias Press, 2006), which will be on sale and available for signing
by the author at each of the lectures.
The schedule of the lectures is as follows:
* Thursday, May 3, 7:30 p.m.: Stanford University, Tresidder Union,
Cypress Rm., 2nd floor, 459 Lagunita Drive, Stanford, CA
* Friday, May 4, 7:30 p.m.: University of California, Berkeley, Dwinelle
Hall, Room 219, Berkeley, CA
* Sunday, May 6, 4:00 p.m.: California State University, Stanislaus,
Demergasso-Bava Hall, Room 166, 801 West Monte Vista Avenue, Turlock, CA
* Tuesday, May 8, 7:30 p.m.: California State University, Fresno,
University Business Center, Alice Peters Auditorium, Rm. 191, Fresno, CA
* Wednesday, May 9, 7:30 p.m.: Assyrian American Association of Southern
California Hall, 5901 Cahuenga Blvd., North Hollywood, CA
* Thursday, May 10, 7:00 p.m.: University of California, Los Angeles
(UCLA), Moore Hall, Room 100, Los Angeles, CA
* Friday, May 11, 7:30 p.m.: Merdinian Armenian Christian School, 13330
Riverside Drive, Sherman Oaks, CA
Groundbreaking Archival Research
Dr. Gaunt will detail how the persecution of Armenian and Assyrian
Christian minorities was organized on the national and local levels in
places where Armenian and Assyrian populations overlap. Case studies
involve the Turkish occupation of Urmia and its surrounding villages,
the Assyrian tribes in Hakkari, the massacres of Armenians in Diyarbekir
and Mardin, the massacres of Syriacs in the hundreds of villages in Tur
Abdin, the successful armed resistance mounted by the villagers of Azakh
and Ayn Wardo, and the victory of Antranik’s Armenian and Assyrian
volunteers at the battle of Dilman.
Gaunt’s work is based on unique access to hundreds of documents in the
archives of Istanbul and Ankara, as well as documents of Iranian,
Russian, Arabic, Armenian, Assyrian, French, and German origin. Most of
these documents have never been published before. In addition, nearly
forty persons were interviewed about their experiences of the war
period. The Turkish documents confirm events and decisions of what was
believed to have happened, but for which evidence has been lacking. In
some ways the new documents fill in the blank spaces in the history of
genocide.
David Gaunt was born in London, grew up in New Jersey, and
moved to Sweden in 1968. He received a Ph.D. from Uppsala University.
He is currently Professor of History at Södertörn University College
in Stockholm, which is situated in one of Europe’s largest
concentrations of the Assyrian diaspora. He has previously taught at the
universities of Uppsala and Umeå. He has published ten books and over
one hundred articles, mostly on Swedish social history. In the field of
genocide research he has edited Collaboration and Resistance during the
Holocaust: Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania (2004) and authored "At
Death’s End: the Genocide in Diyarbekir Province" in Armenian
Tigranakert/Diarbekir and Edessa/Urfa (Richard G. Hovannisian, ed.), as
well as articles in the journals The Assyrian Star and Hujådå.
In addition to the primary-organizing sponsors, the Assyrian
American National Federation and National Association for Armenian
Studies and Research, the lectures are being presented through the
unprecedented collaboration of the following Assyrian and Armenian
organizations (listed in alphabetical order):
Advancement of Education Foundation
Analysis Research and Planning for Armenia (ARPA Institute)
Armenian Educational Foundation Chair in Modern Armenian History at UCLA
Armenian Student Association at UCLA
Armenian Student Association at Stanford
Armenian Studies Program, University of California, Berkeley
Armenian Studies Program, California State University, Fresno
Assyrian Academic Society – Bay Area Chapter
Assyrian Aid Society of America – Central Valley Chapter
Assyrian Aid Society of America-Southern California Chapter
Assyrian American Association of Modesto
Assyrian American Association of Southern California
Assyrian American Civic Club of Turlock
Assyrian National Foundation of America
Assyrian Student Alliance at UC Berkeley
Assyrian Student Association at UCLA
Mesopotamian Museum
Narekatsi Chair in Armenian Studies at UCLA
Zinda Magazine
More information about the lecture is available by calling 617-489-1610,
faxing 617-484-1759, e-mailing [email protected], or writing to NAASR, 395
Concord Ave., Belmont, MA 02478 or contacting Jacklin Bejan at
408-482-1949 or [email protected].