This talk presents 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. Having subsequently lived in the three major colonial and later Soviet Trans-Caucasian capitals – Yerevan, Tiflis, and Baku – Bahaturian established herself as a recognized female writer whose life and career were marked by drastic political and social changes. With a mostly unpublished oeuvre of more than one hundred plays, novels, essays and memoirs, Bahaturian created a literary world where women play central roles in exploring themes of identity, gender, and power. Through a glimpse into Bahaturian’s life and work, the talk will reflect on how women writers positioned themselves and their writing within the broader context of social revolutions and wars that shaped the course of the twentieth century. For questions, email wgs@mit.edu.

Presenters:

• Dr. Hayarpi Papikyan (American University of Armenia, History)

  Dr. Hayarpi Papikyan specializes in 19th- and early 20th-century Armenian studies, history and sociology of schooling and institutionalized education, women's history. She holds a PhD in history and sociology of Education by the Université Paris V - Sorbonne Cité and is attached to the research and scientific center of CERLIS (Centre de recherche sur les liens sociaux) in Paris, France. Her doctoral research and thesis, Education on the edge of Empire: schooling girls and winning public roles for Armenian women in the Caucasus (mid 19th century - early 20th century), brought to light the history of the late-mid-nineteenth century and early twentieth-century education and institutionalized schooling of Armenian girls in the Caucasus. In March 2020, her doctoral thesis received the special mention of the Prize of Robert Mallet in the field of History of education in Paris, France.

• Prof. Rafik Santrosyan (American University of Armenia, Linguistics)

  Prof. Rafik Santrosyan received his PhD in Germanic Linguistics from Yerevan State Linguistic University in 2015. He has served as a lecturer at Yerevan State Linguistic University, American University of Armenia, and as a visiting professor at the Sanford School of Public Policy, University of Duke, USA, and a post-doctoral fellow at City College, International Faculty of the University of Sheffield, Greece. He worked as a research fellow at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland; Center for Women’s and Gender Studies of the University of Paris 8, France; and at the University of Padova, Italy. Santrosyan’s teaching and research interests lie in the fields of gender linguistics, multimodal semiotics, and simultaneous interpreting. His current research examines the interconnectedness of grammatical gender and language-mediated cultural discriminatory practices.

Moderated by: Lerna Ekmekcioglu

Lunch will be served!

This event is sponsored by MISTI Global Seed Funds in Armenia