The Persistence of the Past: How Violence and Genocide in Ottoman Turkey Affect Our World Today

Ronald Grigor Suny, the Charles Tilly Collegiate Professor of Social and Political History at the University of Michigan and Emeritus Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago will speak on the consequences and enduring legacy and effects of the events of 1915 on politics in modern Turkey. The fate of Ottoman Armenians is intricately connected both to the identity of the Turkish nation in its denial of what occurred as the Ottoman Empire was living through its last years and to the current conflicts between Turks and Kurds.  Suny will explore both the Kemalist heritage and the policies of the Islamist government of present-day Turkey.

Sponsor(s): Department of History, Sponsored by the Richard Hovannisian Endowed Chair for Modern Armenian History at UCLA