Scholar Seta B. Dadoyan discusses lesser-known Armenian texts reflecting Islamic-Armenian interaction – such as translations of the Qur'ān and polemical side scripts – and how they reflect perceptions of Islam, as well as Armenian political and social circumstances under various Muslim rules over 14 centuries.

Thursday, November 21, 2024
6:00 PM - 8:00 PM (Pacific Time)
UCLA Bunche Hall, Room 10383

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Even though in her other five volumes and many studies in Islamic-Armenian interactions the Armenians’ perceptions of Islam and the Prophet are always referred to, Dadoyan’s Islam in Armenian Literary Culture. Texts, Contexts, Dynamics (Louvain: 2021) is a unique project and could not be done earlier. It required identifying a great variety of sources and mapping a vast panorama with its own peripheries and methodological requirements. Since primary texts are the only paths to this type of investigation, she has made almost all relevant texts available in English (often in her translation). These are documented accounts of the known, less known and hitherto unknown authors and texts – such as translations of the Qur’ān and polemical side-scripts – about Islam, the Prophet, the Muslims, also terms of relations with the Muslim state and peoples, from the seventh century to the present. As the written record, these texts reflect not only perceptions of Islam, the Prophet and their Scriptures the Qur’ān, but also and primarily Armenian political and social circumstances under various Muslim rules over fourteen centuries. She has formulated and developed broader arguments in the process of analyzing and categorizing a massive amount of material. The objective, also the challenge, has been the composition of a coherent whole and for the first time, a closely textual, comprehensive, thematic and sequential format on a chronological grid, which contains the basic material as well as historical circumstances and dynamics. Her solution of these problematics has been what she calls an “analytical and discursive tripod” of fundamental themes: “the Armenian Mahmet”, the “Armenian Pax Islamica” and the “Armenian Ghurans.”

Prof. Seta Barsoumian-Dadoyan is a prominent Armenian scholar and academic, also a prolific painter. She holds the exclusive Doctor of Philosophical Sciences degree in Philosophy. She writes in Armenian and English and has authored twelve volumes and over sixty scholarly papers in academic publications to her credit. In addition to her research and publications in Western Armenian intellectual and artistic cultures, Dadoyan’s groundbreaking historiographic research in the experience of the Armenians in the Islamic worlds raise awareness toward hitherto unstudied areas and patterns of the Armenian political-cultural role and significance in the region and position her as the initiator of a new area in Near Eastern and Armenian Studies. She has been professor of cultural studies, philosophy, and art history at AUB-American University of Beirut, St. Nersess Seminary, Columbia, Chicago and Yerevan State Universities. In addition to the three major awards in Armenian Studies, the SAS Lifetime Achievement, Mesrop Mashtots of the Catholicosate of Cilicia, and the Medal and Certificate of Dawit Anhaght of the Philosophical Academy of the National Academy of Armenia, Dadoyan has received numerous awards.

Venue Bunche Hall, Room 10383 (10th floor)

315 Portola Plaza

Los Angeles, CA 90095

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Sponsor(s): The Promise Armenian Institute, Armenian Studies Research and Outreach Program, Center for Near Eastern Studies, UCLA Narekatsi Chair in Armenian Studies, Richard Hovannisian Chair of Modern Armenian History at UCLA, Ararat-Eskijian Museum and Research Center, National Association for Armenian Studies and Research