Telling the Story of the 1946-49 Great Repatriation as a State-Orchestrated Migration.

Thursday, May 22, 2025
7:00 PM - 9:00 PM (Pacific Time)
Ararat-Eskijian Museum and Research Center, Sheen Chapel
15105 Mission Hills Road,
Mission Hills, CA 91345

In the aftermath of World War II, nearly 95,000 Armenians from across the diaspora answered a call to return to their ancestral homeland. Promised a new beginning in Soviet Armenia, they instead found themselves trapped in a totalitarian system.

Coming Full Circle tells the story of the 1946–49 Great Repatriation—a state-orchestrated migration driven as much by Stalin’s geopolitical ambitions as by the genuine hopes of a scattered people.

After Stalin's death, emigration trends emerged, intensifying in the 1960s–1980s. Many of the repatriates left the Soviet Union, settling mainly in the United States and France.

Through rare archival materials, personal letters, photographs, and powerful oral histories, the film brings to light the disillusionment and resilience of those who came in hope and were met with exile, surveillance, and repression.

The documentary has been screened at academic and cultural institutions across Armenia, Russia, France, Canada, and the United States, including the University of Arizona, the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), INALCO in Paris, and the American University of Armenia.

About the Author: 

Tigran Paskevichyan is an acclaimed Armenian poet, journalist, and scriptwriter with over 40 years of experience in media and documentary filmmaking. A longtime collaborator with Versus Studio and the Factum Documentary Center, he has authored more than 20 documentaries.

Since 2010, Paskevichyan has led the Coming Full Circle project, which includes four documentaries, an exhibition, and three published books. He is also the founder of www.hayrenadardz.org, a comprehensive digital archive dedicated to the Great Repatriation, featuring hundreds of documents and over 80 eyewitness oral stories.

Sponsor(s): UCLA Narekatsi Chair in Armenian Studies, Ararat-Eskijian Museum, National Association for Armenian Studies and Research NAASR, The Promise Armenian Institute at UCLA