Dr. Karen Jallatyan’s academic interests include diaspora studies, multicultural ethnography, theories of cultural diversity and co-habitation, translation studies, multilingualism and film studies.

He received his PhD in Comparative Literature from the University of California, Irvine in 2019. His dissertation, entitled "Becoming Diaspora: Global Armenian Literature and Film after 1950," draws attention to the specifically post-national and post-catastrophic nature of diasporic Armenian culture in Western Armenian. It argues that finding ways to let Western Armenian language and literature thrive in a multicultural context is the only adequate response to the needs of this surviving culture.

Dr. Anoush Suni studies state and intercommunal violence, cultural heritage, memory, materiality and landscape in Turkey, Armenia, Kurdistan and the Middle East.

She earned her PhD in Anthropology from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2019. Her dissertation, entitled “Palimpsests of Violence: Ruination and the Politics of Memory in Anatolia,” investigates questions of memory and the material legacies of state violence in the region of Van in southeastern Turkey. Herein she focuses on the historic Armenian and contemporary Kurdish communities. Dr. Suni spent over two years in Van and Istanbul (2015-2017) conducting ethnographic research for her dissertation.

The University of Michigan’s Center for Armenian Studies (ASP) promotes the study of Armenian history, language, culture and society. ASP is built on the solid foundation of rigorous curriculum offered by the two endowed chairs in Armenian studies: The Alex Manoogian Chair in Modern Armenian History (1981) and the Marie Manoogian Chair in Armenian Language and Literature (1987). A member of the University of Michigan International Institute, the program organizes educational opportunities for students, faculty and the community.