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Workshop. “Armenian History as World History—Approaches to Teaching & Methods.”

Wednesday, January 21, 2015
12:00 AM
1644 International Institute, 1080 S. University

Sponsors: Armenian Studies Program, Center for European Studies, Center for South Asian Studies, and Eisenberg Institute for Historical Studies

This workshop explores ways to integrate the teaching of Armenian history within the wider context of World History. Workshop participants will think together about how to teach Armenian history and make it relevant to larger audiences of students coming from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines. What methods and approaches can help break the insularity of teaching Armenian History? How can we benefit from new approaches used by global historians to engage students in a rewriting of Armenian history?

The current state of teaching Armenian history survey courses remains largely confined to the traditional paradigm of kingdom / nation state and remains spatially focused on the territory of historical Armenia. Even though a new generation of scholars move beyond the traditional framing of Armenian history there is a visible lack of textbooks that treat Armenian history within the wider context of world history or incorporate the latest conceptual turns in the field of history.

The workshop will explore the possibilities of widening the frames of teaching Armenian history. Armenian history presents a significant space to investigate the interconnectedness of world history  – long established literary tradition, mercantile connections stretching far beyond the immediate socio-spatial milieu traditionally associated with Armenia and Armenians. The location of Armenia / Armenians at the crossroads of a multitude of different empires encompassing Armenia all present possibilities of placing Armenian history within the context of world history. In fact given its reach and continuous recorded history it is surprising how little Armenian history has entered the field of world history.

The workshop brings together scholars working in three different periods of Armenian history stretching from medieval to the early modern and into the contemporary world in an attempt to discuss discrete approaches to world history within each era.

How and Why We Write and Teach History
Presenter: Gerard Libaridian; Discussant: Douglas Northrop

Problematics of Time and Place in Pre-Modern Armenian History
Presenter: Sergio La Porta; Discussant: Karla Mallette

Cross-Cultural Credit Networks, Legal Institutions, and “Trust”: Bills of Exchange between Julfan Armenians and Marwari Sarrafs in Early Modern Isfahan and Mughal India
Presenter: Sebouh Aslanian; Discussant: Matthew Hull

Organizer: Arsene Saparov, lecturer in history, U-M

Sponsors: Armenian Studies Program, Center for European Studies, Center for South Asian Studies, and Eisenberg Institute for Historical Studies