Latest Articles
Mayakovsky in Cleveland: A Fiery Futurist’s Discovery of the Forest City
Vladimir Mayakovsky Photograph of Vladimir Mayakovsky from the first edition of the Great Soviet Encyclopedia Source: Great Soviet Encyclopedia [this essay is a reprint of an originally published article in Cleveland Historical on April 17, 2023, https://clevelandhistorical.org/items/show/1001] In the fateful year of 1917, the Bolshevik Revolution shook Russia and forever changed the world. Its impact […]
An Island with No Name: The Many Lives of San Lazzaro before Abbot Mkhit‘ar
At the very outset, when the site for a monastery was granted to us, it was a kind of ruined monastery, called Saint Lazarus (San Lazzaro). There, for the sake of our dwelling for the time being, Abbot Mkhit‘ar built a number of new cells, as many as sufficed for his monks, as we […]
Repatriation is not a sprint. It is a marathon.
Like every marathon, almost everyone hits a crisis at some point of repatriation. After years of observing hundreds of repatriation journeys as a co-founder and director of Repat Armenia – and going through one myself in 2010 from Moscow – I increasingly feel that most repatriates pass through at least three major crises. Not […]
The Armenians of Basra-Iraq: Rich Historical Legacy of Disappearing Community
The Armenian history and heritage of Basra, Iraq is rich and centuries old, yet it remains largely understudied and not widely documented. During their centuries-old presence in this port city in Southern Iraq, the Armenians contributed much to the city’s mercantile, trading and intellectual prosperity. Their historical presence can be compartmentalised into two historical periods: […]
How My Dissertation Went Terribly, Wonderfully Wrong
When I arrived at St. John’s University to begin my PhD in history, my plan was to be a modernist. In my application, I had enthusiastically proposed to study modern perceptions of Middle Eastern women. I labored under this plan for two full academic years, all the while fulfilling my coursework requirements. One afternoon, I […]
Book Review: The Armenian experience: From ancient times to independence
This is a reprint from an earlier publication. To cite the original article: Artyom Tonoyan (2024): The Armenian experience: From ancient times to independence, Eurasian Geography and Economics, 65(8), 998–1000. https://doi.org/10.1080/15387216.2022.2122529 The Armenian experience: From ancient times to independence by Gaïdz Minassian (translated by Peter Gillespie), London and New York, I.B., Tauris, 2020, 288 pp., […]