Laurence Ritter
The author of a PhD dissertation, Remodelling of Armenian Identities between the Diaspora and Armenia, from Victims to Individuals,
French sociologist Laurence Ritter explains the specifities of the
Armenian Diaspora formed after the 1915 Genocide. In her view, far from
being a monolithic whole, the Diaspora shows different faces according
to the countries Armenians emigrated to. Therefore, one should talk
about not just one but several Diasporas. Armenia’s access to
independence and the wide circulation of information in the digital era
have also deeply changed the ways of the traditional Diaspora. Laurence
Ritter analyses the various challenges the Diaspora must face in order
to step into modernity.
There are an estimated 8 to 10 million Armenians in the world, of which some 3 million in the Republic of Armenia, according to official statistics, although these do not account for the migratory haemorrhage that never ceased since that former Soviet Republic achieved independence in 1991. Given the very large numbers of that migratory wave, both for political and economical reasons, it can be called a Diaspora within the Diaspora. It is developing side by side with the post-Genocide Diaspora both in the United States and in Europe, although not necessarily joining the same organizations or neighbourhoods that have been marked by Armenian presence for almost a century. In Russia, around the cities of Armavir and Krasnodar, but mostly in Moscow, Armenians from Armenia are above all looking for work and better living conditions in a country they are familiar with.
This new mobility can be compared to the
wanderings that the post-1915 Diaspora has already known, in particular
to the waves of internal migrations between 1980 and 1990. Among the
Middle East countries that hosted the largest number of Armenians after
the Genocide, Lebanon counted up to 250,000. The Lebanese civil war
caused mass departures of whole families towards France and the United
States, triggering a sort of “culture shock” between often very
integrated Western Diasporas and a Lebanese community carrying the
direct legacy of a Lebanese congregational system inherited from the
Ottoman Empire. Then, the Islamic Revolution in Iran also drove many
Armenians to temporary or permanent exile, again with the United States
as a favourite destination. It is estimated that, today, there are
around one million Armenians in Russia, another million in the United
States, and at least 600,000 in Europe, with the largest community in
France – these statistics making no distinction between recent migrants
from Armenia and those descended from the Diaspora generated by the
Genocide[1].
Finally, in the last two years of the bloody conflict in Syria, a large
Armenian community mostly from Alep and its surroundings have fled
among the several hundred thousands refugees driven away by the
fighting. Armenia has welcomed at least 10,000 of them since the
beginning of the conflict.
This ever moving geography of the Armenian Diaspora invites us to discuss the subject in the plural form: we are looking at several Diasporas and not just one. In the Armenian vocabulary, the difference is clearly stated: a Libanan-Hay refers to an Armenian from Lebanon, a Fransia-hay to an Armenian from France, and a Hayastantsi
to the citizen of the Republic of Armenia. The towns and neighbourhoods
built throughout the world like so many “Little Armenias” after the
Genocide remain places of remembrance as well as living quarters. Thus,
in Lebanon, the Bourj Hammoud neighbourhood of Beirut, built by Genocide
survivors in a rundown part of town still shows a sense of belonging;
likewise, the so-called “Armenian quarter” of Marseille, the Beaumont
neighbourhood, which was a wasteland in the 1930s, that refugee Armenian
families painstakingly built up to be able to leave the camps or
temporary housing in the city centre. The same phenomenon happened in
the French cities of Paris, Lyon and Valence. In Los Angeles, the Hayastantsi
newcomers have settled in the Glendale and North Hollywood areas, and
in Boston, where Armenians already had important organizations even
before the Genocide, the main Armenian neighbourhood is Watertown. In
Québec, however, Armenians are much more scattered in the city of
Montreal due to an urban policy devised to limit the regrouping of new
migrants. As a result, Armenians do not necessarily live close to the
two gravity centres of the community. However, all over the world,
Armenian communities have put their mark on the places where they
settled, and increasingly as their exile became permanent. Indeed, the
ethnic cleansing that was performed made the return impossible to lands
that are now Turkish so that, beyond longing for their lost land, the
Diasporas proceeded to grow new roots in the countries which became more
than their hosting places, but their states of citizenship.
Between Armenia and the Diaspora, a difficult dialogue
Between Armenia and the Diaspora, a difficult dialogue
As we saw, the Diaspora is anything but
monolithic. It has evolved along various historical lines, timelines,
and developments according to the countries of arrival. Since Armenia’s
independence, however, the Diaspora is no longer solely structured by
its own political life, its parties – mostly the Dashnak and Ramgavar,
with their respective connected associations – by its churches and its
efforts to maintain schools trying to preserve the Western Armenian
language[2].
The Diaspora is also concerned by Armenia. In fact, concern for that
small Soviet Republic had started even before independence. The Gumri
earthquake in 1988, which coincided with the militarization of the
conflict with Azerbaijan over the Karabakh region – a mostly Armenian
enclave – prompted support from communities throughout the world.
Armenians undergoing pogroms in Baku, Sumgait and Kirovabad in 1988 fled
towards Armenia and, from there, hindered by the language barrier and
poorly adapted living conditions, often on to Russia. In 1991, upon
Armenia’s independence, the fight for Karabakh to become part of Armenia
turned into an all-out war. A professional army was set up and, by
1992, after it took the emblematic city of Shushi, the Armenian victory
seemed increasingly certain. The 1994 ceasefire only marked a
theoretical stop to the fighting, with incidents causing casualties
persisting along the Karabakh frontline or in the zone of direct contact
between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The outcome of that conflict was that
Armenians not only re-appropriated Karabakh, but also Azeri land to the
West, allowing a juncture with Armenia, and to the East, forming a sort
of “security corridor” in front of Azeri lines.
NGOs that intervened after the
earthquake consolidated their presence, the All-Armenian Fund became
along the years the official world coordinator of aid for Armenia,
working together with very large organizations such as the AGBU, the
Gulbenkian Foundation, the Lincy Foundation and others. Roads,
hospitals, the maintenance or building of schools and orphanages – many
achievements are the work of the Diaspora with, as a crowning symbol,
the direct highway from Yerevan to Stepanakert, capital of Kharabakh,
which was started in 1996 and displays signs announcing which portion
was financed by which sponsor or community.
The Diaspora has also changed a lot
internally since the 1970s. During that decade, Armenians, initially
from Lebanon but rapidly from the whole Diaspora, claimed for
recognition of the genocide of Armenians in the name of their
grandparents. The third generation after the events “woke up,” and there
are reasons to that: the Diaspora which was by now both very integrated
and faced with memories of massacres and exile, made that memory their
own by turning it into a weapon of political vindication. They were
served by a dramatic context of world events – a time of guerrillas, the
beginning of the Lebanese civil war, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict –
and by the fact that the children of Jewish survivors from Nazi death
camps were also trying to do memorial work, demanding self-examination
from the countries involved, for instance in bringing the role the Vichy
collaborationist regime into the public eye. Armenians of that
generation were naturally permeated by these contemporary debates and
some would resort to terrorist actions to make their Armenian claim
heard. For the first time in 1984, French President François Mitterrand
on a visit to Vienne (France), a city with a large Armenian community,
uttered the word genocide. University studies on genocide developed as
well as an unrelenting political struggle to obtain from parliaments
throughout the world that they officially recognize the genocide. In
France a law to that effect was passed in 2001.
In France, a Committee of the 24th
April was set up at the turn of the 1990s, which later became the
Council for Armenian Communities of France (CCAF). As mentioned above,
the security of independent Armenia in relation to Turkey and Azerbaijan
was a central concern of the communities. Since Armenia, in spite of
poor economic conditions, increasingly opened to tourism, many Diaspora
Armenians have been visiting. Some of them – quite few, it should be
said – have settled there or at least have stayed regularly in contact
for aid purposes or limited investments. Although they are getting to
know each other, Armenians from Armenia and from the Diaspora still find
it hard to dialogue. For instance, the Diaspora never gets involved in
domestic politics at an institutional level, its main aid and charity
organizations refraining from taking sides in troubled times, for
instance during the March 2008 crisis. However, this premise is starting
to change with the advent of the global digital era: through websites,
blogs, social networks, etc., the Diaspora and Armenia are now connecte.
Whatever the language used – and although few Diaspora Armenians have
reading mastery of Armenian, particularly the form used in Armenia,
information does circulate. It is increasingly difficult not to know in
Buenos Aires what is happening in Yerevan or Moscow or Los Angeles. The
Armenian Diasporas are not merging but they are interconnected. Their
relation to Armenia is thus clearly altered, not to mention the
contribution made by Armenians from Armenia who have now settled on the
margins of traditional communities.
The challenges of a diasporic future
The challenges of a diasporic future
Although many Diaspora Armenians still
say that they cannot relate to Armenia because of its Soviet past which
they find a heavy legacy in the people’s mindsets, or because of rampant
corruption (a rather dismissive way of not examining the workings of
today’s Armenian society), and although the vast majority are descended
from ancestors from today’s Turkey, a trend of connectedness has
definitely started between Armenia and the Diaspora. Contrary to popular
belief, Armenians from Armenia are also heirs to the Genocide: one
family in three has at least one grandparent from the Van, Mush or Kars
provinces, not to mention the villages in the Talin region (now in South
Armenia) peopled by over 25,000 Sasuntsi still speaking the dialect of that vast mountainous region. The parades held on the night of 23rd
April see the youth of Yerevan taking to the streets and walking up to
the Genocide Memorial, asking in the same voice as the Diaspora, and at
the same time, for recognition of the 1915 tragedy. On 24th
April a permanent march of over a million people goes up to that same
Memorial, flowers in hand, to place their bouquets around the flame of
remembrance. Armenians from Armenia and Armenians from the Diaspora are
not divided over that issue, quite the contrary. Likewise, the unhappy
fate of the Syrian city of Kessab, and of Armenians of Syria is a
concern in Armenia as well as in the Diaspora. It is irrelevant to look
for some kind of necessary union between Armenia and the Diaspora since
it is already happening through the civil society, much more than
through political watchwords. The Armenian destiny is no longer seen as
dispersion – the actual meaning of the word Diaspora – but as a way of
life for a nation splintered by history and recomposing itself.
The real challenges ahead for these
Diasporas are threefold. First, wherever they are in the world,
Armenians now should use all possible means to be in contact with one
another, thanks to the new technologies, and in spite of the gradual
loss of the Armenian language. The networking mentioned above is not
limited to a virtual cyber world; it also enables genuine ties,
particularly cultural links, to develop, as well as to circulate
information and a lively picture of Armenian life.
Secondly, Diaspora Armenians must choose
their type of relation to Armenia. Only very few can contemplate
productive investment, essentially because any freedom of enterprise in
Armenia is blocked by an oligarchy, and also because of security issues
resulting from the Karabakh conflict. Few Diaspora Armenians have asked
for the 10 year passport or, after it was authorized, for dual
citizenship. Similarly, the “classic” Diaspora hardly gets involved in
the political changes of Armenia, preferring to do charity work than
promote changes in the political sphere. In fact, only Armenians who
migrated from Armenia are really active at the political level in
relation to Armenia, for obvious reasons.
Finally, the third and not the least of
the challenges: the Armenian Diaspora has already considerably changed
in defining its identity and in its very structures. It is now possible
to contemplate exchanging views with some Turks, to travel to Turkey, to
the homeland, even though it means to realize that the genocide of
people was followed by an extensive cultural genocide which crushed the
slightest traces of Armenian presence in many regions of Anatolia.
Armenians must thus reposition themselves in relation to the Genocide
issue and Turkey, that is to the revisionist rhetoric of the Turkish
State. Many are already taking up this challenge, all the more so that,
with Hrant Dink’s activism, the Armenian community in Turkey experienced
a change of paradigm. Although Hrant Dink lost his life to the cause,
the voice of Armenians in Turkey is now heard and is relayed by a small
fraction of the Turkish society made of citizens committed to human
rights. Beside Armenians speaking up in Turkey is also increasingly
heard the voice of “islamized” Armenians, a rather awkward category
referring to all those in the deep, former Armenian provinces who dare
claim themselves Armenian – creating an issue as much for Turkey as for
Armenians themselves, in Turkey and elsewhere.
Thus, in order to step once and for all
into modernity, the Armenian Diasporas should first accept themselves as
heirs not only to the tragedy of the Genocide, but also to the strength
that survived the trauma, proudly showing that what once was doomed to
destruction is in fact a dynamic force. Identity has become plural.
Language and religion are not the only vectors. The fear of total
disappearance through assimilation does not seem grounded considering
the very dynamism of the communities, and the artistic creativity and
social success of many. Armenians must also accept that an identity is
in constant flux and not the fixed transmission of a predefined body of
features. By the same token, they must accept that, today, it is from
the diversity of their legacy that a modern, open, Armenian identity can
truly shine, so that it is passed on not only as a “prescribed”
Armenian-ness but a as more subjective, and therefore more positive,
sense of being Armenian.
[1]
Armenians from Armenia are also present in Turkey, in the Armenian
neighbourhoods of Istanbul, but much more marginally than over the
American continent or in Russia.
[2]
The Armenian language, which was rich in dialects before the Genocide,
is split into two branches – the Western branch spoken by Armenians from
the Ottoman Empire and, today, in the Diaspora and the Easten Armenian,
spoken in today’s Armenia and Iran. There are many differences in
vocabulary and syntax, as well as in the spelling which, however, do not
prevent mutual understanding. The idea of preserving Western Armenian
in the Diaspora is important provided that it is not presented as the
“pure” and “true” Armenian idiom as opposed to Eastern Armenian which
would be a distorted version of it.
"Repair" (repairfuture.net), June 10, 2014
No comments:
Post a Comment