Valley View: An Armenian Diasporic Account in Lieu of a Glendale Biennial Review

Mashinka Firunts Hakopian

 

1.

“NO” WAS THE only word my grandmother, Lida Khatchatrian, knew in English. She declined to learn any others. The only relation she wanted to the English language was one of radical unintelligibility. After immigrating at 70, my grandmother launched a 16-year performance of linguistic refusal. It was staged for a private audience of émigré intimates. No recordings were made.

We relocated from Yerevan to Glendale in 1991, like so many. By 2017, approximately 40 percent of the city’s residents were of Armenian descent, marking it as the largest diasporic population of Armenians in the West. In Glendale, it was still possible to live in Armenian dialects. On East Acacia Avenue, we gathered with neighbors to hear the Soviet Socialist Republic collapsing at the end of a long-distance telephone call we could not afford.

I am telling you this because I recognize that there are no views outside of embodied viewers and historically contingent practices of looking.

When I was 15, we moved to a street in the Glendale foothills from which you could see the mountains. It was called Valley View.

Demq: Laugh and the World Laughs with You

Aram Arkun

Armenians have many tragic episodes in their history. Much of their music seems sad, and for many, black seems to be the color of choice. Are Armenians melancholy by nature? The writers and actors of the Demq group in California are doing their best to disprove this. In the past few years they have presented at least one stage show annually. It is different in scale from most other Armenian comedic shows, as usually at least 2,000 people assemble in a big auditorium. This fall they are preparing to present a new show, Cirque Demq Soleil, while, quite recently, some of their sketches have gone viral on social media (e.g. www.facebook.com/demqshow).

Rohrabacher’s Plan to Partition Iran

Touraj Daryaee

From time to time it is important that one provides a teach-in to nonacademics and educates those who promote wrong and harmful ideas. As a history professor (1) I would like to teach a history lesson to Mr. Dana Rohrabacher, the honorable Congressional Representative of California’s 46th District in Orange County where I live and work. On July 26, 2012 Mr. Rohrabacher wrote a letter to the US Secretary of the State, Hillary Clinton, informing her that since the “people of Azerbaijan are geographically divided and many are calling for the reunification of their homeland after nearly two centuries of foreign rule,” the United States should help them reach that goal.  He then goes on to say that: Russia and Persia divided the homeland of Azeris homeland in 1828, without their consent. “The Azerbaijan Republic won its independence in 1991 when the Soviet Union collapsed,” continues the letter “Now it is time for the Azeris in Iran to win their freedom too.” Finally, Rohrabacher states: “Aiding the legitimate aspirations of the Azeri people for independence is a worthy cause in and of itself…yet, it also poses a greater danger to the Iranian tyrants than the threat of bombing its underground nuclear research bunkers.”

También la Diáspora saluda su independencia

Las iniciativas para la formación de una estructura mundial unificada en la Diáspora no constituyen una novedad. En 1977 se realizó un Congreso Mundial Armenio en Lausana (Suiza) con el propósito, precisamente, de alcanzar ese objetivo. Más de tres décadas después, en una situación política enteramente diferente, nos encontramos con una idea similar. (Ya han comenzado a escucharse voces que, naturalmente, apuntan a la teoría conspirativa; en este caso, una presunta iniciativa emanada de las mismas fuentes que engendraron los malhadados “protocolos” entre Armenia y Turquía de 2008). Resta por ver cuál será la posición que tomarán las estructuras comunitarias e institucionales armenias de los distintos países.