Presented in partnership with scholars and programs at the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and Freie Universität Berlin
The Critical Armenian Studies Collective is pleased to announce "Infidelities: Armenian Studies Otherwise" (March 24 – 26, 2023), a three-day international conference about new directions in the study of Armenian memory, culture, and displacement across West Asia and the Middle East to the Americas and back. In collaboration with scholars and programs at Penn, the University of Michigan, and the Free University of Berlin, “Infidelities” brings together scholars, curators, filmmakers, visual artists, physical theatre performers, and a sound performer, all of whom work either directly in, or tangentially to, Armenian Studies, to flesh out new visions for the field, for the understanding of “Armenianness,” and for categories of identity at large. Through a series of panels, performances, film screenings, and working groups focused around the polyvalent provocation of "infidelity," the conference will focus on a spectrum of lively new directions toward which Armenian Studies is currently moving: feminist and queer interventions; cultural studies of hybrid and syncretic identities; aesthetic imaginings of Armenité beyond text and language; new materialisms and revolutionary change in a postsocialist setting; utopian futures beyond the nation-state; necropolitics, post-memory, and alternative imaginaries of the archive; as well as postcolonial critiques and visions of "reconciliation."
Participating Scholars
Milena Abrahamian, Musician & Artist, Armenia
Arpi Adamyan, Artist, Armenia
Nancy Agabian, Writer, USA
Prof. Micheline Aharonian Marcom, Writer, North Carolina, USA
Prof. Sylvia Alajaji, Franklin & Marshall College, USA
Özcan Alper, Filmmaker, Turkey
Prof. Hakem al-Rustom, University of Michigan, USA
Sophia Armen, Doctoral Candidate, University of California, USA
Dr. Shushan Avagyan, American University of Armenia (AUA), Armeniarof. Kathryn Babayan, University of Michigan, USA
Dr. Arlene Avakian, Professor Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA
Kohar Avakian, Doctoral Candidate, Yale University, USA
Mischa Badasyan, Performance Artist, Russia/Germany
Prof. Houri Berberian, Meghrouni Family Presidential Chair in Armenian Studies, UC Irvine, USA
Prof. Tamar Boyadjian, Michigan State (soon-to-be Columbia University), USA
Dr. Talar Chahinian, Lecturer, University of California, Irvine, USA
Dr. Mashinka Firunts Hakopian, Associate Director of Research for the Future of Democracy program at the Berggruen Institute, CA, USA
Aikaterini Gegisian, Visual Artist, Athens, Greece
Anahit Ghazaryan, Filmmaker, Armenia
Prof. Rachel Goshgarian, Lafayette College, USA
Armine Hovhanissyan, Artist and Archivist, Armenia
Dr. Marianna Hovhannisyan, Carol G. Lederer Postdoctoral Fellow, Brown University, USA
Dr. Karén Jallatyan, Calouste Gulbenkian Lecturer in the Department of Armenian Studies at the Pázmány Péter Catholic University, Budapest, Hungary
Prof. Suvir Kaul, University of Pennsylvania, India/USA
Prof. Ania Loomba, University of Pennsylvania, India/USA
Prof. Joanne Nucho, Pomona College, USA
Tsomak Oga, Musician & Artist, Armenia
Prof. Ayşe Parla, Boston University, Boston, USA
Prof. Nelli Sargsyan, Emerson College, USA
Lara Sarkissian, Musical Artist, Iran/USA
Prof. Elyse Semerdjian, Whitman College, USA
Dr. Gayane Shagoyan, Senior Researcher at the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology, National Academy of Sciences, Armenia
Eric Shahinian, Filmmaker, Los Angeles, USA
Anna Shahnazaryan, Civil Activist, Armenia
Lousie Shamamian, Filmmaker and Comedian, USA
Dr. Tamar Shirinian, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA
Dr. Anoush Suni, Keyman Modern Turkish Studies Postdoctoral Fellow, Northwestern University, USA
Lucine Talalyan, Artist and Filmmaker, Armenia
Alik Tamar, Filmmaker, USA
Prof. Melanie Tanielian, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA
Méliné Ter-Minassian, Performance Artist, France
Hrag Vartanian, Founder and Curator of Hyperallergic, USA
PROGRAM (Subject to minor adjustments) | Friday and Saturday open to the public
FRIDAY, March 24
9:00–9:20 — Welcome Remarks, “Infidelities”—Slought
9:30–11:00 — PANEL 1: Postcolonial Feminist Contestations—Slought
11:15–12:45 — PANEL 2: Re-Imagining Land, Memory, and Trauma—Slought
1:00–2:30 — LUNCH—LGBT Center
2:30–4:00 — PANEL 3: Diasporic Locations in Question—LGBT Center
4:15–5:45 — FILM SCREENING: Place-Making: Communities in Displacement—LGBT Center
6:00–7:00 — Performance—LGBT Center
SATURDAY, March 25
9:30–11:00 — PANEL 4: Historical Aesthetics, Aesthetic Histories—Slought
11:15–12:15 — Performative Interventions—Slought
12:15–1:30 — LUNCH—LGBT Center
1:30–3:00 — PANEL 5: Re-Imagining Archives—LGBT Center
3:15–4:45 — FILM SCREENING: Queering Culture: Shorts—LGBT Center
5:00–6:15 — Book Launch and Conversation with Author/s and Translators—LGBT Center
7:30–11:00 — Reception, featuring DJ Foozool—LGBT Center
SUNDAY, March 26, Conference Participants Only
10:30—12:00 — Roundtable—Slought
12:15—1:30 — LUNCH
1:30—2:30 — Breakout Groups—Slought
2:45—3:45 — What’s next?—Slought
This program is made possible through generous support from the Society for Armenian Studies, and, at the University of Pennsylvania, the following sponsors:
Middle East Center (MEC); Department of English; Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations; Cinema Studies; Russian and Eastern European Studies (REES); Gender, Sexuality and Women's Studies (GSWS); Jewish Studies; Department of the History of Art; Annenberg Center for Advanced Research in Global Communication (CARGC); Program in Comparative Literature and Literary Theory; Theorizing; Lauder Institute; Wolf Humanities Center; Ann Matter; SASgov; Gen/Sex; and the University Research Foundation Award.
