Humans maintain their identity only as long as they have enriched memory and they make constructive and viable sense out of it. Dr Paul Haidostian, President of Haigazian University of Lebanon, talked about how the stories from the past can become inspiration and shape a person’s and a nation’s identity, in a lecture entitled “Stories that inspire: unpacking Armenian genocide memory”, that the University of Cyprus organised to honour the memory of the Armenian genocide.
Professor Haidostian, noting how close Lebanon and Cyprus are, said that often in the Middle East people are blamed for putting too much emphasis on the past and in finding the highest pride in the wealth of ancient civilizations and not in their current stage. Both are considered problematic in the pragmatic world.
However, “I believe that humans are humans because they are able to inspire and to be inspired by others”, he said, noting that certain types of stories are the key of inspiration. “By being inspired by stories we build up nations. We raise the new generation with stories that have the ability to inspire”, he said.
His first story, was not one directly linked to the Armenian genocide. But it was about exit, exile, migration. In a flight from Beirut to Yerevan in 2016, his co-passengers, Armenians that had fled Aleppo, Syria, started talking, sharing their stories from before the war in Syria, gave updates on family statuses etc. The professor, listening to them, wondered whether when exit and migration stories are told, become part of history. “It could have been Adana, Mosul, Artsakh, Famagusta”, he said, pointing the common past and suffering of these places.
“For the victims and their descendants, they (the stories) form their identities. These stories shape families and nations. It’s not simply genetics, or living under one roof. A story is not its summary. It’s the details, its mood, its inner interconnections”, he said.
Humans maintain identity only as long as they have enriched memory and they make constructive and viable sense out of that memory. In his stories, he wondered about the little details, that help to reconstruct the past in a meaningful way.
He went on telling the story of how he found out that his family had escaped from a town called Marash to Aleppo. Not knowing, he had assumed that, since his grandfather was a prominent educator in a German orphanage, he would have escaped in a comfortable way. The information wasn’t shared in his family. He only found out, when reading a book, and a witness described how happy she was, when travelling with a caravan from one city to another, to have seen one of her kindergarten students, naming the professor’s father.
“Is it important to have the answer in such details after 100 years?”, he wondered. “We all need to own our story”, he said, adding “I am the story eventually”. If you don’t own it, you cannot transmit it. This is also true about causes, he said, since they die when you stop demanding.
“For life to continue, we need the pathos as well. There is more. The feeling is in the context and the details. If I cannot make sense of my family’s stories, with what ingredients I will shape my story?”, he wondered.
We need to equip and furnish our imagination, Professor Haidostian said. “Part of a problem of the world is a problem of imagination. Identity is formed when imagination is enriched”.
He clarified that this should not mean that family culture is a prison, “but it is a home”.
“All my grandfathers are from the same German orphanage. When I graduated from University, I went to Germany. Immediately, I went back 70 years”, he said, as he put himself in his grandparents’ shoes.
He then went on sharing another story about when his grandfather was asked to join the Armenian negotiating team to meet with a Turkish ruler. He was a father of eight children and people told his grandmother not to let him go, since there were chances of him not returning. Haidostian said that a story in his family says that his grandmother’s answer was “when the voice of the nation speaks, all other voices should be silent”.
He gave that example as to how identity is shaped. Through this phrase he now has an idea of the values of his family and how his grandparents raised their family.
“The Armenian story is not complete, it should continually expand itself, and the data should be retrieved”, he said, emphasizing the need for stories to be told. He noted that in 2015, when the world commemorated the 100 years from the genocide, one of the outcomes was a renewed interest in the story, alongside of political matters, like the demand for recognition.
He said that everyone can take a lot of lessons through these stories. Maybe one lesson is about cruelty and its continuation through time. Another lesson might be what it means to sacrifice for the nation.
“Stories will keep unpacking, only if there is one who has the stamina to unpack. Not when we say the past is the past”, he said. The stories are still being unpacked, not only by archivists and historians, but from the families of the survivors.
Finally, referencing the destruction of Smyrna and its centennial anniversary this year, he said that the story of Smyrna is still unpacking as well and it needs to inspire. “For some, calling for justice is inspiration, going to an exhibition is an inspiration or watching a documentary. Telling stories is also an inspiration”, adding that in times of trial, every detail has deeper significance, otherwise, it becomes a cheap political tool.
Time and space are relevant. Even if it is subjective, documentation is important. It shouldn’t be slave of memory. Unpacking is the visitation of the truth and the truth sets people free. When we see dedication, selflessness, sacrificial love, clinging to life, or to hope for excellence, when you look for the spirit, then there is inspiration, he concluded.
Tasos Christofides, Rector of University of Cyprus, welcomed Professor Haidostian, saying that they have signed an Agreement of Cooperation between the two Universities.
24th April is established as Armenian Genocide Commemoration date.
Source: Cyprus News Agency