Middle Eastern Studies Program presents: Ronald G. Suny

The Armenian Genocide of 1915 remains an event that has stirred controversy and created confusion long decades after it occurred. Hardly contested at the time, or in the early years after the deportations and massacres of hundreds of thousands of Armenians by the Ottoman authorities, the tragic elimination of Armenians from what is today the Turkish Republic has been subjected to distortions and denials in the last half century. What happened and why requires explanation. Ronald Grigor Suny offers a review of the ways people have constructed (and deconstructed!) the Genocide and a unique interpretation of why the Young Turks turned to the most extreme methods to rid their empire of what they perceived as an existential threat. Ronald G. Suny is the Charles Tilly Collegiate Professor of Social and Political History at the University of Michigan. Professor Suny is the author of many books, co-editor of A Question of Genocide: Armenians and Turks at the End of the Ottoman Empire, and one of the leading experts on the non-Russian nationalities of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, particularly those of the South Caucasus (Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia). Speaking: Ronald G. Suny Charles Tilly Collegiate Professor Social and Political History at the University of Michigan Sponsor: Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs, Co-Sponsor Moynihan European Research Centers, Co-Sponsor Middle Eastern Studies, Co-Sponsor Department of History, Co-Sponsor