Survivors: An Oral History Of The Armenian Genocide / Edition 1

by Donald E. Miller, Lorna Touryan Miller

Overview

Between 1915 and 1923, over one million Armenians died, victims of a genocidal campaign that is still denied by the Turkish government. Thousands of other Armenians suffered torture, brutality, deportation. Yet their story has received scant attention. Through interviews with a hundred elderly Armenians, Donald and Lorna Miller give the "forgotten genocide" the hearing it deserves. Survivors raise important issues about genocide and about how people cope with traumatic experience. Much here is wrenchingly painful, yet it also speaks to the strength of the human spirit.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520219564
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	02/02/1999
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	274
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Donald E. Miller is Professor of Religion at the University of Southern California and the author of Reinventing American Protestantism: Christianity in the New Millennium (California, 1997). Lorna Touryan Miller is Director of the Office for Creative Connections at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, California. Her parents survived the Armenian genocide.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction 1

PART I: HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
1. Remembrances of a Forgotten Genocide
2. The Historical and Political Context of
the Genocide

PART II: SURVIVOR ACCOUNTS
3. Life and Politics Before the Deportations
4. The Deportation Marches
5. The Experience of Women and Children
6. Orphanage Life and Family Reunions
7. Emigration and Resettlement

PART III: ANALYSIS
8. Survivor Responses to the Genocide
9. Moral Reflections on the Genocide

Appendix A: Methodology
Appendix B: Interview Guide
Appendix C: Survivors Interviewed
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

Combining a compelling oral history with a trenchant analysis of the first major genocide of the 20th century, this moving study focuses on the Turkish murder of more than one million Armenians between 1915 and 1923 in a systematic campaign of mass deportations, slaughter, forced labor and starvation. The Millers, a husband-and-wife team--he is a sociologist of religion at the University of Southern California, she is the daughter of survivors of the genocide--present formidable documentary evidence that this holocaust was the result of an ultranationalist Turkish government's deliberate plan to exterminate the Armenians (still denied by Turkish officials). Their interviews with 100 survivors of the genocide are organized to illustrate specific themes such as the imprisonment and torture of Armenian leaders, life in orphanages (which cradled a new generation of Armenians) and the psychological traumas that continue to afflict survivors in nightmares and waking moments. Photos. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

The Armenian genocide of 1915 is one of the few systematic atrocities of the 20th century that has yet to be fully acknowledged. Committed in a remote corner of the world during World War I, it has been regularly denied by successive Turkish governments and never truly mourned by the world community. In this book, Donald Miller (religion, Univ. of Southern California) and Lorna Miller, whose parents survived the massacre, recall the event in a painfully moving and objective testament to all those who suffered and died. Their work is impressive in its scope and methodology; over 100 elderly survivors were interviewed. Balanced and objective throughout, the book attempts to deal succinctly with survivor reactions over time and offers poignant reflections on the birth of the new Armenian republic in the wake of the Soviet collapse. An excellent work; recommended for all libraries.-- Joseph W. Constance Jr., St. Anselm Coll. Lib., Manchester, N.H.

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