The Armenian Middle East – Fractures, Connectivities and Reconfigurations | Sossie Kasbarian
The Department of Middle Eastern Studies of the University of Chicago is honored to have Dr. Sossie Kasbarian as the speaker in the Dumanian Lecture Series for the Spring 2026 session. The lecture will be in person Thursday, April 16 at 6:30 PM US Central Time in Rosenwald 405.
Please see below the information about this talk and our speaker, and attached the poster of the lecture.
Title: The Armenian Middle East – Fractures, Connectivities and Reconfigurations
Abstract:
This talk approaches the contemporary Middle East through the prism of the Armenian experience. Drawing from extensive field research, the lecture explores the changing practices and identities of Middle East Armenians, focusing on Egypt, Lebanon and Syria, through their own narratives, orientations and reflections.
Bio: Sossie Kasbarian is currently the Dumanian Visiting Professor in Armenian Studies at the University of Chicago, and Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the University of Stirling. She earned her doctorate from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. She has been a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Edinburgh and has taught at SOAS, the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies (Geneva), the University of Lancaster (England), and the American University in Cairo.
Sossie is co-editor (with Talar Chahinian and Tsolin Nalbantian) of The Armenian Diaspora and Stateless Power: Collective Identity in the Transnational 20th Century (IB Tauris/Bloomsbury 2023); co-editor (with Anthony Gorman) of Diasporas of the Modern Middle East: Contextualising Community (Edinburgh University Press 2015) and author of numerous journal articles and book chapters spanning contemporary Middle East politics and society; the Armenian diaspora; and diaspora, refugee and migration studies. She is currently working on a monograph entitled, The Armenian Middle East - Remnants, Resilience and Reconfigurations. Sossie is co-editor (with Talar Chahinian and Jo Laycock) of Diaspora – a journal of transnational studies.