Public Book Presentation: “Gramsci’s Circle of Humanity and Armenia”

The American University of Armenia (AUA) College of Humanities and Social Sciences in collaboration with the Armenian Association of World History are organizing an event dedicated to the legacy of Italian Philosopher and Political Theorist Antonio Gramsci. To mark the 125th anniversary of his birth, the book “Gramsci’s Circle of Humanity and Armenia” will be presented by co-authors Smbat Hovhannisyan, Narek Mkrtchyan and Ara Merjian. The book is a collective monograph that presents remarkable relationships between Gramscianism and recognition of the Armenian Genocide.

The presentation will be followed by a keynote speech via Skype by Joseph A. Buttigieg (Notre Dame University, USA), the editor and translator of the multi-volume complete critical edition of Antonio Gramsci’s Prison Notebooks. 

The aims of the presentations are to draw attention to Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci’s article “Armenia” published in 1916, discuss Gramsci’s theory of hegemony, and address the pivotal steps in the process of recognition of the Armenian Genocide within the context of Gramsci’s outlined “circle of humanity”.

About the authors:

Smbat Hovhannisyan is Associate Professor of World History at the Department of World History of Yerevan State University. He is also a visiting lecturer at AUA.

Narek Mkrtchyan is a PhD candidate at the Department of World History of Yerevan State University, and coordinator of the Armenian History Course at AUA. 

Ara Merjian is an Associate Professor of Italian Art History and Director of Undergraduate Studies at New York University. He is the author of “Giorgio de Chirico and the Metaphysical City: Nietzsche, Modernism, Paris” (Yale Univ. Press).