Richard Gable Hovannisian ( hy, Ռիչարդ Հովհաննիսյան, born November 9, 1932) is an

Armenian American Armenian Americans ( hy, ամերիկահայեր, ''amerikahayer'') are citizens or residents of the United States who have total or partial Armenian ancestry. They form the second largest community of the Armenian diaspora after Armenians ...

historian and

professor emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

at the

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the Californ ...

. He is known mainly for his four-volume history of the

First Republic of Armenia The First Republic of Armenia, officially known at the time of its existence as the Republic of Armenia ( hy, Հայաստանի Հանրապետութիւն), was the first modern Armenian state since the loss of Armenian statehood in the Middle ...

Biography

Background

Hovannisian was born and raised in

Tulare, California Tulare ( ) is a city in Tulare County, California. The population was 68,875 at the 2020 census. It is located in the heart of the San Joaquin Valley, eight miles south of Visalia and sixty miles north of Bakersfield. The city is named for t ...

into a family of

Armenian genocide The Armenian genocide was the systematic destruction of the Armenian people and identity in the Ottoman Empire during World War I. Spearheaded by the ruling Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), it was implemented primarily through t ...

survivors. His father, Gaspar Gavroian, was born in 1901 in the village of Bazmashen (Pazmashen; now Sarıçubuk, Elâzığ), near Kharpert in the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University ...

. Fleeing the genocide of 1915, he moved to the United States by 1920 and changed his last name from Gavroian to Hovannisian, after his father's name, Hovhannes. In 1926, Kaspar married Siroon (Sarah) Nalbandian, also a child of genocide survivors. Their two sons were born in 1928 (John) and 1930 (Ralph). Richard Gable Hovannisian (named after

Clark Gable William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American film actor, often referred to as "The King of Hollywood". He had roles in more than 60 motion pictures in multiple genres during a career that lasted 37 years, three decades ...

) was born last on November 9, 1932. Hovannisian married Vartiter Kotcholosian in 1957 at the Holy Trinity Armenian Church of Fresno. They had four children, Raffi, Armen, Ani, and Garo.

Raffi Raffi Cavoukian, ( hy, Րաֆֆի, born July 8, 1948), known professionally by the mononym Raffi, is a Canadian singer-lyricist and author of Armenian descent born in Egypt, best known for his children's music. He developed his career as a " ...

later went on to become the first Foreign Minister of Armenia and is currently an opposition politician.

Education and career

Hovannisian received his B.A. in history (1954) from the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant un ...

, and his M.A. in history (1958) and his Ph.D. (1966) from

(UCLA). He was also an associate professor of history at Mount St. Mary's College, Los Angeles, from 1966 to 1969, having joined UCLA in 1962. A

Rankean Leopold von Ranke (; 21 December 1795 – 23 May 1886) was a German historian and a founder of modern source-based history. He was able to implement the seminar teaching method in his classroom and focused on archival research and the analysis of ...

by training, Hovannisian's scholarly work early on was focused on the history of the

(1918–20). His Ph.D. dissertation, originally envisioned to encompass its entire history, was published in 1967 as ''Armenia on the Road to Independence'' and would serve as a prologue to the four volumes (1971-1996) that he would eventually publish on the history of the republic. These volumes were generally well-received among scholarly circles. In 1986, Hovannisian was appointed as the first holder of the Armenian Educational Foundation Endowed Chair in Modern Armenian History at UCLA. Hovannisian is a

Guggenheim Fellow Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

who has received numerous honors for his scholarship, civic activities, and advancement of Armenian Studies. His biographical entries are included in

Who's Who in America Marquis Who's Who ( or ) is an American publisher of a number of directories containing short biographies. The books usually are entitled ''Who's Who in...'' followed by some subject, such as ''Who's Who in America'', ''Who's Who of American Wome ...

and

Who's Who in the World Marquis Who's Who ( or ) is an American publisher of a number of directories containing short biographies. The books usually are entitled ''Who's Who in...'' followed by some subject, such as ''Who's Who in America'', ''Who's Who of American Wome ...

among other scholarly and literary reference works.. Hovannisian serves on the board of directors of nine scholarly and civic organizations, including the Facing History and Ourselves Foundation; the International Institute on the Holocaust and Genocide;

International Alert International Alert is a global peacebuilding charity offering dialogue, training, research and policy analysis, advocacy and outreach activities focusing on solving the root causes of conflict with people from across divides. For over 30 yea ...

; the Foundation for Research on Armenian Architecture; and the Armenian National Institute (ANI). He received the UCLA Alumni Association's 2010-2011 "Most Inspiring Teacher" award. Since 2000, Hovannisian has overseen and edited a number of individual studies on the former Armenian-populated towns and cities of the Ottoman Empire. In 2014, he became adjust professor at USC "with the intention of advising on the Shoah Foundation’s integration of the Armenian Film Foundation’s collection of genocide survivor interviews." He then in 2018 donated his own interviews to USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive. The 1000 interviews are titled the Richard G. Hovannisian Armenian Genocide Oral History Collection, and is "the largest existing collection about the Armenian Genocide" according to the foundation. The interviews were first recorded in 1972, when he had students in California tape Armenian genocide survivors throughout the Southern part of the state, as well as other states and countries. In the 1990s and 2000s, as the survivors died off, the interviews focused instead on the children of survivors, with the last class taking place in 2011. In February 2020, Hovannisian received the Armenian Genocide Education Legacy award at the 4th Annual Armenian Genocide Education Awards Luncheon put on by The Armenian National Committee of America – Western Region’s Education Committee.

Political views

In a 2006 interview Hovannisian criticized the government of then President Robert Kocharyan for its authoritarian nature and added that Armenia "must not become a failed state." Hovannisian partook in the protests following the 2013 presidential election in Armenia in which his son,

, came in second according to official results.

Selected works

*''The Republic of Armenia'', Vol. I (1971), Vol. II (1982), Vols. III & IV (1996) Berkeley: University of California Press *''The Armenian Holocaust'', Cambridge, Massachusetts, Armenian Heritage Press (1980) *''The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times'', 2 vols. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997 (editor) *''Remembrance and Denial: The Case of the Armenian Genocide''. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1998 (editor)

UCLA conference series proceedings

The UCLA conference series titled "Historic Armenian Cities and Provinces" has been organized by Hovannisian, as the Holder of the Armenian Educational Foundation Chair in Modern Armenian History. The conference proceedings (edited by Hovannisian) that have so far been published (in Costa Mesa, CA, by Mazda Publishers) are: # ''Armenian Van/Vaspurakan'' (2000) # ''Armenian Baghesh/Bitlis and Taron/Mush'' (2001) # ''Armenian Tsopk/Kharpert'' (2002) # ''Armenian Karin/Erzerum'' (2003) # ''Armenian Sebastia/Sivas and Lesser Armenia'' (2004) # ''Armenian Tigranakert/Diarbekir and Edessa/Urfa'' (2006) # ''Armenian Cilicia'' (2008) (together with Simon Payaslian) # ''Armenian Pontus: The Trebizond-Black Sea Communities'' (2009) # ''Armenian Constantinople'' (2010) (together with Simon Payaslian) # ''Armenian Kars and Ani '' (2011) # ''Armenian Smyrna/Izmir '' (2012) # ''Armenian Kesaria/Kayseri and Cappadocia'' (2013) # ''Armenian Communities of Asia Minor'' (2014)

Articles

* * * * *

References

Bibliography

* (the author is a grandson of Richard Hovannisian)

External links

Full bibliographyNational Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Armenia
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hovannisian, Richard G. 1932 births Living people 21st-century American historians 21st-century American male writers American male non-fiction writers American writers of Armenian descent Armenian studies scholars Ethnic Armenian historians Historians from California Historians of Armenia Historians of the Armenian genocide Mount St. Mary's University (Los Angeles) faculty University of California, Berkeley alumni University of California, Los Angeles alumni