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PRINCIPLES OF PARONYAN IN DEPICTING A BIG CITY

“A Stroll through the Streets of Polis”

The study is dedicated to the examination of the series of essays entitled “A Stroll Through the Streets of Polis” that occupies a unique place in the diverse and multi-genre literary work of the brilliant Armenian satirist Hakob Paronyan (1843-1891). As a classic example of physiological essay genre, it is noteworthy in the field of worldwide satire and, by the way, unique in the context of the whole Armenian literature.

Surprisingly, previous literary studies have not made this masterpiece a subject of special study and have been content with merely recording a few words of praise. Interest in “Stroll…” necessarily arose nowadays, and with the discovery and comparison of numerous newly revealed facts (25 new essay versions), a complete scientific history of that work was created for the first time. Meanwhile this masterpiece by Paronyan undoubtedly has a modern resonance: it allows us to restore the artistic biography of Constantinople located at the crossroads of East and West in the second half of XIX century filled with deep authenticity and a colorful environment. It is no coincidence that “Stroll…” was translated into Turkish and was published in Istanbul. In 2014, in Turkey, the book was included in the list of the best books recommended to readers for reading in summer time. As “Armenpress”, reported the list was compiled by the Turkish newspaper “Hurriyet” recommending reading it during the summer holidays, “as the best medicine for those readers who have decided to spend their vacation in Istanbul. In the book “A Stroll Through the Streets of Istanbul” Hakob Paronyan satirically depicts the public and courtyard life of 34 districts of Istanbul, the indifference of the Armenian leadership to the problems of the Armenian community and the contradictions created by class division. “Paronyan will help you to look at the past of the city, that has lost its colors, outline, image, and even most of its people,” with different eyes, – states the book’s announcement. And this study aims to uncover Paronyan’s principles of depicting a big city, the ideological and artistic features of the work in question and the value system.

HAOMA – SOMA
The Arian Sacred Drink in Armenian and World Literature

The article examines the depiction of the Zoroastrian equivalent of the Indo-Iranian sacred drink, Haoma, in Armenian and world literature. At the end of the 18th century, the Zoroastrian holy book ”Avesta” was translated into French for the first time. Over the next 250 years, this religion and its symbols remained a focal point for scholars, translators, and writers worldwide. Armenian authors also took an interest in it, paying attention to Haoma, a deity frequently depicted in Avesta and holding a significant place in ancient Iranian rituals. Haoma is the Iranian counterpart of the ancient Indian Soma.

The article is relevant because this topic has not been comprehensively analyzed and systematized in Armenian literature. Another reason for its significance is that the great Armenian poet Yeghishe Charents wrote the poem ”Soma” in 1918, which led to some scholarly study of the Indian manifestation of the sacred plant and liquid by Armenian researchers. However, to fully understand the mythological foundations of the poem, it is also necessary to study the Haoma mythological phenomenon as depicted in Armenian and world literature. This article represents the first attempt to examine Charents’s poem in the context of the Soma-Haoma mythological unity and its cult.

The study explores the reflections of Haoma and ”Avesta” in the works of Armenian writers and scholars from the 5th century to the present. Among the representations of the sacred Haoma drink, the works of Daniel Varouzhan, Leo, and Levon Khechoyan have been highlighted. The article also examines references to Zoroastrianism in the works of Raffi, Siamanto, and others. To accurately interpret Soma within a mythological context, traces of Zoroastrianism in Charents’s works are identified.

The research employs historical-comparative, comparative-contrastive, and mythological methodologies. Relevant phenomena in Armenian literature are compared with Zoroastrian mythology, classical historians (Herodotus, Plutarch), and writers from the Middle Ages and modern times (Ferdowsi, Gustave Flaubert, Georg Ebers). The depictions of Haoma in Armenian literary works and the representation of Soma in Charents’s poetry are compared with translations of ”Avesta” passages, particularly those dedicated to the sacred Haoma drink, by Russian Symbolist poet Konstantin Balmont.

One of the theoretical foundations of this study is comparative mythology. The author integrates observations by Armenian philologists and religious scholars with the ideas of renowned mythologists, particularly Friedrich Windischmann and Dmitry Ovsyaniko-Kulikovsky. Interdisciplinary connections are also made with history, philosophy, and psychology. The views of Hegel and Carl Jung on the Haoma deity are referenced.

The main conclusion of the article is that Zoroastrianism, its sacred text ”Avesta”, and the Haoma sacred plant and drink hold a significant place in Armenian literature. The Armenian reflections of the Iranian Haoma, particularly its representation as the Soma deity introduced into Armenian reality by Charents, form a unified whole.

THE GOVERNORSHIP (KOGHMNAKALUTYUN) DURING THE ZAKARIAN ERA IN ARMENIA

In the last decade of the 12th century, in the first decade of the 13th century, Shahnshah Zakare II Zakaryan, who restored Armenia’s independence, carried out administrative territorial reforms in the Armenia-Hayk kingdom he founded and gave bias to individual administrative units created within the country, biased names to their leaders, awarding the latter with the title of prince of princes. These territorial units, being the product of the historical and political situation of the 13th century, completely reflected the philosophical approaches of the country’s leader to building a state. Although they were a new phenomenon in the Armenian reality of that time, they still had their historical precedents.

ARMENIA AS A BRIDGE OF CIVILIZATION

If we think of the book about Musa Dagh, we come to the topics of medium and memory. Anything can become a medium, but this does not make it arbitrary in terms of its content. The countless possibilities of the interrelated existence of signs find their limit(s) in the need for action that interrupts the process. Constellations (Walter Benjamin) form a series from an Armenian internal perspective that promises the eternal return of the same.

Where everything has the same effect, the question of the origin of the single event becomes interesting. However, the origin is not to be sought in an absolute beginning. Rather, the event has its own origin, which can be found in (individual) thinking and its (collective) preconditions.

The question of the origin of an event can be discussed using the example of Artsakh by asking what echo (Walter Benjamin) the loss of Artsakh has in Armenian government policy. To this end, a number of commemorative rituals and events are described against the background of and as signs of a transformation. The change in the current politics of remembrance will be questioned using a systems theory approach with regard to possible destabilization of the social system.

THE NEW WORLD ORDER AND THE OLD TURKEY

The current publication reveals the political blackmail techniques employed by R. Erdoğan nearly a decade ago toward the leadership of China, and later Russia, and compares them with Ankara’s recent attempts to exploit the contradictions among global superpowers.

Let us recall that for years, R. Erdoğan had accused China of committing genocide in Xinjiang. However, in 2017, he managed to reach an understanding with Beijing—sacrificing his “Uyghur brothers” in the process. Prior to that, after downing a Russian military aircraft near the Syrian border, Erdoğan secured profitable gas deals with Russia while simultaneously reinforcing “Brother Ilham’s” position in the South Caucasus.

Now, after years of strained relations with the United States, Erdoğan is moving toward legitimizing the genocidal regime of “Brother al-Sharaa” in Syria. At the same time, he is attempting to bargain for a “Zangezur corridor” in exchange for accepting the Russian status of Crimea.

The publication demonstrates that Erdoğan, who has long played on the weaknesses of global powers, is now trying to skillfully take advantage of the clear utilitarianism of the new U.S. administration—something directly related to efforts to contain U.S. national debt and prevent dollar depreciation.

In early 2025, before the Trump administration had clarified its position on U.S.-China relations, Turkey’s president used Ilham Aliyev’s April 22 visit to China to remind official Beijing—on Azerbaijan’s behalf—of the mutual obligations outlined in the 2017 Turkish-Chinese agreement, thereby making Azerbaijan a party to them as well.

Taking into account the inevitable improvement in Russian-American relations and the potential formation of a “Entente-2”, Turkey has sought certain security guarantees from China concerning its territorial integrity. It is now clear that, by drawing Azerbaijan into the game, these guarantees will be used to transform China into a trench-digging instrument in the South Caucasus.

In conclusion, the publication suggests that Turkey’s hopes for a restoration of a bipolar world order currently lack serious foundations, as today’s global competition revolves not around quantity, but around qualitative resources—the majority of which remain under U.S. control. Moreover, Turkey’s multi-vector games have already begun to raise concerns among its patron, the United Kingdom. Hence, having been informed in advance about the upcoming resignation of his old friend—the head of British intelligence Richard Moore—Erdoğan began taking steps toward resolving the Kurdish issue as early as the end of last year.

PHILOSOPHICAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL PERCEPTIONS

Of prediction in Ghazaros Achayan’s novel “Two sisters” and his folklore process

Dreams and visions have their unique place in the novel “Two Sisters” and folklore processes by one of the important authors of Armenian classical literature – Ghazaros Aghayan. The author often fills his stories with various dream allegories and tricks, thus, on one hand, sharpening the reader’s interest, adding mystery to the plot, and giving information about future developments and, on the other hand, opening the doors to the dreamland. This trick allows the heroes to move freely beyond the space-time boundaries in a world where life does not follow any set laws. The topic of the given study is the examination and interpretation of the boundaries of real and imaginary in the works by Ghazaros Aghayan.

The choice of Aghayan’s works is not accidental, as his legacy is distinguished by authorial and artistic tricks, realistic, magical, and allegorical images, etc. Aghayan’s literary works allow us to form a deep comprehension of the manifestations of boundaries between the real and imaginary within the framework of the artistic text. The aim of the study is to examine the boundaries of the real and imaginary in Aghayan’s novel “Two Sisters” and folklore processes.

The objective of the study is to reveal what relationship the dream, as a predicative trick of plot, a manifestation of the imaginary and literary device, has with the real world. The objective of the study also is to examine through which philosophical manifestations it reveals the psychology of the characters of Aghayan’s above-mentioned novel and fairy tales and by what means the author prepares the reader for the further developments in the plot of the given works.

The modernity of the study is due to its interdisciplinarity: it was carried out as a result of interpretive examination processes of different disciplines, namely, literary studies, philosophy, and psychology. The scientific novelty of the study is that in Aghayan’s novel “Two Sisters” and folklore processes the dream is considered as a special structural element of the work, which enriches the plot with mystery, as well as provides an opportunity to analyze and reveal the reflections of dream in folklore notions and Armenian culture. Structural, hermeneutic, meta-critical, and historical-comparative methods were used.

HISTORY OF THE FOUNDATION OF THE WESTERN DIOCESE OF THE ARMENIAN APOSTOLIC CHURCH IN THE USA

Based on Handwritten Documents

The Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church in America was founded in 1898. On this occasion, the Catholicos of All Armenians, Mkrtich A. Khrimyan, mentioned in his “Kondak” that “the free flow of Armenians has not yet reached far to America, but in recent years this place has also been filled with Armenians. Therefore, it is necessary to have an independent diocesan organization.”

At the beginning of the 20th century, the number of Armenians increased in the western states of the USA, primarily in California. Influenced by various factors within this growing and economically developing community, the idea of creating a separate diocese gradually gained momentum. The Western Diocese of America was officially founded in 1927.

This publication recounts the first meetings, programs, and other foundational steps of the diocese to highlight the path the Western Diocese took during two to three decades before its formal establishment. This article is based on handwritten documents of the Western Diocese and press publications from the 1900s–1920s.

Among these documents, the protocol of the first deputy assembly holds great historical and significant importance. The protocol notebook measures 22×32 cm, has 140 pages, and is written in fine handwriting. This document is an important testimony to the formation of the Armenian community and church in California.

Another document is a letter from the Armenians of California to the Armenian Catholicos, in which six points outline the arguments for establishing a new diocese. These points can be briefly formulated as follows: the Armenians of California seek to have an independent diocese in order to:
a) stop the “hunt” by missionaries of foreign and wealthy churches,
b) have the opportunity to train clergy,
c) manage the establishment of schools,
d) resolve complex marital issues,
e) clarify rules consistent with the traditions of the Armenian Church and national customs,
f) unite the dispersed Armenians of the colony.

The protocol notebook is preserved in the office of the Western Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church in the USA, which we accessed with the permission of Primate Archbishop Hovnan Derderian. The documents are being published for the first time.

ARMENIAN ORAL LITERATURE

Armenian Folklore in the Russian-language “Collection of Materials Describing Places and Tribes of the Caucasus”

The collection comprises texts from the Armenian folklore heritage, originally published in the Russian-language multi-volume “Collection of Materials for Describing Places and Tribes of the Caucasus” (1881-1915). The collection include texts of Armenian folklore texts, including prose, lyrical, and paremiological pieces, collected from Zangezur, Nakhichevan, and Echmiadzin districts (uezd) The Elizavetpol, Tiflis, Erivan Governorates of The Tsarist Russian Empire. The presented materials offer insights into both national and historical-geographic characteristics, as well as universal themes, making them valuable for comparative academic research. The texts within the collection have remained largely unaltered, faithfully representing the language and content of the original materials, with no additional linguistic or textual modifications. However, the texts were adapted to modern reading standards, considering the contemporary Russian language orthography and punctuation. Furthermore, certain texts are supplemented with scholarly annotations. This collection is intended for philologists, folklorists, ethnographers, as well as individuals with an interest in South Caucasus culture.

THE MORPHOLOGY OF THE ARMENIAN LANGUAGE NOWADAYS

About the book “Modern Armenian Language: Morphology” by Yu. Avetisyan

After the last textbook presenting the morphology of the Modern Armenian language, almost half a century of silence in this field of research was broken by the publication of a new book of the same title. It is also true that morphological changes in language occur slowly, so it is natural that large-scale studies in this dimension can be published intermittently for decades. Yuri Avetisyan’s “The Modern Armenian Language: Morphology” is a worthy work in terms of content and structure – thoughtful, structured, restrained, with an accurate combination of scientific caution and courage, a study that has important scientific and educational value at the present stage of the Armenian language.

The structure, serious content and rich practical material with examples in this book really make it possible to fully use it as a university textbook, since it includes not only extensive theoretical material, from historical views on this morphological reality to the separation and filtering of outdated forms and new combinations, but also tools for conducting practical and research work, for example, the section “Topics of Reports and Essays” presented at the end of the book, or the “Dictionaries” section highlighted in the “Literature” section.

DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION AS A DRIVER FOR IMPROVING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF INTEGRATED SOCIAL SERVICES*

Nowadays, there has been a remarkable transformation in the arrangements and functioning of social protection systems due to the use of technology in service delivery systems. Social protection systems and services have courted various digital channels by quite a considerable number of countries around the globe in the hope of increasing the efficiency, availability, management, as well as quality of the services in order to better cater to the needs of the population. This article analyzes the trends of digitalization in social protection systems, with a focus on service delivery mechanisms. It explores the multitude of benefits that have emerged from this digital shift, as well as the challenges and obstacles that are often encountered in the realm of providing these services. The article aims to make a positive contribution to the existing literature regarding digital transformation by exploring its positive impacts and challenges and further localizing the scope of analysis in the Armenian context.