Reading Silences

Illuminating the unique experiences of Armenian and Turkish women both during and after genocide, this book explains why women’s difficulties and strategies of survival were different to those of men. It stresses that women voices and experiences are central to the understanding of genocide and its aftermath.

The author revisits the Armenian genocide in 1915 from a centenary perspective, examining the roles of women as victims, perpetrators, survivors, and those of the second generation. Drawing from personal narratives, memoirs, oral interview, literature, and historical photography this book brings together women’s stories of martyrdom, trauma, and survival and those in which women took active part in genocidal violence.

Engaging different modes of historical analysis, this book thus aspires to avoid two recent trends in Genocide Studies: a one-sided focus on either the perpetrators or the victims, and obsessive revolving around the notion of denial.