The Courses for Diaspora Armenian Journalists have kicked off as part of the 2015 “Diaspora” Summer School Program of the RA Ministry of Diaspora. Young and beginning Armenian journalists have come to the homeland to improve their knowledge and acquire more skills, as well as take advice from professional experts. They’re more than excited because not all of them are journalists by profession. Among them there are lawyers, managers and experts in international affairs. However, seeing themselves as journalists, they live and work as correspondents for Armenian presses in the Diaspora and foreign media outlets. The participants are from various countries, including Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, the Islamic Republic of Iran, Syria, Lebanon and France.

During the ten-day program, the participants will take part in courses on the key issues in Armenian history, the Armenian Question, Turkey’s policy on the Armenian Genocide, the current challenges in Armenian studies on the Internet, the Artsakh issue and journalism (mastery of a journalist, the Armenia-Diaspora partnership in the media, social awareness, the media environment, etc.) hosted by top experts from Yerevan State University and several Armenian media outlets.

During the first course, the participants were introduced to the origin of the Armenian people, the territorial and geographical features of the Armenian Highland, were provided with a brief background of the historical significance and importance of the Armenian nation, talked about the anti-Armenian propaganda of neighboring nations and tried to find effective ways to fight against that propaganda, as well as listened to all the possible options and scientific arguments.

Head of the Department of Virtual Armenian Studies and Information of the Institute for Armenian Studies at Yerevan State University Mher Hovhannisyan presented the eight websites of the Institute that contain an infinite amount of information about Armenian history, language, faith and culture, including maps and atlases, books and documents, videos and exclusive pictures. After the lesson, the Diaspora Armenian journalists watched Turkologist Lusine Sahakyan’s documentary film “Hamshen at the Crossroads of the Past and Present”, which had quite a huge impact on the inner worlds of the participants. As they listened to the sweet dialect of the Hamshen-Armenians, understood them and found in their eyes their ancestors, they got emotional and were disappointed with the fact that the Turks are trying to prove to the Hamshen-Armenians that their dialect and language derive from Turkish.

After the lesson, the journalists talked a little about the problems that they face in the Diaspora. They especially touched upon language and style. According to them, Armenian language newspapers are not sold as much as they used to. For instance, the Noyev Kovcheg newspaper, which is published in Russia, started publishing in Russian, taking into consideration readers’ demands. Asbarez newspaper is an English-language newspaper published in the U.S. It is widely popular among Armenian Americans since there is a higher demand for information in English. For example, Agos Weekly also has an Armenian section edited by Bagrat Estukian, but there isn’t a lot of information, compared to the information in the Turkish section of the newspaper.

In terms of style, the participants mentioned that there is often a need for something new. The age-old pathos needs to be replaced by urgent, impartial and documented news. The participants also set aside the lack of specialists and funding and the problems with access to the Internet. However, they all voiced hope that they would leave with solutions and with a lot of professional knowledge.

After the course, the participants visited the Faculty of Journalism of Yerevan State University where Dean Naghash Martirosyan greeted the participants with excitement and hospitality, introduced them to programs and achievements of the Faculty and the opportunities that it has to offer and voiced hope that some of the participants would stay and continue their studies in the Faculty.

Amalya Karapetyan

4^th year student of the Faculty of Journalism of Yerevan State University.