Staff

Along with his training in the history and politics of the Modern Caucasus, Armenia, and the Middle East, he received substantial training in both France and the US in diplomatic history, political psychology (as it pertains to leaders, decision-making, and international relations more broadly), crisis management, and conflict resolution. Over the past decades, he has taught over twenty different courses, including half a dozen doctoral seminars, at the following universities: California State University, Long Beach; the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; UCLA; and the University of California, Berkeley. He joins AUA after retiring from the latter, where he taught for nearly twenty-five years and held a dual position as the William Saroyan Director of the Armenian Studies Program and an Associate Adjunct Professor in the Department of History. While at Berkeley, he hosted numerous scholars including from Armenia through the Fulbright program, among others. He also mentored half a dozen or more foreign doctoral students who came to Berkeley through exchange programs to carry out research into contemporary Armenia or the post-Soviet Caucasus.

He has served and/or continues to serve on several boards and editorial committees:
-the Executive Committee of the Institute of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (U.C. Berkeley), 2011-July 2022.
-the Board of Directors of the American Research Institute of the South Caucasus (ARISC), 2010-July 2022.
-the Prize-Awarding Jury of the President of the Republic of Armenia that nominates “Individuals Having Made a Significant Contribution to the Recognition of the Armenian   Genocide” since March 2007. The prize was suspended in 2021, 2022, and 2023 because of the pandemic and the Karabagh War.
-the selection committee of the Dolores Zohrab Liebmann Fund.
-the Advisory Board of Armenians in the Modern and Early Modern World book series published by I.B. Tauris (Bloomsbury Publishing) since 2020.
-the Editorial Board of the Journal for the Society of Armenian Studies since March 2018.
-the Academic Board of the Zoryan Institute since 2004.
-the Editorial Board of the Armenian Review since 2003.

Astourian has peer-reviewed various projects and publications. Some of the organizations and academic presses/journals follow.

Education

Ph.D., University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).
Doctoral Exams, UCLA (with distinction).
MA, UCLA.
Diplôme d’Etudes Approfondies, University of Paris I (Sorbonne), summa cum laude.
Certificate (Classical Armenian), Institut Catholique (Paris).
Maîtrise, University of Paris I (Sorbonne), summa cum laude.
Licence, University of Paris I (Sorbonne).
Diplôme d’études universitaires générales, Lycée Henri IV (Paris), Classes préparatoires à l’Ecole Normale Supérieure (Admissible).

Office location
423M Main Building

Email
[email protected]

Phone
(+374 60) 61 2673

Office hours
Mondays: 2 :45 pm-3:45 pm
Thursdays: 5 :15 pm-6 :15 pm
And by appointment or via Skype

Areas of research and teaching specialization
Modern Armenian and Caucasian History and post-Soviet Politics; Genocides and Ethnic Conflicts; Diasporas; Late Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey.
Foreign Policy Analysis; Foreign Policy and Strategic Planning; Political Psychology in International Relations; Diplomatic History; Intelligence as a Field of Historical Studies.

Courses currently taught

• IRD 301: Foundations of International Relations.

Publications

–Editorship of Books:

• Stephan H. Astourian and Raymond H. Kévorkian, eds, Collective and State Violence, Homogenization and Construction of National Identity in Turkey. New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, November 2020. (578 pages)
• MemorIkon.  Los Angeles: Arvest Publishing, 1997. (Art Book)

–Editorship of a journal:

• Jusur: The UCLA Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 6 (October 1990): 1-134.
• Jusur: The UCLA Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 5 (October 1989): 1-118.

–Editorship of Occasional Papers and Armenian Studies Conference Proceedings:

•    Stephan H. Astourian, ed., Armenia’s Foreign Policy: Some Perspectives, Occasional Paper of the Armenian Studies Program at U.C. Berkeley, No. 2. (May 2016).
•   James R. Russell, “The Book of the Way (Girk` Chanaparhi) of Yeghishe Charents: An Illuminated Apocalyptic Gospel for Soviet Armenia,” ed. Stephan H. Astourian.  Occasional    Papers of the Armenian Studies Program at U.C. Berkeley, No. 1, (Spring 2012).

–Articles and Book Chapters

Nineteen peer-reviewed articles and book chapters published in France, Great Britain, and the U.S., some translated and republished in Frace and Turkey, and ten or so other articles or essays.

–Selected peer-reviewed articles and book chapters:

• “Afterword: Shapes, Legitimation, and Legacies of Violence in the Ottoman Empire  and Turkey,” Collective and State Violence, Homogenization, and Construction of National Identity in Turkey (sponsored by the Zoryan Institute), edited by Stephan H. Astourian and Raymond H.  Kévorkian, 525-567. New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2020.
• “Reflections on the Ottoman Historiography (1960s-1990s) about the Role of Non-Muslims and Armenian Ottomans in Trade and the Urban Economy.” In Le génocide des Arméniens : Cent ans de recherche (1915-2015), edited by the Conseil scientifique international pour l’étude du génocide des Arméniens (Becker, Annette; Bozarslan, Hamit; Duclert, Vincent; Kévorkian, Raymond; et. al.), 224-48, 350-56.  Paris: Armand Colin, 2015.
• “The Silence of the Land: Agrarian Relations, Power, and Ethnicity in Late Ottoman Turkey.”  In A Question of Genocide: 1915: Armenians and Turks at the End of the Ottoman Empire, edited by Ronald Grigor Suny, Fatma Müge Göçek, and Norman M. Naimark, 55-81, 328-39.  Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.
• “Armenian Demography, the Homeland, and the Diaspora: Trends and Consequences.”  In Arméniens et Grecs en diaspora: approches comparatives, edited by Bruneau Michel, Ioannis Hassiotis, Martine Hovanessian, and Claire Mouradian, 191-210.  Athens: École française d’Athènes, 2007.
• “State, Homeland, and Diaspora: The Armenian and Azerbaijani Cases.” In Currents, Cross-Currents and Conflict: Transnationalism and Conflict in the Caucasus and Central Asia, edited by Touraj Atabaki and Sanjyot Mehendale, 80-112 London: Routledge, 2005.
•  “Le Génocide arménien: massacre à l’asiatique ou effet de modernité ?”  In Quand tombe la nuit: Origines et émergence des régimes totalitaires en Europe, edited by Stéphane Courtois, 63-77, 364-69.  Lausanne: L’Age d’Homme, 2001.
•  “The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict: Dimensions, Lessons, and Prospects,” Mediterranean Quarterly 5, 4 (Fall 1994): 85-109.
•  “In Search of their Forefathers: National Identity and the Historiography and Politics of Armenian and Azerbaijani Ethnogeneses.”  In Nationalism and History: The Politics of Nation Building in Post-Soviet Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia, edited by Donald V. Schwartz and Razmik Panossian, 41-94. Toronto: University of Toronto Centre for Russian and East European Studies, 1994.
• “The Sykes-Picot Agreement Revisited: Behavioral Models and Diplomatic History,” Jusûr: The UCLA Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 3 (September 1987): 1-36.  Received the James E. Phillips Award for best article published in UCLA’s more than twenty peer-reviewed academic journals.