On 21-22 March 2015, over 250 academicians, scholars, students of law and humanities gathered at the Arizona State University Law School to Commemorate the Centennial of the Ottoman Turkish Genocide of Armenians and other Christian minorities. It was 100 years ago that the genocide began with the execution of hundreds of Armenian intellectuals on 24 April 2015. In the years that followed, the Ottoman Empire engages in a campaign of extermination that included children, women, and the elderly. According to the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (U. Minn), census figures show that there were 2,133,190 Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1914. By the end of 1922, that number had been reduced to 387,800.

The State of Arizona recognized the Genocide of Armenians in 1990, declaring April 24th a day of Armenian remembrance. The weekend was filled with educational programs to bear witness to this tragedy and the ASU honored the memory of the dead through education. The conference organizing committee, co-chaired by Jennifer Hammerschmidt and Zari Panosian, carefully selected a diverse group of speakers, constructing panels to kindle thoughtful discussion in which audience participation played a central role.

Senior Vice President of ASU, Dr. Christine Wilkinson, opened the conference by welcoming the audience, followed by a key note address by a Turkish Scholar, Taner Akcam, currently Professor of History, Kaloosdian & Mugar Chair in Armenian Genocide Studies at Clark University. The two-day program had panels addressing the legal perspectives, comparative perspectives, reconciliation and remediation, and perspective on post-genocide culture. Other presenters were Peter Balakian, Prof of English at Colgate University.

Dr. Kalayjian was invited to bring a unique perspective to the conference. She was invited to address healing perspective through acknowledgment, forgiveness, transforming generational trauma, and much more. Her presentation was very powerful, dynamic, interactive, and filled the audience with thoughtful but non-traditional reflections. She presented on horizontal violence, generational transmission, and how to heal and be empowered. She revised an anonymous quote and said, “Trauma and pain that is not transformed will be transferred to 7- generations” and described the findings of her research indicating how the trauma of Genocide had passed already through 2 generations.

A rich reception followed each day of events and panel discussions. During Q&A session most were eager to learn how to forgive, why to forgive, when to forgive, and how to empower the next generations.