Meet Meline Karakashian, author of the new book, KOMITAS (1869-1935): Victim of the Great Crime on Thursday, October 15, 2015 at 7:30pm at Abril Bookstore – 415 E. Broadway, Glendale, CA. Admission is free with reception to follow.
Book will be available in English and in Armenian.
KOMITAS (1869-1935): Victim of the Great Crimeis the researched story of Komitas Vartabed’s development, his immense contribution to the preservation of Armenian religious and folk music, and his psychiatric hospitalizations following the Great Crime of 1915, written by a psychologist. This small volume encapsulates the story of the Great Crime and its psychological consequences, Komitas Vartabed being a prime example of a victim-survivor-sufferer.
Meline Karakashian is a licensed psychologist living in New Jersey. She was born in Lebanon where she received her primary education. She moved to the United States and studied at Rutgers and Seton Hall universities, majoring in psychology. For the past 25 years, she has worked as a clinical psychologist and university lecturer and has served on the boards of Armenian and American professional, educational, charitable, and civic organizations. Her expertise is in traumatic stress (PTSD) and her lifelong goal is to help individuals overcome psychological trauma. The subjects of her writings, while professional, almost always focus on Armenian issues, in particular the Genocide of 1915, the Earthquake of 1988, the Karabagh war, and Armenian migration. She published, The Trauma of Genocide and National Identity, on the intergenerational transmission of Genocide trauma in Eastern Armenian for her students, in 2006. With her husband, Nubar, a second cousin to Komitas, she has three adult children.
