Presentation of the monograph “Cultural Policy in Soviet and Post-Soviet Armenia”

Recently, with the endorsement of the Academic Council of the Faculty of History at Yerevan State University (YSU), a 208-page monograph titled “Cultural Policy in Soviet and Post-Soviet Armenia”, authored by Haykuhi M. Muradyan, PhD in History and researcher at the Artsakh Cultural Heritage Studies Group of the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, was published. The work provides a comprehensive overview of the formation of Armenia’s cultural policy from 1920 to the present.

On November 24, the book presentation took place at the library of YSU’s Faculty of History, attended by specialists interested in the topic, faculty members, students, and guests. The event was opened by Mkhitar Gabrielyan, Dean of the Faculty of History at YSU, who underscored the scholarly and practical significance of the monograph and congratulated the author.

The book’s scientific editor, Professor Hamlet Petrosyan, Doctor of Historical Sciences, also delivered welcoming remarks, describing the monograph as a long-awaited and exceptional study. Gayane Kanatin, Scientific Director of the “SIREH” Cultural Heritage Research, Preservation, and Development Center and one of the initiators of the publication, emphasized in her address that the release of the monograph represents one of the key achievements of their organization. The publication was carried out within the framework of the pilot programs of the European Heritage Center and co-funded by the European Union and Europa Nostra.

The importance of the book was further highlighted by Yulia Antonyan, Associate Professor at the Department of Cultural Studies of YSU’s Faculty of History, as well as Nzhdeh Yeranyan, PhD in History and Deputy Scientific Director of the History Museum of Armenia, both of whom congratulated the author on her valuable research contribution.

The monograph was then presented by the author herself. The work includes an Introduction and the following chapters:

• “Definitions of Cultural Policy:
• “A Critical Review of Theoretical Approaches”
•  “Cultural Policy in Soviet Armenia”
•  “The New Conceptual Formation of Cultural Policy”
•  “From Theory to Practice: Current Amendments to the RA Law on the Preservation and Use of Immovable Historical and Cultural Monuments and Historical Environment, and Their Semantic-Structural Problems”.

At the end of the presentation, attendees posed questions to H. Muradyan and emphasized the importance of the monograph both for academic research and for the study of cultural policy formation processes.