The month of April marks the celebration of Armenian American Heritage Month (AAHM), with Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day on April 24. UC Irvine students and faculty honor their heritage every April through the Armenian Students Association (ASA) and the UCI Center for Armenian Studies.
“This month means everything to me,” ASA President Sevanna Shaverdian told New University. “It’s the month where we bring the most awareness to our cause and our people. It means bringing together a family.”
The first known history of Armenians in America began in 1618 when John Martin, or Hovhannes Martikyan, first settled in Jamestown, Va. From then on, many Armenians emigrated from their countries in the 1890s due to the extensive massacres in the Ottoman Empire.
According to the Embassy of Armenia to the United States of America, after the Armenian Genocide in 1915, many began to flee to the Middle East until war broke out in those regions. The flood of Armenian immigrants in the United States was largely due to the Arab-Israeli wars, the Lebanese Civil War and the Iran-Iraq War, as well as other global factors. By the late 1980s, most of the Armenian Americans and refugees resided in Los Angeles.
AAHM and Genocide Remembrance unite those of Armenian culture in America, according to ASA Vice President Angela Ter-Martirosyan.
“There have been Armenians in the U.S. since and even before,” Ter-Martirosyan told New University. “So we’re just doing what we can to kind of like … keep [ourselves] together, keep our main culture and do these cultural things — cultural shows, dances, songs — all of that to keep it alive.”
ASA’s Armenian History Month itinerary included the National Armenian Pre-Law Conference on April 12, the Armenian Cultural Show on April 14, the “My Sweet Land” film screening on April 16 and the Armenian Genocide Remembrance Vigil on April 24. The association aims to “build a bridge with the Armenian community in Orange County” through Genocide Rembrance Week and cultural activities.
According to Ter-Martirosyan, ASA hosted the 2025 Armenian Cultural Show with a traditional Armenian wedding theme. Additionally, the vigil is a significant part of Armenian Genocide Remembrance and includes a candlelight service with an Armenian priest and a monument model.
In an Orange County Register article on the Armenian Genocide memorial in Irvine’s Great Park, the “Turkish government has resisted calling the massacres genocide, saying that while tragedies took place during World War I, no coordinated genocide happened.” However, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, genocide in the Ottoman Empire took the lives of nearly 1.2 million Armenians in 1915-16.
“We went through a genocide, and it’s also a huge deal because right now there [are] still ongoing threats to Armenian sovereignty and the existence of an independent Armenia,” Ter-Martirosyan said. “Anytime there’s an attack on Armenia or there’s turmoil in the country, I don’t think anyone in the diaspora can eat or sleep or anything … because of that, I think we are very hard on ourselves about what it means to be Armenian.”
UCI’s ASA also collaborates with other Armenian student organizations around the nation. Their leading board, All-ASA, finds initiatives to donate their philanthropic efforts to.
Currently, ASA is working on building an educational learning center in Armenia for kids in underprivileged areas.
“People like me and Angela who have visited Armenia in the past, we have actually seen the Tumo Center that’s built in Armenia and what it’s doing for kids there,” Shaverdian said. “And so these little boxes that they’re creating are giving opportunities to kids all around the entire country instead of just the main city.”
UCI’s Center for Armenian Studies, launched in 2020, stresses the importance of understanding the history of Armenian life. Director of the Center for Armenian Studies Houri Berberian commented on what is important to her and her family.
“These things that we think are particularly Armenian are probably not,” Berberian told New University. “They are shared across the board by all cultures, and that is the importance of family, the importance of gathering, the importance of supporting each other and being there for each other. For me, family holds a very special place in my life, and I think that is not just an Armenian thing.”
For students interested in sending support, visit focusonchildrennow.org and follow UCI ASA’s philanthropic efforts towards a better life in Armenia.
Alyssa Villagonzalo is a 2024-2025 Assistant Features Editor. She can be reached at akvillag@uci.edu.
Edited By Sofia Feeney and Jaheem Conley.
Editor’s Note: A mistake about the Tumo Center’s name was fixed and hyperlinked.