Teaching Resources

Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, University of Minnesota

www.chgs.umn.edu

The director, Stephen Feinstein, a noted genocide scholar, has constructed an amazing Web site about genocide. The site includes a tremendous amount of “student friendly” documents about the Armenian Genocide as well as the Holocaust and other genocides of the Twentieth Century.

Facing History and Ourselves (FHAO)

www.facinghistory.org

FHAO not only provides wonderful print resources on the Armenian genocide but also offers online lesson plans. Lessons and Readings on the Armenian Genocide is a set of lesson plans on four aspects of the Armenian Genocide. The resource guide Crimes against Humanity and Civilization: The Genocide of the Armenians is also available to download by chapter.

The Armenian Education Center

www.armenian-educationcenter.org

This site was designed to support the Virginia Department of Education’s Standards of Learning and Curriculum Framework for teachers in History/Social Sciences. These lessons and study guide on the Armenian Genocide of 1915 have been developed to address WH II, 11b: examples of other genocides (in addition to the Holocaust).

Anne Frank Lessons in Educating for Human Rights

www.fcit.usf.edu/HOLOCAUST/activity/68plan/afcntr1.htm

By Dr. Joyce Apsel, Anne Frank Center, USA, Inc.

Joyce Apsel is a genocide scholar and Master Teacher, General Studies Program, New York University, and Director of Rights Works; She was also the President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, 2001-2003. Chapter 14 of this online learning center treats the Armenian Genocide with a brief history of the genocide, the role of memory and survivor testimony, with discussions of impunity when perpetrators are unpunished and how this contributes to the process of denial, and its impact on teaching history and moral accountability. “The 20th century has been one of genocide against individuals belonging to targeted groups. War is often a cover for genocide and the genocide against the Armenian took place during World War I.”

General Information About Genocide

USC Shoah Foundation

https://sfi.usc.edu

The USC Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education is a nonprofit organization founded by filmmaker Steven Spielberg to record video testimonies of survivors and other witnesses of the Shoah. In April, 2010, USC Shoah Foundation agreed with filmmaker Dr. J. Michael Hagopian, his wife Antoinette and their organization, the Armenian Film Foundation, to house the interviews of survivors and witnesses of the Armenian Genocide the late Hagopian filmed between 1975 and 2005 for documentaries he produced.

Genocide Watch

www.genocidewatch.net

The Genocide Watch “exists to predict, prevent, stop, and punish genocide and other forms of mass murder.” It is a laudable organization led by the most noted scholars in the field of Genocide Studies. The Web site has great resources that can be easily modified for educational use including a “pledge” and a description of the eight stages of genocide (both used in the lesson plans).

The Committee on Conscience at the United Stated Holocaust Memorial Museum

www.ushmm.org

The Committee on Conscience (COC) provides information on current genocides and on possible genocidal activities today. It contains a wealth of resources on the history and definition of genocide. More recently, the Web site has added resources specifically for educators and students.

Prevent Genocide International

www.preventgenocide.org

Prevent Genocide International has a tremendous amount of information about genocides and the concept of genocide. It is a trove of assorted documents that are more geared for adults than for students in terms of reading level.

Historical Resources

Documents from German State Archives

www.armenocide.de/armenocide/armgende.nsf

Revised and extended edition of the collection of diplomatic documents published by Johannes Lepsius in 1919 under the title “Germany and Armenia. The Armenian genocide during World War I was the first violent crime against humanity in the 20th century. To further education and awareness of this crime, the genocide can now be verified via the Internet from official German documents, available in German and English that describe the events in detail. They include hundreds of documents, detailing graphically, day in and day out, the atrocities that took place in the interior of Turkey during World War I. These were produced by German officials, consuls, vice consuls, and military officers. They reveal that the true intention of Turkish leaders was extermination (Ausrottung).

Armenian Genocide Museum and Institute (AGMI)

www.genocide-museum.am
The Armenian Genocide Museum and Institute is a non-profit organization based in Yerevan, Republic of Armenia. The mission of the Museum-Institute is the academic and scientific study, analysis of the problems as well as exhibition of the textual and visual documentation related to the first Genocide of the 20th century.

Project Save

www.projectsave.org

Project Save is an archive for Armenian related photographs whose mission is “is to collect, document, preserve, and present the historic and modern photographic record of Armenians and Armenian heritage.” Their Web site includes some historic photographs of interest and contains a “virtual museum” about Armenian history.

Zoryan Institute

www.zoryaninstitute.org

The Zoryan Institute for Contemporary Armenian Research and Documentation is based in both Canada and the U.S. The mission is to provide a “scholarly center devoted to the documentation, study, and dissemination of material related to the life of the Armenian people in the recent past and the present, and within the context of larger world affairs.” The Web site has documents and books available that would be of interest to teachers pursuing in depth units on the Armenian Genocide.

Armenian National Institute

www.armenian-genocide.org/index.htm

The Institute offers an excellent and easily navigable site for teachers, educators, students, and the general public that includes a comprehensive list of resources, sample curricula, a chronology of the genocide, archival documents, a list of international responses to the genocide, press coverage of the genocide, photographs, bibliographies, and much more. The site is divided into several sections and includes maps, historical documents, a photo collection and a site map.

Republic of Armenia – Armenian Genocide Institute-Museum

www.genocide-museum.am

The Armenian Genocide Museum of Armenia has provided a virtual multi-language tour of the museum. The site contains an exposition of historical documentary material, archival documents, and photos on the Armenian Genocide. The Museum collects historical and documentary material on the genocide from the state archives of many countries. Online resources include a historical overview of the genocide, various notable quotations, a map showing areas where Armenians were killed along with the approximate number of victims, tables listing regions affected by the genocide with population figures before and after the genocide, and the number of churches, schools, and settlements destroyed.

University of Michigan Dearborn – Armenian Research Center

 

www.umdearborn.edu/casl/685095/

Site contains articles and fact sheets on Armenia, Armenian history and the genocide, including a Fact Sheet on the genocide, several full text essays including one under Selected Writings of  Dr. Dennis Papazian addressing denial and the distortion of the facts of the genocide: “Misplaced Credulity: Contemporary Turkish Attempts to Refute the Armenian Genocide.” Includes links to important articles on a range of topics related to the genocide including the “King-Crane Commission Report on the Near East,” (Official United States Government Report) that dealt with the aftermath of the Armenian Genocide. Includes a link to the online text of “The Blight of Asia” by George Horton, American Consul in Smyrna in 1922 who was eyewitness to many events and who also availed himself of the testimony of other diplomats’ accounts of the Turkish massacres of Armenians and Greeks.

The Forgotten

www.theforgotten.org

A remarkable multimedia site with sound, a Timeline, Images, and Survivor Accounts. Sections include the 5-minute ABC Evening News Special Report by Peter Jennings on the Armenian Genocide aired nationwide on April 1999 on ABC’s “The Century” with interviews and photographs. The Survivors section includes online video testimonies by more than 25 people including Armin T. Wegner, Henry Morgenthau III and many others. The Images section includes a slide show of 17 photographs and the Time Line presents an interactive timeline for the events from 1893 to 1930 with sound and pictures.

Detroit Free Press: “Lessons of Armenian Genocide Relevant to all Nations.”

www.umdearborn.edu

April is Genocide Month and many people of goodwill are commemorating with solemn observances the Armenian Genocide and the Jewish Holocaust. Others ask why we should remember a genocide carried out during World War I, and a Holocaust that took place during World War II.  Each day’s newspaper brings us fresh stories of slaughter and carnage in some corner of the world. What makes these events different and still relevant to our era? First, of course, are the moral arguments. These were evil deeds, systematically carried out on a large scale by unjust governments against defenseless religious minorities. The Armenian Genocide, the first genocide of the 20th Century, took the lives of as many as 1.5 million people, yet the Turkish government denies to this day that it happened.

 

Uncategorized

The Legacy Project

www.legacy-project.org

The Legacy Project provides a collection of visual and literary art created by the descendents of those who survived some of the most horrific atrocities of the twentieth century including the Armenian genocide, the Holocaust, and the Cambodian Genocide. The site offers examples of artwork and literary.

California Model Curriculum

www.cde.ca.gov/re/pn/fd/modcurr-hr-pdf.asp

By the California State Board of Education

From the California Department of Education Web site: “This model curriculum reflects the wishes of the people of California and their legislative representatives to give local curriculum leaders and teachers continued guidance in classroom practices. As in 1988, this model curriculum supports the curriculum and instruction described in the History-Social Science Framework for California Public Schools. Since then the history-social science curriculum has been reinforced with academic content standards, and this model curriculum is supported by the history-social science content standards that were adopted by the State Board of Education in 1998. The Model Curriculum for Human Rights and Genocide is only available as a PDF file.”