Your trusted source

The Harvard University Press has published a book by Turkish author Umit Kurt on the Armenian Genocide titled "The Armenians of Aintab: The Economics of Genocide in an Ottoman Province." Renowned Turkish historian and researcher Taner Akçam wrote on Facebook that this was the second PhD of Strassler Center Genocide Program in Armenian Genocide track. "We are going to create "Clark School" in Armenian Genocide Research. Congratulations Umit, well deserved," Akcam wrote. 

To note, Ümit Kurt, born and raised in Gaziantep, Turkey, was astonished to learn that his hometown once had a large and active Armenian community. The Armenian presence in Aintab, the city’s name during the Ottoman period, had not only been destroyed―it had been replaced. To every appearance, Gaziantep was a typical Turkish city. A Turk’s discovery that Armenians once thrived in his hometown leads to a groundbreaking investigation into the local dynamics of genocide.

Kurt digs into the details of the Armenian dispossession that produced the homogeneously Turkish city in which he grew up. In particular, he examines the population that gained from ethnic cleansing. Records of land confiscation and population transfer demonstrate just how much new wealth became available when the prosperous Armenians―who were active in manufacturing, agricultural production, and trade―were ejected.

The Armenians of Aintab draws on primary sources from Armenian, Ottoman, Turkish, British, and French archives, as well as memoirs, personal papers, oral accounts, and newly discovered property-liquidation records.