Gender discrimination is a deeply cultural problem, Rafik Santrosyan writes. The incident last month in Yerevan City Hall where a group of men beat a woman councilor highlight how patriarchal relations, toxic masculinity and internalized misogyny have influenced the public discourse.
In the last 100 years, there have been hierarchies of identity and canonical approaches to definitions of "Armenian," especially as articulated, rationalized and promoted by elites, institutions and political parties in the Diaspora and in Armenia. This essay is not a study of identity per se, but about one of the aspects of identity – the “Armenian” bit of it.
From referencing the issue of sex-selective abortions to drinking toasts in honor of women, the grammatically genderless Armenian language, still fails to provide a space for its speakers to develop sensitivity towards the intricacies of gender as social conventions and cultural constructs. Rafik Santrosyan, PhD in Linguistics, explains how.
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