Dancing Against Erasure: Armenian Dance in Diaspora as Cultural Reclamation and as Radical Politics

Natalie Kamajian is a Ph.D. Student in Culture and Performance at UCLA. She is a practitioner and teacher of Armenian vernacular dances, which are largely understudied within the fields of both Dance and Armenian studies. Her research inquiries stem from an in-depth dance practice spanning several years in Armenia. Her PhD project is a multilingual study that will constitute the first critical investigation of Armenian dance and its competing aesthetic expressions and socio-political framings. Outside of UCLA, Natalie is the co-Founder and Dance Director of Lernazang, a cultural collective and performance ensemble whose mission is to strengthen Armenian cultural heritage in Los Angeles. Kamajian will give a lecture on her innovative work and then invites all attendees and audience members to embody the dance practices she speaks of on Bowling Green Lawn.