ABSTRACT
Social change is constant, transforming norms, values, interpretations, and imaginaries over time. At this particular moment in history, the Enlightenment thinking that shaped our conceptualization of change seems to have failed: no country in the world has achieved the assumed linear positive ‘civilizational’ progress. Two factors made the 2015 WATS Workshop significant: it was held, for the first time, in Istanbul, Turkey, namely the geographical site, the site where the collective violence occurred and where the perpetrators dwelled: the officially denied collective violence against the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire and later Turkey had taken place there. Our hope was to do the next one in Yerevan, Armenia, this time at the site of the survivors. The second factor concerned the centennial of the Armenian Genocide. Given Turkey’s violent and immoral stand of denial, scholars thought that the centennial would be an apt time for Turkish state and society to finally recognize and acknowledge the past genocide.
