Dietro le quinte della modernità armena
Il ruolo degli intellettuali nel periodo delle Riforme costituzionali dell’Impero Ottomano. Il contributo di Ṙet‘ēos Bērbērian
abstract
This paper explores the varied facets of the intellectual activity of Ṙet‘ēos Pērpērean (1848-1907). He was the founder of one of the most renown educational centres of Constantinople, the Pērpērean/Bērbērean College, and a dynamic agent in the cultural and political panorama within the so-called Awakening movement (Zart‘ōnk‘). The paper aims to show that Pērpērean played a dominant role in enhancing the cultural and social modernisation that influenced the social life of the Constantinopolitan Armenian millet. Pērpērean contributed to reform the educational system of his time, promoted gender equality and women’s rights, and constituted the first Armenian workers associations in Constantinople. This article shall analyse Pērpērean’s philosophical thought and its significance in the later nineteenth-century Armenian-Ottoman society.
Keywords: Constitutional Reforms in the Ottoman Empire • Armenian Millet • Women’s Rights Discourse • Modernity and Modernisation • Ṙet‘ēos Pērpērean • Scholarisation