РОССИЙСКО-АРМЯНСКИЙ УНИВЕРСИТЕТ

About us
Director of the Institute
Academic staff

About us

The Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian-Armenian University, was established in 2016. The Institute currently provides undergraduate and graduate programs in Iranian Studies, Turkic Studies, Arabic Studies, and Indian Studies in the Armenian-Russian departments of the University (according to the Russian classification: 58.03.01 Oriental-African Studies). It also offers postgraduate programs in Ethnography and General Comparative Linguistics.
The Institute provides fundamental academic education based on the principles of classical Oriental Studies and rich experience and methodology. Areas of study include the geographical zones of Central Asia, the Caucasus, Central Asia, North Africa, and the Indian subcontinent. The programs cover the following disciplines: history of the people inhabiting areas of study, their languages and dialects, religion and beliefs, political issues and economics.
The scientific-educational visits to countries such as Iran, Afghanistan, Turkey, India, Arab countries, etc. are the integral part of the Institute’s program.
In parallel, the Institute aims to develop Oriental Studies as a separate branch of the humanities. For this purpose, the Institute implements scientific publishing and cooperates with the leading international Oriental Studies centers. Within the framework of international cooperation programs, scientific conferences, seminars, visits of famous orientalists and scholars of the related fields are organized, joint scientific projects are implemented.
The Institute publishes the international peer-reviewed journal Iran and the Caucasus (Brill: Leiden-Boston; indexed by SCOPUS; Web of Science; a number of other scientific systems; founded in 1996); https://brill.com/view/journals/ic/ic-overview.xml), a Russian-language Труды Института Востоковедения РАУ: Caucaso-Caspica, (indexed by РИНЦ), Yerevan Oriental Series - international series, that include small monographs, Persian-language Штудии по кавказско-каспийской словесности (Pa (hešhā-ye zabānī-adabī-ye Qafqāz va Kāspiyan) issued in Persian in Tehran in cooperation with The Centre for the Great Islamic Encyclopaedia, and Armenian-language Iran-Name, published in Yerevan since 1993.

Director of the Institute

Garnik Asatrian
Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian-Armenian University - Doctor of Philology, Professor

Professor Garnik Asatrian organizes the educational process of the four directions of the Institute and the scientific and educational activities of the instructors, represents the Institute in the managerial bodies of the university, international scientific centers.

The recognized scientific school of Oriental Studies Professor Garnik Asatrian has a wide international authority and is integrated into large-scale international scientific projects.

Professor Asatryan is the founder and editor-in-chief of a number of scientific periodicals and academic series, including one of the most rated peer-reviewed international journals Iran and the Caucasus (Brill: Leiden-Boston; indexed in SCOPUS, Web of Science and a number of other scientometric systems; based in 1996, https://brill.com/view/journals/ic/ic-overview.xml, as well as the Russian-language yearbook Труды Института Востоковедения РАУ: Caucaso-Caspica (indexed in РИНЦ), the international Yerevan Oriental Series that includes brief monographic works, and Studies on Caucasian-Caspian Literature (Pažūhešhā-ye zabānī-adabī-ye Qafqāz va Kāspiyan), a quarterly journal published in Persian in Tehran together with the Great Islamic Encyclopedia. Professor Asatryan is at the same time the founder and editor-in-chief of the Armenian orientalist magazine Iran-Name, published in Armenian since 1993.

The director of the Institute of Oriental Studies, RAU has significantly contributed to the organization of humanity science in Armenia. He headed the Departments of Eastern Philology (1983-1989) and Iranian Studies (1989-1996) of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Academy of Sciences of Armenia. From 1997 to 2015, he was the head of the department of Iranian studies at Yerevan State University; in 1996 he founded and ever since has been the head of the Caucasus Center for Iranian Studies in Yerevan, and since 2014 - the Institute of Indigenous Peoples of the Caucasus-Caspian Region.

G. Asatrian is the author of dozens of scientific monographs and teaching manuals, hundreds of articles published in different languages. Dozens of graduate students from different countries defended their dissertations under his supervision.

Garnik Asatrian's contribution to the study of ethnic minorities and indigenous peoples of the Caucasian-Caspian area and Eastern Anatolia is significant. A number of special areas, in particular, Kurdology, Yezidi Studies, Zaza Studies, Talysh Studies, ethno-confessional communities in Western Asia and others are the traditional currents of the oriental school of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the RAU.

The high reputation of this school is based on rigorous academic research, combined with innovative methods of work. An integral part of the research laboratory of the Institute of Oriental Studies of RAU is regular scientific expeditions to Iran, Afghanistan, Turkey and other countries of the region.