The Armenian Studies Group (ASG) is proud to close the 2025–26 academic year with PhD candidate Kayane Gavrilof’s groundbreaking project HabaYete. Join us at the Institute or online on Wednesday, May 27, at 7 pm for a presentation exploring a bold and innovative project that challenges outmoded models of cultural production and transmission. We begin again in September with fellow doctoral researcher Emma Silagy’s Ari Pari.
ASG brings together researchers, writers, artists, journalists, educators, students, photo-essayists, and creative practitioners working across all areas of Armenian Studies to share works in progress, test emerging ideas, and engage in stimulating, constructive conversation. At its heart, ASG seeks to cultivate a supportive interdisciplinary environment where research and creative practice evolve through dialogue, curiosity, and collaborative reflection. If you want to join the ASG, click here.
This meeting (in English) will be chaired by Dr. Tamara Wilson.
Please RSVP by emailing mariana@armenianinstitute.org.uk - please specify if you would like to attend the event in person or online.
About the Speaker
Kayane Gavrilof is a creative practitioner, educator, and PhD candidate in Art Education at the University of Lisbon. She is the founder of HabaYete, a creative Western Armenian initiative exploring language and cultural transmission through collaborative workshops, podcasts, and child-led productions. Kayane also leads What If Creative Lab, which develops creativity-based social and educational gatherings. Since 2017, she has collaborated with communities and institutions across several countries, including programmes supported by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, working at the intersection of creativity, education, and diasporic cultural practice.
HabaYete: Reshaping Cultural Transmission. This talk explores how creativity can reshape approaches to Armenian cultural transmission within diasporic contexts. Drawing on the evolution of HabaYete — a transnational Western Armenian creative pedagogy initiative involving workshops, podcasts, educational resources, and institutional collaborations — it reflects on the role of participatory and imaginative practices in language and cultural learning. The presentation introduces the broader questions guiding the doctoral research, particularly how children and educators might move beyond preservation-based models toward more active, creative, and collectively reimagined forms of cultural engagement.