(June 14, 2010) -- Having completed their own oral histories and children’s books, Jennifer and Chris Davis’s humanities classes had guest speaker, Lorna Touryan Miller, come and speak to them about her own works. Miller has written a book entitled Survivors: An Oral History of the Armenian Genocide, which contains over 100 oral histories with survivors of the Armenian Genocide. Miller interviewed 40 men and 60 women in their nineties about their most vivid childhood memories about the genocide.

“I first decided to do oral histories when I realized that all of this incredible history about the genocide would be lost if the survivors were to pass away,” Miller said. “One thing led to another and now after 15 years we have a whole book composed of very interesting oral histories.” Today, Miller and her husband are working on doing oral histories on survivors of the Rwandan Genocide.

“Miller’s story was very interesting to me, I could easily relate to her because I too have lost relatives in the genocide,” said sophomore Anna Ladian. “I am glad that there are people who are actually trying to prevent any more genocides from happening in the future.”

Miller’s story has also inspired students to follow in her footsteps and do many more oral histories with older relatives. “I definitely want to talk to my grandparents about their history and write it all down so that it is never lost,” said sophomore Narine Vartanian. “It would have been such a shame if the stories of the Armenian genocide survivors were lost.”