Dr. Patricia Kaishian: Advocate for Diversity of Life, Advocate for Armenia

Nancy Kricorian, who was born and raised in the Armenian community of Watertown, Massachusetts, holds an MFA in Poetry from Columbia University and is the author of four novels about post-genocide Armenian diaspora experience, including Zabelle, which was translated into seven languages, was adapted as a play, and has been continuously in print since 1998. Her latest novel The Burning Heart of the World is focused on Armenians of Beirut before, during, and after the Lebanese Civil War. Her poems and essays have appeared in The Los Angeles Review of Books Quarterly, Guernica, Parnassus, Minnesota Review, The Mississippi Review, Mizna, The Markaz Review, Witness, and other journals. She has taught at Barnard, Columbia, Yale, and New York University, as well as with Teachers & Writers Collaborative in the New York City Public Schools. Kricorian has also been a literary mentor with We Are Not Numbers since 2015. She has been the recipient of a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, a Gold Medal from the Writers Union of Armenia, and the Anahid Literary Award, among other honors. She lives in New York City.