Assyrian Ethnic Minority of Armenia: Integration and Self-Identification as Citizens of the Country

In modern conditions of integration of ethnic minorities, which is quite problematic, including in a number of highly developed countries in Europe and America, it is important to study the existing successful integration experience. It is noteworthy that this experience would be useful both in cases of migrations of recent years (as in European countries) and in situations where ethnic minorities live in a particular territory traditionally (here, Russia can be cited as an example, as well as some other Asian countries). Armenia, which is usually perceived as a mono-ethnic country, can quite unexpectedly serve as a positive example here. Nevertheless, dozens of ethnic minorities live on the territory of the Republic of Armenia, successfully woven into the fabric of a single state and society. This determines the relevance of this study, which also extends to the self-perception and self-identification of the ethnic minorities of the republic, on the one hand, in terms of their own identity, and on the other, as citizens of Armenia. In the course of our work, an attempt was made to analyze the self-description of the Assyrian community of the Republic of Armenia, its identification and historical memory. As sources, we used interviews with public activists, as well as religious figures of the Assyrian community, publications in the media, social networks and Internet publics, as well as visual symbols used by the Assyrians of Armenia in their religious practice and everyday life.