The engaged and engaging world of David Barsamian Kay Mouradian

by Kay Mouradian

Through his weekly radio program, Alternative Radio, an independent weekly series based in Boulder, Colorado, David Barsamian’s fiery brand of politics is heard world- wide. He is a radio producer, jour- nalist, author, and lecturer and has been working in radio since 1978. In 1986 his program went national and plays also in Canada and Australia. He is currently on an extended book tour talk- ing about his latest book, Target- ing Iran, co-authored with Noam Chomsky, Ervand Abrahamian, and Nahid Mozaffari. I heard his talk at the Luna Play- house in Glendale a few weeks ago. Having listened to his radio David Barsamian (r.) with Aramazd Stepanian, co-founder of Luna playhouse. Photo: program, Alternative Radio, and Levon Parian. viewed his website, my percep- tion of him was that of a gentle that is David Barsamian; a first- er’s village, my Armenian antenna dissident, but his intense passion generation Armenian born in New rose. I became curious about his for social justice overshadows York during the era of the baby reaction to that visit. that gentleness. He is a power- boomers. He is driven by a moral- Kay Mouradian: Tell me about ful speaker and captures the at- ity of social justice and refuses to that trip. tention of an audience, especially quietly let our democratic way of David Barsamian: My mother those of like mind. He doesn’t care life be tainted by politicians who came from Dubne, about an hour whose toes he steps on, and he use corrupt propaganda to pro- north of Diyarbakir. Diyarbakir pulls no punches about our poli- mote their addiction to power and is populated by Kurds. It is their ticians in Washington. His credo line their pockets as well as those cultural center and the city where is “information is the oxygen of of their friends. I wanted to learn they hold political power. There democracy.” more about where and when he I met the mayor who put me in Barsamian started his talk with began to understand the horrors touch with the mayor of Dijali, a heated monologue. “A breaking of injustice and how that affected the area where my mother’s vil- news announcement,” he blared him. I was also curious if the Ar- lage is located. The Dijali mayor out. “The Glendale Liberation menian Genocide played a role. offered to take me to my mother’s Front just arrested George W Bush We met over coffee in Westwood village. At different times and in for crimes against humanity.” His and I asked him about his trip to different words, both mayors told absurdity and humor in this three Turkey. me they held great shame and minute political satire was worthy “Which one?” he replied. remorse in their hearts for what of any Saturday Night Live appear- He had just returned from a trip their Kurdish grandparents had ance where absurdity invariably to Turkey, Syria, and Lebanon, but done to the Armenians during the contains a nugget of truth. when he told me he had gone to Genocide, even as neither tried to

books If there is anyone left of the left, Turkey in 2005 to visit his moth- justify the actions of their ances-

Armenian Reporter Arts & Culture 11/3/2007 C9 less and unashamed in my trav- afternoon. He wasn’t a blood rela- els if I make grammatical errors, tion, but he was from my mother’s knowing how much people appre- village, and he was very political. ciate foreigners trying to speak I was learning from him even at their language.” seven years old. I loved being with KM: Tell me about your love of someone who had clearly defined language and how it influenced political ideas, so different from you. my parents. Uncle Sarkis was a Barsamian: I was the youngest strong Armenian ARF nationalist of four children; grew up speak- and a radical who hated Nixon and ing Armenian, learned English Joseph McCarthy. At nine I was David Barsamian’s in school in New York, and as I educating myself watching the Targeting Iran, watched my parents struggling to McCarthy hearings and Edward co-authored write a sentence, I decided early R. Murrow’s famous broadcast on with Noam on that I wanted to have a com- CBS which eventually became the Chomsky, Ervand mand of English and the power filmGoodnight and Goodluck. Abrahamian, and of a large vocabulary. My parents KM: Tell me more about your Nahid Mozaffari. came from illiterate villages and early interest in social justice. didn’t have books in the home. I Barsamian: There were two menian generation. I’m proud to saw what happened to them and major things. I was strongly influ- say that my birthday is on Flag maybe unconsciously there was enced by my parent’s displacement Day, June 14, the same birthday this drive for knowledge, maybe and disposition and the ensuing as Che Gueverra, and I identify thinking if you are clued in then Turkish denial, and the other, be- more with Che Gueverra. at the remnants of an Armenian maybe you won’t get massacred. lieve it or not, was a baseball team, KM: Barsamian recently returned Church. The villagers told me they KM: What about your early edu- the Brooklyn Dodgers. One of my from Turkey, Syria and Lebanon. In used the church stones to build cation? brothers was a Yankee fan, the Turkey he interviewed Hrant Dink’s their homes. Like recycling. They Barsamian: I barely got through other a Giants fan and for me to son and Ron Margalies, a promi- treated me like a rock star, touch- high school and was a drop-out. I individuate myself, I had to be a nent Turkish Jewish commentator ing me and following me every- hated school, but I am a voracious Dodgers fan. When rumors hinted and poet. In Beirut he interviewed where. reader. At ages 7, 8, and 9 I was the Dodgers would leave New York, Rami Khouri, an independent Arab KM: Knowing his mother had subscribing to Esquire, Newsweek, I believed owner Walter O’Malley journalist who at one time inter- survived the genocide, I asked US News and World Report maga- when he said the Dodgers would viewed Osama Bin Laden, and Amal about his emotional reaction to zines, writing letters and getting never leave New York….until Los Saad-Ghorayeb, a leading authority being in Dubne. them published. When the mag- Angeles made him a deal, gave him on Hezbollah. And in Damascus Barsamian at an Barsamian: They were so excit- azines came every month with Chavez Ravine worth 80 million he talked with Yassin al Haj Saleh appearance at the ed having me, a foreigner, in their my name on the label, I felt like dollars and uprooted the Mexican- – one of Syria’s leading dissidents Luna Playhouse in village, they never left me alone I was something, somebody. My American community who lived and political activists who spent Glendale. Photos: for a moment. I left Dubne not parents couldn’t imagine writing there. That taught me all I needed more than 15 years in the jails of Levon Parian. knowing. a letter or expressing an opinion to know about greed, economics, Hafez al-Assad. Barsamian said Yas- KM: Listening to the rhythm of and getting it published. I spent lying, and manipulation. sin is a brilliant guy, was a medical try. As we drove along the Tigris on a tour of the village … to the his words, I suspected that mu- most of my free time in the Web- KM: I find it interesting that student when arrested, and taught River, I remembered my mother’s stream and the apricot trees my sic played a role in David’s life. He ster public library on 78th street many in the Armenian commu- himself English while in jail. Those descriptions of the river and the mother talked about so often. The told me that he spent the years in New York. I read everything nity don’t know of you. interviews will be scheduled on his surrounding semi-arid mountains. man who owned the apricot or- 1966-70 in India studying Urdu, and anything. The library was an Barsamian: That’s because my radio program. Barsamian’s web “Your mountains are just like ours chard is an Armenian whose fam- one of India’s 23 official languages, oasis where I could feed my mind politics are so radical. Most Amer- site, alternativeradio.org, is a trea- in Dubne,” she would say when she ily converted to Islam and he is and the sitar, an Indian lute, under and get away from the roaches in ican-Armenians are Republicans, sure trove of programs with many visited me at my home in Boul- now called Mustafa. They gave the guidance of a world-famous si- my house. I lived in a section of flag wavers, primarily interested of today’s well-known personalities der. My imagination was coursing me a basket filled with apricots, tar master, Debu Chaudhuri. He New York populated primarily by in making money and don’t want who are unafraid to challenge the through my mind. How will I re- so sweet to the taste, and I later traveled and performed with his Germans, Italians, and Irish im- to upset the status quo. I don’t ideas of those in power. His radio act? Will I be emotional, nostalgic, shared them with those on the teacher, sometimes for groups as migrants, and I had to constantly feel American citizens should program on NPR is funded entirely angry? When we arrived in Dubne, bus when I left Diyarbakir. From large as 20,000. On one occasion explain about being Armenian, serve in the military in wars of by listeners who hear a program the villagers recognized the may- the orchard they took me to the they performed for Indira Gandhi, because no one knew anything imperialism or wars of aggression, and order a CD. f or’s car and rushed tell him about old Armenian cemetery whose who at the time was Prime Minis- about Armenians. but if it is about being attacked all the things that needed to be gravestones were barely readable. ter of India. David gained a rudi- KM: Where did your interest in that is a very different thing. I connect: fixed in the village. When they My grandfather was probably bur- mentary grasp of both Arabic and politics begin? attract those who are concerned alternativeradio.org learned that my mother once lived ied there. He was killed before the Farsi, because both languages are Barsamian: My uncle, Sarkis primarily with social justice, and Kay Mouradian is author of A Gift in the in Dubne, many of them took me deportations. We went to look rooted in Urdu. “I’m totally fear- Hagopian, visited every Sunday I’m seeing hope in the younger Ar- Sunlight: An Armenian Story

C10 Armenian Reporter Arts & Culture 11/3/2007 less and unashamed in my trav- afternoon. He wasn’t a blood rela- els if I make grammatical errors, tion, but he was from my mother’s knowing how much people appre- village, and he was very political. ciate foreigners trying to speak I was learning from him even at their language.” seven years old. I loved being with KM: Tell me about your love of someone who had clearly defined language and how it influenced political ideas, so different from you. my parents. Uncle Sarkis was a Barsamian: I was the youngest strong Armenian ARF nationalist of four children; grew up speak- and a radical who hated Nixon and ing Armenian, learned English Joseph McCarthy. At nine I was David Barsamian’s in school in New York, and as I educating myself watching the Targeting Iran, watched my parents struggling to McCarthy hearings and Edward co-authored write a sentence, I decided early R. Murrow’s famous broadcast on with Noam on that I wanted to have a com- CBS which eventually became the Chomsky, Ervand mand of English and the power filmGoodnight and Goodluck. Abrahamian, and of a large vocabulary. My parents KM: Tell me more about your Nahid Mozaffari. came from illiterate villages and early interest in social justice. didn’t have books in the home. I Barsamian: There were two menian generation. I’m proud to saw what happened to them and major things. I was strongly influ- say that my birthday is on Flag maybe unconsciously there was enced by my parent’s displacement Day, June 14, the same birthday this drive for knowledge, maybe and disposition and the ensuing as Che Gueverra, and I identify thinking if you are clued in then Turkish denial, and the other, be- more with Che Gueverra. at the remnants of an Armenian maybe you won’t get massacred. lieve it or not, was a baseball team, KM: Barsamian recently returned Church. The villagers told me they KM: What about your early edu- the Brooklyn Dodgers. One of my from Turkey, Syria and Lebanon. In used the church stones to build cation? brothers was a Yankee fan, the Turkey he interviewed Hrant Dink’s their homes. Like recycling. They Barsamian: I barely got through other a Giants fan and for me to son and Ron Margalies, a promi- treated me like a rock star, touch- high school and was a drop-out. I individuate myself, I had to be a nent Turkish Jewish commentator ing me and following me every- hated school, but I am a voracious Dodgers fan. When rumors hinted and poet. In Beirut he interviewed where. reader. At ages 7, 8, and 9 I was the Dodgers would leave New York, Rami Khouri, an independent Arab KM: Knowing his mother had subscribing to Esquire, Newsweek, I believed owner Walter O’Malley journalist who at one time inter- survived the genocide, I asked US News and World Report maga- when he said the Dodgers would viewed Osama Bin Laden, and Amal about his emotional reaction to zines, writing letters and getting never leave New York….until Los Saad-Ghorayeb, a leading authority being in Dubne. them published. When the mag- Angeles made him a deal, gave him on Hezbollah. And in Damascus Barsamian at an Barsamian: They were so excit- azines came every month with Chavez Ravine worth 80 million he talked with Yassin al Haj Saleh appearance at the ed having me, a foreigner, in their my name on the label, I felt like dollars and uprooted the Mexican- – one of Syria’s leading dissidents Luna Playhouse in village, they never left me alone I was something, somebody. My American community who lived and political activists who spent Glendale. Photos: for a moment. I left Dubne not parents couldn’t imagine writing there. That taught me all I needed more than 15 years in the jails of Levon Parian. knowing. a letter or expressing an opinion to know about greed, economics, Hafez al-Assad. Barsamian said Yas- KM: Listening to the rhythm of and getting it published. I spent lying, and manipulation. sin is a brilliant guy, was a medical try. As we drove along the Tigris on a tour of the village … to the his words, I suspected that mu- most of my free time in the Web- KM: I find it interesting that student when arrested, and taught River, I remembered my mother’s stream and the apricot trees my sic played a role in David’s life. He ster public library on 78th street many in the Armenian commu- himself English while in jail. Those descriptions of the river and the mother talked about so often. The told me that he spent the years in New York. I read everything nity don’t know of you. interviews will be scheduled on his surrounding semi-arid mountains. man who owned the apricot or- 1966-70 in India studying Urdu, and anything. The library was an Barsamian: That’s because my radio program. Barsamian’s web “Your mountains are just like ours chard is an Armenian whose fam- one of India’s 23 official languages, oasis where I could feed my mind politics are so radical. Most Amer- site, alternativeradio.org, is a trea- in Dubne,” she would say when she ily converted to Islam and he is and the sitar, an Indian lute, under and get away from the roaches in ican-Armenians are Republicans, sure trove of programs with many visited me at my home in Boul- now called Mustafa. They gave the guidance of a world-famous si- my house. I lived in a section of flag wavers, primarily interested of today’s well-known personalities der. My imagination was coursing me a basket filled with apricots, tar master, Debu Chaudhuri. He New York populated primarily by in making money and don’t want who are unafraid to challenge the through my mind. How will I re- so sweet to the taste, and I later traveled and performed with his Germans, Italians, and Irish im- to upset the status quo. I don’t ideas of those in power. His radio act? Will I be emotional, nostalgic, shared them with those on the teacher, sometimes for groups as migrants, and I had to constantly feel American citizens should program on NPR is funded entirely angry? When we arrived in Dubne, bus when I left Diyarbakir. From large as 20,000. On one occasion explain about being Armenian, serve in the military in wars of by listeners who hear a program the villagers recognized the may- the orchard they took me to the they performed for Indira Gandhi, because no one knew anything imperialism or wars of aggression, and order a CD. f or’s car and rushed tell him about old Armenian cemetery whose who at the time was Prime Minis- about Armenians. but if it is about being attacked all the things that needed to be gravestones were barely readable. ter of India. David gained a rudi- KM: Where did your interest in that is a very different thing. I connect: fixed in the village. When they My grandfather was probably bur- mentary grasp of both Arabic and politics begin? attract those who are concerned alternativeradio.org learned that my mother once lived ied there. He was killed before the Farsi, because both languages are Barsamian: My uncle, Sarkis primarily with social justice, and Kay Mouradian is author of A Gift in the in Dubne, many of them took me deportations. We went to look rooted in Urdu. “I’m totally fear- Hagopian, visited every Sunday I’m seeing hope in the younger Ar- Sunlight: An Armenian Story

Armenian Reporter Arts & Culture 11/3/2007 C11