Women in Armenia

Painting of an Armenian woman (circa 1682)

According to the 2018 Grant Thornton International business survey, the proportion of senior roles held by women in Armenia went slightly up from 31% to 32%. However no improvement was recorded among the surveyed Armenian businesses in diversity in management positions: 17% having no women in senior roles (10% in 2017)".[10]

Based on 2021 data provided by Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security, among countries in Central and Eastern Europe, Armenia’s performance on women’s financial inclusion in business has been at 40.9%, compared to the minimum score in the region assigned to Azerbaijan (27.7%) and the maximum score in Estonia (98.4%).[11]

Based on a report by the United Nations, there were 24 female mayors and community leaders in Armenia in 2011; a further 50 women held lower-level administrative positions.[12]

Some Armenian intellectuals, like Sibil, viewed ancient Armenian society and laws as woman-centric in line with the common trend of 19th century reformers who saw women as guardians of ancient, national culture, "many reformers idealised the civilization of a distant past, speaking of the need to regain the lost freedom that women were once said to have possessed in their societies”.[13] The law code of Mkhitar Gosh, dating to the 12th century, sought to raise women's status from its former level, however the code explicitly enshrined male domination and forbade divorce, even in the case of domestic violence or marital rape.[14] Its most progressive elements seem to have never been applied in society at large, and in the 18th and 19th centuries both outsider and insider reports overwhelmingly commented on the low status of women in traditional Armenian society. Armenian families were traditionally patrilocal, labor in the house was divided based on gender and generation. The rigidity of this hierarchy was best illustrated by the subordinate position of the new bride.[15] During the first year of marriage, they were not permitted to speak to anyone except their husbands, and were forbidden from leaving the house. Young Armenian brides created a sign language called Harsneren, which translates to "Language of the Bride." It is a gesture based sign language that developed against the rule of silence imposed on married Armenian women.[16] In some villages, these restrictions continued even after the birth of the first child, and may have lasted more than ten years. In the beginning of the 18th century among the Armenian population in Transcaucasia female suicide was more common than male suicide, in contrast to the situation in the West, where male suicides were 3 to 4 times more common.[17]

In spite of the inferior position of women in Armenian society, the Armenian Apostolic Church allowed women greater opportunities for assuming clerical roles than most other Christian traditions. Unlike the Eastern Orthodox, however, they were strongly opposed to divorce, and as a result the divorce rate in traditional Armenia has always been among the lowest in the Christian world.

According to the United Nations Global Database on Violence against Women, 8.2% of Armenian women suffered domestic abuse and violence in 2021.[18]

Armenia has been lacking well-established laws against domestic aggression and gender-based prejudice as noted by UHCR in 2010.[19]

Following the Velvet Revolution, the new government has taken some steps to combat domestic violence. In 2018, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labour established the Domestic Violence Council, in order to develop bylaws and regulations to enforce the Law on Domestic Violence and develop response mechanisms to handle cases of domestic violence.[20] In 2019, decrees were signed to establish shelters, develop regional crisis centres and establish clear protocols to address cases in each province, and create a support fund for survivors.[21]

During the Soviet years the true political power was held by the Politburo of the Communist Party, with the Supreme Soviet functioning more like a rubber stamp. It had a quota for women - on average one-third of deputies at the all-union and union republic levels were women, however in reality they had no significant political power. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and establishment of independent states with free elections the quota system was abolished, which brought to a significant drop in the number of women elected in post-soviet years.[22][23]

In May 2007, through the legislative decree known as "the gender quota law", more Armenian women were encouraged to get involved in politics. That year, only seven women occupied parliamentary positions. Among these female politicians was Hranush Hakobyan, the longest-serving woman in the National Assembly of Armenia.[24] The relative lack of women in Armenia's government led to Armenian women being considered "among the most underrepresented" and "among the lowest in the world" by foreign observers in 2007.[24] In addition, Armenian women's place in politics was often located in the private sphere - their entry in the public sphere only valued when they reflected the image of the feminine ideal based on social expectations, which continue to put a barrier on the political, social, and economic accessibility for women.[25] In 2015, Arpine Hovhannisyan,[26] became the first Armenian Woman to hold the position of Justice Minister in Armenia, a role she held until 2017.[27][28]Anna Vardapetyan became the first female Prosecutor General of Armenia in 2022.[29]

Female representation in the Parliament has been growing steadily in Armenia in the last decade[30] and currently represents the highest percentage in the South Caucasus (35.51%)[31] compared to neighbouring Georgia(18.44%)[32] and Azerbaijan(18.64%).[33]

In 2010 and 2011, during Women's Month and as part of the "For You, Women" charitable program, the Surb Astvatcamayr Medical Center in the Armenian capital of Yerevan offered free gynecological and surgical services to the women of Armenia for a full month. Women from across the country arrived seeking treatment.[34]

Sex-selective abortion is reported as being a problem in the country, due to patriarchal social norms which consider having a son preferable to having a daughter.[35][36][37][38][39] Nevertheless, due to strong emigration under the form of "brain drain", where young Armenian men go abroad in search of work, there are more young women than men in the country, especially among those in their 20s: women make up 55.8% of the population aged 15–29.[40]

The oldest literary expression by Armenian women available to us today in writing is the poetry of two 8th-century CE women, Khosrovidukht of Goghtn and Sahakdukht of Syunik.[41] Following the Armenian literary renaissance of the 19th century, and the spread of educational opportunities for women, a number of other writers emerged, among them the 19th-century feminist writer Srpouhi Dussap, considered the first female Armenian novelist.[42] She, like her contemporary, Zabel Sibil Asadour, is generally associated with Constantinople and the Western Armenian literary tradition. Zabel Yesayan, also born in Constantinople, bridged the gap with Eastern Armenian literature by settling in Soviet Armenia in 1933. The literary renaissance and its accompanying voice of protest also had its representatives in the East with poet Shushanik Kurghinian(1876–1927) of Aleksandrapol (today, Gyumri). Sylvia Kaputikyan and Maro Markarian are probably the best-known women poets from the Republic of Armenia of the 20th century, and continued the tradition of political speech through poetry.

Upon the formation of the Soviet Union, the new government wished to radically reconstruct society by tackling economic, social, and political questions. In this attempt, Party leaders brought up the “woman question.” Many argued that the emergence of the woman from the private sphere of the home into the economic and political world was an essential change necessary for building towards a communist future.

Thus, Soviet legislation was adopted during the early 1920s that established civil marriage, easy divorce, abortion services, maternity pay, and childcare facilities. Women were given equal rights to hold land, act as heads of households, be members in rural communes, and perform paid labor.[43]

• Armenians (ethnic group)
• Mother Armenia
• Politics of Armenia
• Crime in Armenia
• Union of Producers and Women
• Armenia women's national football team

• Zakarian, David (2021). Women, Too, Were Blessed: The Portrayal of Women in Early Christian Armenian Texts. Brill. ISBN 978-90-04-44441-6.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Women of Armenia.

• Zohrab Center Book of the Week: The Other Voice: Armenian Women's Poetry Through the Ages. Retrieved 22 May 2014.
• Women’s Resource Center Armenia
• Armenia: Women Suffer in Silence Archived 2014-10-28 at the Wayback Machine. Amnesty.org. 13 November 2008. Retrieved 18 June 2013.
• Women's Organisations Armenia