The Program in Modern Greek Studies in conjunction with the Center for Middle East Studies and the Department of History present a lecture by Christine Philliou of UC Berkeley titled, “Invisible Cities:  Istanbul of the 19th Century through the Lens of Ottoman Census Registers”. 

Years before announcing its high-profile “Belt and Road” global infrastructure initiative in 2013, the Chinese government earmarked Greece as a strategic, geopolitical gateway for Chinese manufacturing into Europe (China’s largest trade partner). Prior to 2000, the modern Chinese and Greek nation-states shared no significant historical relationship. Yet in wake of China’s accession to the WTO and Greece’s accession to the Eurozone, Sino-Hellenic bilateral relations were kindled and rapidly intensified.

Professor Stelios Michalopoulos (Eastmann Professor of Political Economy, Brown University) presents findings from two ongoing projects regarding the economic, political, and artistic impact of refugees from Anatolia in Greece over the last century. The local and aggregate impacts of refugee resettlement on human capital (schooling) and structural transformation in about 11,000 settlements in Greece will be discussed alongside the refugees’ artistic expression, as reflected in the songs by artists of refugee origin.