MELANIE MARGARYAN WRITES — If you don’t know much about Armenia, that’s not really surprising.
Armenia is a tiny country in the Caucasus, where nothing interesting really happens. Well, besides war and really sad stuff. But let’s talk about something great that’s been happening for Armenians, for once: TikTok.
If you go onto YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, etc, and try to find Armenian video entertainment, there isn’t much. And the videos that you do find are usually skits written by professional Armenian creators and actors. But if you go onto TikTok and look up any Armenian-related hashtag, you get an unbelievable amount of results with billions of views.
These TikToks are not exclusively posted and created by professional actors or entertainers. Armenians of all ages and backgrounds put up content and get hundreds to thousands to millions of likes and comments. And they’re not just Armenian-related videos. Most of the content is funny and light-hearted, which is incredibly refreshing for Armenians with a long, dark cultural history.
If you read the comment sections of these Armenian comedy TikToks, they’re usually loaded with comments from other Armenians who feel strongly related to the video they just watched. People make comments like: “This is so accurate it’s crazy”, “MY GRANDMA DOES THIS,” and “If you’re Armenian and say you don’t relate to this, you’re a liar.”
Through these TikToks, Armenians across the globe are connecting to one another in a way that has never before happened. With this new platform they are able to build an upbeat, tightknit virtual community. This is a really big deal, mainly because Armenians are dispersing increasingly across the world
Yes, TikTok has helped transform the tears of sadness into tears of laughter for the Armenian community. In this way, maybe, history is not doomed to repeat itself, but to re-script its story from one of less tragic to more comedic proportions.