Սօնա Թաթոյեան | Sona Tatoyan is a first generation Syrian-Armenian-American actor/writer/producer who spent childhood summers in Aleppo where she learned about the Armenian Genocide. The history book in her small Indiana town made no mention of it. From childhood she obsessed with who tells the story, seeing that narrative propagates “truth.” At Wake Forest University, Maya Angelou mentored her, exemplifying story’s power to address injustice. “When something is the truth, you must speak it. No matter what, you must speak it.”
Realizing stories of the Syrian war did not reflect her family’s reality in Aleppo, Sona started the non-profit Hakawati to amplify the voices of marginalized and frontline communities to inspire healing. Sona created Azad Storytelling, performing recently at Pergamon Museum in Berlin, and is developing the multimedia play Azad (the rabbit and the wolf) in 2023/24. Residencies include: Vineyard theater in NYC, University of Connecticut Global Affairs, Harvard Artlab, and Wake Forest University. Sona has performed at Yale Repertory Theatre, The Goodman Theatre, The American Conservatory Theatre, and others. Her feature film script, The First Full Moon, was a 2011 Sundance/RAWI Screenwriters Lab participant/2012 Dubai Film Connection/Festival Project.
Sona’s work explores storytelling as healing by questioning and reframing what’s unquestioned, silenced and inherited.
