Ethnic Identity of Armenian: the Sociological Study of the factors affecting the continuity of Armenian Ethnic (A case Study of Armenian in Tehran)

Iranian Armenian are an ethnic-religious group in Iran which are living with Iranian during their long history. Since 350 years ago that they have moved to this country, so they are a part of this nation now. Studying about their cultural- religious continuity during the history has been my PhD thesis and this article is written according to the results of that. Here we are going to study about their cultural symbols and elements of Armenian identity, and the mechanisms of their ethnic continuity form a sociological point of view. To examine the questions of this study, we used a theoretical framework consisting of the Ethno-Symbolism Theory of Anthony Smith and Social Identity Theory of Richard Jenkins. This is a historical-theoretical study also survey and interviews is used for testing hypothesis. This research is conducted on the f field study in order to examine smith`s theory in Iran. The results show strong ethnic identity among Armenians and the transformation of these subjective and objective elements to next generations