Ethnic Relations in the Baltic Reconsidered Conference

September 16 to 17, 2022

Event will be available in a hybrid format (zoom and in-person).

Room location is Luce Hall, Rm 203, 2nd floor

Faculty Hosts: Bradley Woodworth (Yale University / University of New Haven) and Darius Staliūnas (Lithuanian Institute of History)

For the full program:

Friday, September 16

9:00-10:00 AM ET Keynote Address
Toivo Raun (Indiana University) on “Ethnic Relations in the Baltic Region: Complexity and Coexistence”

10:00 AM- 12:00 PM ET Panel 1 | Drawing Ethnic Boundaries Under the Old Regime
Chair: Darius Staliūnas (Lithuanian Institute of History)

Jörg Hackmann (University of Szczecin) “Voluntary Associations as Accelerator or Inhibitor of Inter-Ethnic relations in the Baltic Region?”
Irina Paert (University of Tartu) “‘Neither Jew, Nor Gentile?’ The Russian Orthodox Clergy in the Baltic Provinces in the Service of the Empire”
Bradley Woodworth (University of New Haven / Yale University) “The Origins of the State: Tartu University Legal Historian Gustav von Ewers and Russian Historiography”

1:00 – 2:20 PM ET Panel 2 | Memory
Chair: Mārtiņš Kaprāns (University of Latvia)

Epp Annus (The Ohio State University / Tallinn University) “Spring Flowers and Border Guards: Estonian Nar-ratives of Soviet Military and Border Troops”
Violeta Davoliūtė (Lithuanian Institute of History) “The Habitus of Holocaust Remem-brance during the Thaw in Soviet Lithuania”

3:00-5:00 PM ET Panel 3 | Ethnic conflicts
Chair: Andres Kasekamp (University of Toronto)

Tomas Balkelis (Lithuanian Institute of History) “Dividing Society: The Impact of Border Making between Lithuania and Poland, 1920-1940”
Darius Staliūnas (Lithuanian Institute of History) “Anti-Jewish Violence in the Interwar Lithuania: Preconditions of the Holocaust?”
Stanislovas Stasiulis (Lithuanian Institute of History) “The Image of the ‘New Lithuania’ in Propaganda of the Lithuanian Activist Front”

Saturday, September 17

9:30-11:30 AM ET Panel 4 | Policies Toward Minorities
Chair: Bradley Woodworth (University of New Haven / Yale University)

Klaus Richter (University of Birmingham) “Ways Out of the Interwar Slump: Imagined Historical Trajectories and State-Minority Relations in the Baltics”
Andres Kasekamp (University of Toronto) “Konstantin Päts and Ethnic Minorities: The Political Trajectory of an Estonian Nationalist Authoritarian Leader”
Karsten Brüggemann (University of Tallinn) “On the Interplay of Soviet Internationalism and Estonian Nationalism in the ESSR”

12:30-2:30 PM ET Panel 5 | Contemporary Trends in Intra-Ethnic Relations
Chair: Tomas Balkelis (Lithuanian Institute of History)

Ammon Cheskin (University of Glasgow) “New Categories of Analysis and Avenues of Research in Inter-Ethnic Relations in the Baltic”
Mārtiņš Kaprāns (University of Latvia) “Crossing Symbolic Boundaries: Can Precarity Bring Latvians and Russophones Closer Together?”
Vello Pettai (European Centre for Minority Issues) “Minorities and E-Governance”

3:00 PM ET Concluding Remarks and Discussion