LIETUVOS RESPUBLIKA

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LIETUVOS RESPUBLIKA

• LITHUANIA
• LITAUEN

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THEMES

• PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE
• ECONOMIC OVERVIEW
• ORIGINS
• EAST or WEST?
• IDENTITY Language Religion
• VALUES

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PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE

• Father Lithuanian (born in Lithuania)
• Mother Polish (born in USA, her parents in
  Hapsburg Galicia)
• Child of RZECZPOSPOLITA
  Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1569-1795)
• Child of Lithuanian Diaspora - 1944

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RZECZPOSPOLITA

• Personal Union Jagellonian Dynasty (1386-1572)
• Union of Lublin - 1569
• Official Languages Latin, Polish
• Established Church Roman Catholic
• Head of State King of Poland, Grand Duke of
  Lithuania

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LITHUANIAN DIASPORA

• First Soviet Invasion Annexation 1940
• Nazi Invasion 1941
• Second Soviet Invasion 1944
• Refugees fled to Germany as Red Army advanced
• DP camps in Germany Displaced Person

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FAMILY HISTORY

• Father fled west in 1944
• Family deported to Siberia in 1949 (one sister
  remained)
• Grandmother died in 1976
• First contact established by letter in 1978
• First telephone call in 1979
• First visit to Lithuania in 1981
• Father returned in 1982, 1989

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THEMES

• PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE
• ECONOMIC OVERVIEW
• ORIGINS
• EAST or WEST?
• IDENTITY Language Religion
• VALUES

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ECONOMIC OVERVIEW
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THEMES

• PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE
• ECONOMIC OVERVIEW
• ORIGINS
• EAST or WEST?
• IDENTITY Language Religion
• VALUES

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ORIGINS

• Baltic group of nations moved to the Baltic
  region around 3000 B.C. from beyond the Volga
  region of central Russia
• Language is Indo-European
• By 900 A.D. had split into separate language
  groups Prussian, Lithuanian, Latvian
• Lithuanian is Oldest living language close to
  Sanskrit

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THEMES

• PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE
• ECONOMIC OVERVIEW
• ORIGINS
• EAST or WEST?
• IDENTITY Language Religion
• VALUES

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EAST or WEST?

• Lithuania was on the eastern fringe of Europe
• Poland converted to Roman Catholicism in 966 A.D.
  (Mieszko I)
• Rus (Kiev) converted to Orthodoxy in 988 A.D.
  (Vladimir I)
• Teutonic Knights invited to Mazovia by Konrad I
  in 1226 to defend Mazovias borders and subdue
  the pagan Prussians

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EAST or WEST?

• Lithuania remained pagan with Catholicism to the
  West, and Orthodoxy to the East
• Mindaugus united Lithuanian tribes around 1230
• Mindaugas converted to Catholicisim in 1251,
  crowned king in 1253

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EAST or WEST?

• Mindaugas sought co-existence with Teutonic
  Knights, access to western Europe
• Lithuanian nobles disagreed Mindaugas killed
• Successors to Mindaugas looked for expansion to
  the Slavic east

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EAST or WEST?

• Lithuania was a kingdom of Lithuanians and Slavs
• Pagans and Orthodox Christians
• Jogailo (Jagiello) became Grand Duke in 1377 and
  faced the fundamental question of whether to look
  to the East or to the West

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EAST or WEST?

• Teutonic Knights raison detre was to convert
  the pagan Lithuanians
• Polish King, Louis dAnjou, died of syphilis in
  1382
• Jogailo chose the West and united with Poland
  through marriage
• In 1386, Jadwiga was married at the age of 12 to
  Jogailo, then 36 years old

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EAST or WEST?

• Jogailo became King of Poland and converted to
  Catholicism
• His cousin, Vytautas, became Grand Duke of
  Lithuania
• Teutonic Knights continued to pressure Lithuania
• 1410 Battle of Grunwald, Jogailo and Vytautas
  defeat the Teutonic Knights

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EAST or WEST?

• Polish nobility resisted efforts for Vytautas to
  be crowned King of Lithuania
• Following Vytautas death in 1430, Jagellonian
  dynasty ruled Lithuania until the death of
  Sigismund II Augustus in 1572
• Polish king was elected, but Grand Duke of
  Lithuania was hereditary

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EAST or WEST?

• Union of Lublin 1569 created the
  Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth or RZECZPOSPOLITA
• Grain trade with Hanseatic league
• Poland/Lithuania exported grain to Amsterdam
• Eastern Europe remained agricultural, while
  Western Europe began to industrialize

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EAST or WEST?

• Elected king, weak central authority, power in
  hands of the nobility
• Sigismund III elected King of Poland in 1587, son
  of John III of Sweden and Catherine, sister of
  Sigismund II
• United Vasa and Jagellonian dynasties

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EAST or WEST?

• Sigismund III crowned King of Sweden in 1594
• Ruled Sweden under a regent, his paternal uncle
  Charles
• Charles took full control of Sweden, rebelled
  against Sigismund III ostensibly because
  Sigismund III might re-Catholicize Sweden
• Sigismund III deposed as Swedish king in 1599
• Charles IX crowned King of Sweden

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EAST or WEST?

• Vasa dynasty continued in Poland
• Wladislaus IV Vasa (1632-1648)
• John II Casimir Vasa ruled during The Deluge,
  war with Sweden
• Sweden captured almost the entire territory of
  Poland

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EAST or WEST?

• John II Casimir Vasa forced to renounce his
  claims to the Swedish throne in 1660 and
  acknowledged Swedish sovereignty over Livonia and
  Riga
• John abdicated the Polish throne in 1668
• John returned to France, joined the Jesuits, and
  died a monk in 1672

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EAST or WEST?

• Poland/Lithuania continued to elect its
  King/Grand Duke
• John III Sobieski ruled from 1674 to 1696
• Defeated the Ottoman Turks at the gates of Vienna
  in 1683 when he led Polish, Austrian and German
  troops
• Ottoman threat to Western Europe was ended

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EAST or WEST?

• Central authority in Poland/Lithuania remained
  weak
• In neighboring countries, growing centralized
  authority and power in Prussia, Russia, and
  Austria
• Poland/Lithuania was partitioned out of existence
  in 3 partitions ending in 1795

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EAST or WEST?

• Lithuania was absorbed into Czarist Russia
• Lithuanian schools forbidden, Latin script
  outlawed
• Roman Catholic church suppressed
• Restrictive policies failed to extinguish
  cultural institutions and language

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EAST or WEST?

• National awakening in 1880s led by secular and
  clerical intelligentsia
• Demands for self-government
• 1905 Lithuania was the first Russian province
  to demand autonomy
• Publishing in Lithuanian language continued in
  Lithuania Minor (Prussia)

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EAST or WEST?

• World War I led to collapse of German and Russian
  empires
• Lithuania declared independence in 1918
• Border war with Poland, also newly independent
• Poland seizes Vilnius in 1920, Kaunas becomes
  provisional capital
• Lenin renounces claims to Lithuania forever in
  1920

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EAST or WEST?

• Interwar Lithuania 1918-1940
• Highly agricultural (87 farmers)
• Almost 1/3 of population illiterate
• Progressive land reform in 1922
• 1926 coup detat by Smetona, established
  authoritarian regime
• Political parties outlawed, press censored

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EAST or WEST?

• 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop pact
• Nazi and Soviet spheres of influence
• In October 1939, Soviet Union forced a
  non-aggression pact on Lithuania and stationed
  20,000 troops in the country
• Vilnius returned to Lithuania

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EAST or WEST?

• June 1940 Red Army invades Lithuania
• July 1940 newly elected Parliament declared
  Soviet rule
• August 1940 Lithuania incorporated into CCCP as
  Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic
• June 14, 1941 Deportations to Siberia, more
  than 30,000 people in a single night

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EAST or WEST?

• Stalinist purges interrupted by Nazi invasion on
  June 22, 1941
• Underground resistance
• Lithuanians sent to Germany to work as laborers
• Soviet Red Army retakes Lithuania in 1944,
  Klaipeda (Memel) in January 1945

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EAST or WEST?

• Armed resistance to Soviet rule by partisans from
  1944 to 1952
• Soviet rule imposed
• Monopoly of power by communist party
• Deportations to Siberia
• Suppression of religion
• Intense Russification

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EAST or WEST?

• 1988 first celebration of Lithuanian
  Independence Day (February 16)
• Formation of Sajudis (Movement)
• Lithuanian sovereignty proclaimed in May 1989
• August 23, 1989 Baltijos kelias, human chain
  from Tallinn-Riga-Vilnius

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EAST or WEST?

• Declaration of Independence March 11, 1990
• Moscow imposes economic blockade
• January 13, 1991 Soviet tanks attack
  demonstrators at TV tower, 13 killed
• August 21, 1991 Soviet putsch against Gorbachev
• September 16, 1991 Moscow recognizes Lithuanian
  independence

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EAST or WEST?

• Russian troop withdrawal by August 1993
• Lithuania re-establishes the functions of
  government
• Hyperinflation, talonas as temporary currency,
  introduction of litas
• Early stage of transition to market economy

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EAST or WEST?

• Late 1990s Lithuania introduces reforms to
  qualify for EU membership
• Russian crisis in 1998 causes recession
• Trade patterns shift from East to West
• Massive foreign investment inflows into Lithuania
  as telecoms, banks, breweries are taken over by
  foreign firms

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EAST or WEST?

• Lithuania votes to join EU by referendum
• Accession to EU on May 1, 2004
• Depopulation of Lithuania, from 3.7 million to
  under 3.5 million
• Emigration to UK, Ireland

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EAST or WEST?

• Neither East nor West prior to 1386, 1918-1940,
  1991-2004
• West 1386-1795, 2004-present
• East 1795-1918, 1940-1991

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THEMES

• PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE
• ECONOMIC OVERVIEW
• ORIGINS
• EAST or WEST?
• IDENTITY Language Religion
• VALUES

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IDENTITY

• LANGUAGE
• 81 Lithuanian
• 9 Russian
• 7 Polish
• 2 other
• 1 Byelorussian

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IDENTITY

• LANGUAGE
• Lithuania granted citizenship to all upon
  collapse of Soviet Union
• No language requirement for citizenship
• Unlike Latvia and Estonia, no large groups of
  non-citizens

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IDENTITY

• LANGUAGE
• Russian widely spoken under Soviet rule
• Younger generation does not speak Russian
• English is taught, but only a minority of youth
  are fluent
• Television shows are dubbed, not subtitled

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IDENTITY

• LANGUAGE
• Lithuanian language is dominant
• News coverage in Russian and Polish for
  linguistic minorities
• Ethnic Russians are sending their children to
  Lithuanian-language day care

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IDENTITY

• CULTURE
• Dainu Svente Lithuanian song festival held
  every 5 years
• Focal point for cultural expression
• In 1990, song festival ended to chants of
  Lietuva, Lietuva

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IDENTITY

• RELIGION
• During Czarist rule, religion provided a focal
  point for national identity in both Lithuania and
  Poland
• Under Soviet occupation, religion was suppressed
• Chronicle of the Catholic Church samizdat
  publication

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IDENTITY

• RELIGION
• Church no longer dominates Lithuanian life
• Lithuanian society increasingly secular
• Little interest among youth in religion
• Akropolis largest shopping center in Vilnius
  is the new religion

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THEMES

• PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE
• ECONOMIC OVERVIEW
• ORIGINS
• EAST or WEST?
• IDENTITY Language Religion
• VALUES

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VALUES

• Rush to consumerism
• Large income inequality in a society where
  previously there was little difference in incomes
• Checkout lines Media Kaunas versus Hemköp
  Göteborg
• organic versus packaged

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VALUES

• Dream of the restoration of Lithuanian
  independence
• Deportees returned to Lithuania from Siberia in
  early 1990s
• Massive emigration from Lithuania by jaunimai
  today