Arvydas Ramonas. Krikščioniškoji eschatologija. Doktrina apie mirtį ir paskutiniuosius dalykus. Klaipėda: Klaipėdos universiteto leidykla, 2016. 404 p.
The analysis of the pre-Christian Baltic culture, in the centre of which there is a pagan religious logic, reveals the issue of credibility of its records. Therefore, the article attempts to review and to verify mythical material directly related to fir tree and pear tree, described by Matthaeus Praetorius (Matthäus Prätorius) in his manuscript “Deliciae Prussicae or Prussian Theater” (Deliciae Prussicae, oder Preussische Schaubühne, the end of the17th century). In parallel with this, the article discusses interpretations by more significant researchers of the 19th–21st centuries who were concerned with Praetorius’s mythical material on fir tree and pear tree. The context of the researches of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries has shown that the researchers of earlier periods did not consider the question of reliability of Matthaeus Praetorius’s mythical material. The present research also allowed to trace the varying tendency of reliability of Praetorius’s described mythical data directly related to fir tree and pear tree.
The article deals with the construction of a frame-based scenario model of national cooperative communicative behavior as a cognitively semiotic and discursively pragmatic phenomenon in Ukrainian, Russian, Lithuanian and American linguocultures. The slot organization of the script of the national cooperative communicative behavior has been determined and characterized based on the discursive practices as the sign structures of the communicative consciousness of Ukrainians, Russians, Lithuanians and Americans.
The ethno-linguistic origins of formation of miсrotoponymy of Sloviansk area and its regional features are explores in the article; the author states that an overwhelming number of language units have Turkic origin; as it turns out the Sloviansk toponymic nominations are its archaic and established layer of the vocabulary where “preserved” the coherent linguoethnogeographic story of analyzed lands.
The article analyzes the links between the hymnals of Prussian Lithuanians (M. Mažvydas, B. Vilentas, A. F. Šimelpenigis and others) and local German publications until 1750. It is assumed that the Prussian Lithuanians prepared their official hymns by using books relied on indigenous Germans. The main conclusion was that Prussia and all diferent national groups had a common treasure of hymns, which could be freely adjusted and supplemented.
This article presents a research concluded in 2016, which aimed to unveil how social and cultural issues were represented in Lithuanian rap music. The research shows that social, political and valuable reflections of the state and people are the most reflected by rap texts. It is revealed that rap music helps not only to evaluate, analyze phenomena in the country, but also helps to change, rebuild, and understand them. Research on rap lyrics helps to understand the attitude of hip-hop subculture members towards different events and at the same time look at them from another perspective.
he article sheds light on the importance of Candlemas candle as a subject apotropei. The emphasis is laid on the magical actions related to the protection of an individual and the specific protection of the common living space (home, farmstead). The suggested conclusions concern apotropei functions of Candlemas candles and transformation of the symbolic forms of protection in the second half of the XX – early XXI cent. The main provisions of the article are illustrated with the materials collected in the course of ethnographical expeditions.
The article examines the letters of Kleofas Jurgelionis (1886–1963; Kleopas Jurgelionis, USA – Ray Jurgen), who was a moderniser of Lithuanian poetry, a literary critic, a translator, an editor of periodicals, publicist and lawyer, to Valerija Tysliavienė (1914–1984), who from 1938 to 1940 was a secretary of his newspaper “Tėvynė”, preserved at the Klaipėda University Library (KUB RSS). These letters (1949–1961) are very rich in content, in them the subject themes are abundantly weaved with courtship. This article discusses the topics of Jurgelionis’s letters to Tysliavienė. Taking into account the reasearch into Jurgelionis’s life and creative works and the KUB RSS archive and publications, this article sets out a twofold purpose: to discuss the content of Jurgelionis’s letters to Tysliaviene and to discuss poetry manuscripts and their publications with a textological lens.
First of all, this article discusses the general features of the letters, then the article touches upon the dominant topics in the letters. Another, co-stored material is used for interpreting the letters: dozens of letters from the poet to other people; a letter from Henrietta Jurgen, his third wife, to Tysliavienė; several poetry poems; manuscripts of articles revealing new details about his life and the origins of his creative work, his relationship with the Lithuanians in the USA, the activities of the Lithuanian Writers’ Society (USA), the behind the scenes look at the operations at the newspaper “Vienybė”, the cultural and social life of the emigrants, etc.; as well as a bundle of the American Lithuanian periodicals from the archive of “Vienybė”.
The article deals with the structural-genetic and cultural-genetic aspects of table evolution. Varieties, design features as a separate element, as well as element of the interior of the dwelling (stationary benches, mobile benches, small benches) have been analysed. The table in the Polissya dwelling performed originally a sacred-symbolic function as it was investigated in field material and written sources. Table played a role of a kind of a home altar. As a place for everyday eating table began to be used quite late. Table predecessors were stationary benches, mobile benches and small benches.