Acta Historica Universitatis Klaipedensis

The subject of this research is feminine gender roles in Kristina Sabaliauskaitė’s Silva rerum and Kerstin Thorvall’s The Story of Signe. The aim of the thesis is to identify the most common traditional and non-traditional gender roles of women in historical literary narratives by two women writers. The study identifies six gender roles of women: four traditional (mother and wife, daughter and care-giver/housewife), and two non-traditional (adventurer and competitor). The research shows that in historical literary narratives, despite the space-time of the novels, the main semantic axis remains the traditional gender roles of women. The failure to fulfil traditional gender roles determines the emergence of non-traditional gender roles, and a negative impact on the state of women in the novels.

Historians have so far analysed the historical narrative used for modern Lithuanian nation-building in terms of its structure, the main storylines and images, and the most important historical figures rooted in it. Previous studies have revealed how the narrative was constructed. However, less research has been done on how it was received by individual social groups. The article analyses the Lithuanian historical narrative promoted by partisans who participated in the anti-Soviet armed resistance in 1944–1953. The author discusses how the narrative was used to strengthen and perpetuate the struggle, and looks for connections between the organisational unification of the guerrilla fighters and their relationship with historical images and figures. She provides an outline of interpretations of history presented in writings by partisans of various ranks, and reveals features of the historical awareness of the resistance fighters. The main sources used for the research were publications (proclamations, bulletins, periodicals, etc) issued by the partisans. In addition, the author examines the pseudonyms used by 935 fighters, and the names that were given to their organisational units. Data from all three anti-Soviet resistance areas, southern, eastern and western Lithuania, are analysed.

The paper discusses different appropriation strategies applied to the same historical region of East Prussia. By dating the beginning of the symbolic appropriation to the early 19th century, the author reviews the strategies, first applied by Germans and Poles, and later also by Lithuanians and Russians, to make East Prussia or their respective part (Warmia and Masuria, Lithuania Minor, and the Kaliningrad Oblast) their own. This is demonstrated by several periods, starting with the situation before 1914, the First World War, the interwar period, and the Second World War, when East Prussia still existed; and finishing with the postwar period and the changes after 1989. A distinction is made between national and regional East Prussia appropriation strategies, as well as different levels of the process, i.e. publicistic (literary) and practical.

The article deals with the settling down process of the newcomers to post-war Olsztyn, i. e. their efforts to develop their own relationship with the environment of the place of residence they arrived in from other territories. The author believes that the “national” (Polish) version of reading of the past of the city that took root in the Soviet years and that neglected the regional specificities of Warmia and Masuria served as one of the major stimuli accounting for the settlers’ formation of meaningful relationships with Olsztyn. By comparing the meanings used in the formation of relationships in the periods before and after 1989, the author demonstrates that the said “national” version of reading the past of the city presently co-exists with the efforts to popularize regional history and the multiculturalism of the past of Warmia and Masuria.

The aim of the article is to present theoretical interpretation of the concept of Lithuania Minor as a Lithuanian memory site in the contemporary Lithuanian historical narative. The principal attention in the article is focussed on theoretical aspects that allow understanding the prerequisites of ideological receptions of the region of Lithuania Minor in the discourse of Lithuanian memory culture. From the empirical viewpoint, the content of stereotypes, images, and plots that realise the concept of Lithuania Minor as a Lithuanian memory site is analysed.