Journal:Acta Historica Universitatis Klaipedensis
Volume 40 (2020): The Anti-Soviet Resistance: New Approaches to the Lithuanian Partisan War = Antisovietinė rezistencija Lietuvoje: partizaninio karo tyrimų naujos prieigos, pp. 25–67
Abstract
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.
This paper deals with the processes of identity reconstitution for descendants of Jewish emigrants from the Baltic and Central Europe, and with the current relationships they have with these regions. Considering their practices of identity reconnexion which are part of identity re-registration processes, the attention is centered on the individual and collective identity economies existing in victims’ families, and on the social interactions increasing in the context of the institutional politics concerning the Baltic and Central Europe. Many descendants of victims begin nowadays to come more and more to zones where their families lived, and not only to the extermination places. They try to find all that happened in the social history of their family before and during the Holocaust, and also what occurred for the Jews in these territories during the Soviet domination. They seek there the past and current presence of their cultural and historical heritage, which is also one of the important components of the European inheritance.