1919: Memory of Vilnius – memory in Vilnius Cover Image

Rok 1919: pamięć Wilna – pamięć w Wilnie
1919: Memory of Vilnius – memory in Vilnius

Author(s): Walentyna Krupowies
Subject(s): Cultural history, Higher Education , Rural and urban sociology, Sociology of Culture, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Politics of History/Memory
Published by: Instytut Slawistyki Polskiej Akademii Nauk
Keywords: Stefan Batory University; Ferdynand Ruszczyc; individual memory; family memory; cultural memory;

Summary/Abstract: This article applies the framework of three types of memory – individual, communicative and cultural – as an effective tool for describing the phenomenon of “circulation” of the content of memory in communities of memory. I approach the Polish community in Vilnius, especially the intelligentsia, as a community of memory, and show how the three forms of memory were activated at a particular historical time. I argue that the year 1919 and the time of reviving Vilnius University was crucial for the transfer of the content of communicative memory in general, and family memory in particular, to cultural memory. The effort to revive the university was directly related to the restoration of cultural memory in the urban landscape of Vilnius. The person who played the main role in this process was Ferdynand Ruszczyc, the artistic supervisor of revitalisation of university buildings, the author of toponyms and the key figure of cultural life of the city at the time.

  • Issue Year: 2018
  • Issue No: 42
  • Page Range: 81-98
  • Page Count: 18
  • Language: Polish