Libraries and Societies of Ukrainian Political Emigration at the Balkans in the Interwar Period Cover Image

Бібліотеки і клуби української політичної еміграції на Балканах у міжвоєнний період
Libraries and Societies of Ukrainian Political Emigration at the Balkans in the Interwar Period

Author(s): Valeriy Vlasenko
Subject(s): Cultural history, Social history, Interwar Period (1920 - 1939)
Published by: Филозофски факултет, Универзитет у Новом Саду
Keywords: Bulgaria; library; Romania; society; Ukrainian emigration; Yugoslavia

Summary/Abstract: Ukrainian political interwar emigration in the Balkans was formed as a result of three waves of emigration by sea, consisting of the White forces of A. Denikin and P. Wrangel, and by land as a part of the Army of the UNR and Ukrainian insurgent groups. In the early 1920s, it created a network of public organizations. Societies and libraries were created to meet the cultural and educational needs of emigrants. They existed as separate institutions or structural units of public organizations. The board of a community or company was required to have the librarian’s position. Societies were multi-profile institutions of Ukrainian emigrants. Thus, in the capital of Bulgaria there was a society “Ukrainska Khata” [Ukrainian Hut] where a dining room, a shelter for disabled people and patients, craft workshops, a cultural and educational clubs, library, justices of Ukrainian public organizations in Sofia were placed. Funds of libraries were formed mainly through the supply of books and periodicals by representatives of the Minister of War of the UPR in the Balkans V. Fylonovych and by H. Porokhivskyi in Romania, the conservative hetman and radical nationalist environment, editions of certain Ukrainian periodicals and material support of the ambassadors of Poland in Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. Usually libraries and societies acted according to their own statutes and rules. These cultural institutions promoted adaptation of Ukrainian emigrants to the new conditions of life and the preservation of their national identity.

  • Issue Year: 2018
  • Issue No: 2
  • Page Range: 188-199
  • Page Count: 12
  • Language: Ukrainian