International Lithuania Congress – Lecture by AE member Prof. Bonifacas Stundžia,

DATE: May 22-24, 2017

VENUE: Faculty of Law, Administration and Economics | ul. Uniwersytecka 7-10

The International Lithuania Congress is a cyclical event combining academic panels, expert debates, and cultural events. Its main aim is to bring together representatives of many disciplines (law, political science, international relations, European studies, sociology, linguistics, as well as cultural and literary studies) whose research deals with Lithuanian issues in a broader geopolitical context. The organisers are the University of Wrocław, the “Labas” Lithuanian Studies Club, and the Pobliza Foundation. Its previous editions (held in 2013, 2014, and 2015) saw almost 100 speakers (students, doctoral students, PhD’s, and professors) representing twelve Polish and eleven foreign scientific centres.

The fourth edition, held from the 22nd to the 24th of May 2017, was devoted to three symbolic topics constituting the general themes of this year’s Congress.
Firstly, it was the Year of Culture of the Lithuanian Language, as announced by the Lithuanian Seimas. The uniqueness of the Lithuanian language and its special importance to Lithuanian society was stressed in various forms, including a lecture delivered by a Member of Academia Europaea, Prof. Bonifacas Stundžia, a well-known Lithuanian linguist.

Secondly, the year 2017 also marked the 25th anniversary of the adoption of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania and the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. Well-known constitutional experts debated on the role of these documents, which are central to the legal orders of both countries. The participants in the debate were Prof. Toma Birmontienė (former member of the Lithuanian Constitutional Court); Prof. Danutė Jočienė (current member of the Lithuanian Constitutional Court), and Prof. Leon Kieres (current member of the Polish Constitutional Tribunal, former president of the Institute of National Remembrance).

Thirdly, it was important to stress the heritage of Algirdas J. Greimas – a semiotician of Lithuanian descent, renowned literary scientist, and linguist – on the 100th anniversary of his birth and the 25th anniversary of his passing. As part of this section, a lecture was delivered by Mindaguas Kvietkauskas PhD, Head of the Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore in Vilnius.
The academic part of the IV International Lithuania Congress was accompanied by cultural events open to the public. Those included a concert of a Lithuanian jazz duo Dmitrij Golovanov and Veronica ChiChi (May 22, “Stary Klasztor” music pub), the opening of Liudas Parulskis’ exhibition “Baroque and Concrete”, a meeting with Edwin Bendyk dedicated to the memory of Prof. Leonidas Donskis, as well as, a screening of Giedrė Žickytė’s film entitled “How We Played the Revolution”, which presented the Lithuanian transformation process (May 23, Zajezdnia History Centre). The cultural events were co-organised with Rasa Rimickaitė, Cultural Attaché of the Republic of Lithuania to the Republic of Poland.

The event was held under the honorary patronage of Rafał Dutkiewicz, Mayor of the city of Wrocław; Tomasz Kosoń – Honorary Consul of the Republic of Lithuania in Wrocław; Prof. Adam Jezierski, Rector of the University of Wrocław; Prof. Algidras Gaižutis, Rector of the Lithuanian University of Educational Sciences; as well as Prof. Jan Miodek, a Polish linguist and former Head of the Institute of Polish Philology at the University of Wrocław. The media patronage was provided by the magazine New Eastern Europe (Nowa Europa Wschodnia) and the online portals przegladbaltycki.pl; zw.lt, and alkas.lt.

The partners of the event were Academia Europaea Wrocław Knowledge Hub; the Jan Nowak-Jezioranski College of Eastern Europe in Wrocław; the Konrad Adenauer Foundation; the Lithuanian University of Educational Sciences; the Mykolas Romeris University; the Regional Centre for International Debate in Wrocław, and Zajezdnia History Centre.

The programme is available here.