Jewish Life in the Baltic Region Before, During, and After the Holocaust
Monday, September 2 - Thursday, September 5, 2024
The Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM), the Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Latvia, and the Museum “Jews in Latvia” are pleased to hold an international conference entitled, "Jewish Life in the Baltic Region Before, During, and After the Holocaust." The conference is scheduled for September 2-5, 2024, in Riga, Latvia.
The conference will focus on all aspects of Jewish life as it existed in the Baltic region before, during, and after the Holocaust on topics which include, but are not limited to, culture, art, politics, literature, religion, music, photography, history, law, philosophy, restitution, memory, family studies, and material culture. All aspects of Jewish life that existed in the region from the beginning of the 20th century up until the present will be considered, though emphasis will be given to those topics that address how the Holocaust impacted Jewish life.
All conference events are held in Riga local time. All meals and events on September 5, 2024, are for participants only. The conference will be conducted in English.
Register to attend the event live or virtually through our form.
Sunday, September 1
Arrival in Rīga and Check-In (Hilton Garden Inn Riga Old Town, Grecinieku 25)
Monday, September 2
University of Latvia (Raiņa bulvāris 19), Small Hall
9:00-9:30 — Conference introductions
Gundars Bērziņš, Rector of the University of Latvia
Paul Brummell, Ambassador of Great Britain to Latvia
Anna Ullrich, Director of International Academic Programs at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
9:30-10:30 — Andrii Rukkas, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, “The Repatriation of Baltic Jews - Forced Deportees, Evacuees and Refugees of WWI from Soviet Ukraine in the Early 1920s: General Process and Specific Life Trajectories”
Moderator: Daniel Newman, Program Officer in International Academic Programs at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
10:30-11:00 — COFFEE BREAK
11:00-12:00 — Tobias Brinkmann, Pennsylvania State University, “Safe Haven: Jewish Refugees and Migrants in the “Free City” of Danzig”
Moderator: Daniel Newman, Program Officer in International Academic Programs at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
12:00-13:00 — Tzipora Weinberg, New York University, “Bet Jakob Journals Reveal a Nascent Culture of Orthodox Womanhood in Lithuania”
Moderator: Daniel Newman, Program Officer in International Academic Programs at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
13:00-14:00 — LUNCH
14:00-15:00 — Lara Lempertienė, National Library of Lithuania, “The YIVO in the Years of the First Soviet Occupation of Lithuania (1940-1941)”
Moderator: Ilya Lensky, Director of the Museum “Jews in Latvia”
15:00-16:00 — Stanislovas Stasiulis, Lithuanian Institute of History, “Between Inherited and Imposed: Antisemitism and Linguistic Violence in Nazi-Occupied Lithuania, 1941-1944”
Moderator: Ilya Lensky, Director of the Museum “Jews in Latvia”
16:00-17:00 — Panel Discussion on “The Idea of Museums of Jewish Life in Small Towns”
17:00-18:30 — Reception at University of Latvia, Raiņa bulvāris 19
Tuesday, September 3
University of Latvia (Raiņa bulvāris 19), Small Hall
9:00-10:00 — Christoph Dieckmann, University of Haifa, “Trapped. Jewish life in ghettos in Lithuania 1941-1944
Moderator: Svetlana Pogodina, Centre for Judaic Studies, University of Latvia
10:00-10:30 — COFFEE BREAK
10:30-11:30 — Alisa Miller, Vilnius University, “Role of Judenrat: Different Perceptions of Vilnius and Kaunas Jewish Councils”
Moderator: Svetlana Pogodina, Centre for Judaic Studies, University of Latvia
11:30-12:30 — Andrea Löw, Leibniz Institute for Contemporary History, Munich, “"Always with One Foot in the Grave": Experiences of German Jews deported to Riga: Ghetto, Camps, Survival”
Moderator: Svetlana Pogodina, Centre for Judaic Studies, University of Latvia
12:30-13:30 — LUNCH
13:30-14:30 — Konstantin Fuks, Independent Scholar, “Forging the First Awareness of the Holocaust: How Did Latvian Jewish Red Army Soldiers Learn about the Nazi Atrocities in their Homeland?”
Moderator: Arkadi Zeltser, Director of the Moshe Mirilashvili Center for Research on the Holocaust in the Soviet Union of the International Institute for Holocaust Research, Yad Vashem
14:30-15:30 — Serafima Velkovich, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, “I Can’t Rest Until I Have Done Everything I Can to Save the Remnant”: How Latvian and Lithuanian Jews Escaped Totalitarian Regime Using Polish Documents Just After the Holocaust”
Moderator: Arkadi Zeltser, Director of the Moshe Mirilashvili Center for Research on the Holocaust in the Soviet Union of the International Institute for Holocaust Research, Yad Vashem
15:30-16:00 — EHRI Presentation by Ines Koeltzsch , Vienna Wiesenthal Institute for Holocaust Studies
16:00-16:15 — USHMM Presentation by Anna Ullrich, Director of International Academic Programs at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
16:45-17:45 — (optional) Book Presentation at the Museum “Jews in Latvia”
17:45-19:00 — (optional) Reception at the Museum “Jews in Latvia”
Wednesday, September 4
University of Latvia (Raiņa bulvāris 19), Small Hall
9:00-10:00 — Markus Roth, Fritz Bauer Institute, “YIVO in Munich? – The Journal “Fun letstn khurbn” as a Memory Project of Jewish Life, Resistance, and Suffering of Baltic Jews during the Holocaust”
Moderator: Elina Vasiljeva, Professor in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Daugavpils University
10:00-10:30 — COFFEE BREAK
10:30-11:30 — Eliyana Adler, Binghamton University, “The Collective Memorial Books of Baltic Jewry”
Moderator: Elina Vasiljeva, Professor in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Daugavpils University
11:30-12:30 — Maria Kaspina, Central Archive of Jewish History in Jerusalem, “Riga's Holocaust Survivor's Stable Narrative and Memorialization”
Moderator: Elina Vasiljeva, Professor in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Daugavpils University
12:30-13:30 — LUNCH
13:30-14:30 — Elena Beletckaia, Heidelberg University of Jewish Studies, “Sentimental Echoes: The Notion of Home in Holocaust Survivors' Testimonies of the Baltic Region”
Moderator: Didzis Bērziņš, Lecturer, Centre for Judaic Studies, University of Latvia
14:30-15:30 — Benjamin Arenstein, University of Chicago, “Language and Underground Jewish Reading in Riga”
Moderator: Didzis Bērziņš, Lecturer, Centre for Judaic Studies, University of Latvia
16:30-18:00 — Panel on Jewish Press in National Library of Latvia with Participation of Eyal Miller from the National Library of Israel
Moderator: Ilya Lensky, Director of the Museum “Jews in Latvia”
Thursday, September 5
Starting at 9:00 — Mr. Ilya Lensky of the Museum “Jews in Latvia” will lead a guided tour through Holocaust sites and sites of Jewish heritage in and around Riga, including Rumbula, the Salaspils Memorial, Biķernieki Forest, KZ Jungfernhof Concentration Camp, and other sites as time permits
Friday, September 6
Checkout from Hotel and Departure from Rīga
Questions should be directed to USHMM Program Officer Dan Newman: danewman@ushmm.org.
This conference has been made possible through the generosity of Sheila Johnson Robbins*, George D. Schwab, Selwyn Haas, and Arkady Suharenko.
* Deceased
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