Every city’s monument, street name or museum creates its local cultural memory. This memory is a constant process of destroying and building, losing and finding, forgetting and remembering. Memory is not only about remembering, it is also about forgetting or not- remembering.
A city’s memory is the memory of its inhabitants belonging to different generations, social groups and ethnic communities. It is not just a “representation of the past” but an important element of modernity, a tool of contemporary culture, a part of identity construction processes or even a battlefield for information warfare. What creates the cultural memory of Vilnius and other cities? How are memory politics performed in Lithuania and the United States? What does the city remember, and what has long been forgotten?
We cordially invite you to a public conversation with dr. Krista Hegburg, an anthropologist and researcher at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, about memory and its representations in the city. The discussion will be moderated by Anna Pilarczyk-Palaitis, a doctoral student in anthropology at VMU and researcher of the memory processes of national minorities in Lithuania. The event will take place in September 15th, at 6:30 PM, at Vilnius Museum.
The event is organized by Lithuanian Anthropological Association, together with Vilnius Museum, Multicultural center “Padėk pritapti” and Roma Community Center. It is co-funded by the United States Embassy in Lithuania and Baltic-American Freedom Foundation.