scholarly journals Przemiany narodowościowe na ziemi łotewskiej w XX i na początku XXI wieku

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Piotr Eberhardt

Ethnic Transformations on the Latvian Territory in the 20th Century and at the Beginning of the 21st CenturyThis paper presents demographic and ethnic transformations in the territory of Latvia. First, information is provided on the origins of the population of Latvian nationality. Then, ethnic composition of the population inhabiting the present-day Latvian territory at the end of the 19th century is characterised. The basis for the respective statistical analysis is constituted by the results of the Russian census of 1897. This census showed, side by side with the Latvian population, also important German, Russian, Jewish, and Polish minorities. The subsequent part of the paper is devoted to the ethnic situation in the interwar period. Here, the census carried out in 1935 is the main source of information. Essential demographic transformations took place during World War II. The paper accounts for the war losses, which in ethnic terms had a selective character. Latvian Jews were exterminated, while the remaining groups also suffered great losses. Then, the paper takes up the subject of the demographic-ethnic situation during the post-war Soviet occupation and the existence of the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic. In this period, numerous migrants from the farther-off territories of the Soviet Union moved to Latvia, these Russian-speaking migrants being primarily of Russian nationality. This resulted in the essential shift in the ethnic composition of the population in Latvia. The effects are reflected in the data from the Soviet censuses of 1959 and 1989. The results of these censuses are subject to interpretation in the paper. The last part of the article is devoted to ethnic changes in the sovereign Latvian state. Statistical and substantive analysis was carried out using the census data of the year 2000, and the estimated data from the year 2014. The contemporary ethnic structure of the entire country and in individual provinces was established. Przemiany narodowościowe na ziemi łotewskiej w XX i na początku XXI wiekuW artykule przedstawiono przemiany demograficzno-etniczne na ziemi łotewskiej. We wstępie podano informacje o rodowodzie ludności narodowości łotewskiej. Następnie zaprezentowano i scharakteryzowano skład narodowościowy na współczesnym terytorium państwa łotewskiego w końcu XIX wieku. Podstawą analizy statystycznej były rezultaty spisu rosyjskiego z 1897 roku. Ujawnił on oprócz Łotyszy liczną mniejszość niemiecką, rosyjską, żydowską i polską. Kolejna część publikacji poświęcona jest sytuacji narodowościowej w okresie międzywojennym w niepodległym państwie łotewskim. Wykorzystano tu głównie spis przeprowadzony w 1935 roku. Poważne przeobrażenia demograficzne miały miejsce w latach II wojny światowej. Określono straty wojenne, które miały charakter selektywny w ujęciu narodowościowym. Przyniosły one eksterminację łotewskich Żydów oraz duże straty wśród pozostałych grup etnicznych. Dalsza część artykułu dotyczy sytuacji demograficzno-narodowościowej w okresie powojennej okupacji sowieckiej i istnienia Łotewskiej SRS. W tym czasie napłynęło na terytorium Łotwy wielu migrantów z głębi ZSRR. Była to ludność rosyjskojęzyczna, głównie narodowości rosyjskiej. Doprowadziło to do istotnej zmiany składu narodowościowego kraju. Odnotowały to spisy sowieckie z lat 1959 i 1989. Ich wyniki poddano interpretacji. Ostatnia część artykułu poświęcona jest zmianom narodowościowym zachodzącym już w suwerennym państwie łotewskim. Przeprowadzono analizę statystyczną i merytoryczną, korzystając z danych spisowych z 2000 roku oraz danych szacunkowych z 2014 roku. Określono współczesną strukturę narodowościową w skali całego kraju i wybranych prowincji.

2016 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 25-88
Author(s):  
Łarysa Briuchowecka

POLAND IN UKRAINIAN CINEMAMultinational Ukraine in the time of Ukrainization conducted a policy which was supportive of the national identity, allowed the possibility of the cultural development of, among others, Jews, Crimean Tatars, and Poles. Cinema was exemplary of such policy, in 1925 through to the 1930s a number of films on Jewish and Crimean Tatar topics were released by Odessa and Yalta Film Studios. However, the Polish topic, which enjoyed most attention, was heavily politicized due to tensions between the USSR and the Second Commonwealth of Poland; the Soviet government could not forgive Poland the refusal to follow the Bolshevik path. The Polish topic was particularly painful for the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic due to the fact that the Western fringe of Ukrainian lands became a part of Poland according to the Treaty of Riga which was signed between Poland and Soviet Russia. This explains why Polish society was constantly denounced in the Ukrainian Soviet films The Shadows of Belvedere, 1927, Behind the Wall, 1928. Particular propagandistic significance in this case was allotted to the film PKP Piłsudski Kupyv Petliuru, Piłsudski Bought Petliura, 1926, which showed Poland subverting the stability of the Ukrainian SSR and reconstructed the episode of joint battles of Ukrainians and Poles against the Bolsheviks in the summer of 1920 as well as the Winter Campaign. The episodes of Ukrainian history were also shown on the screen during this favorable for cinema time, particularly in films Zvenyhora 1927 by Oleksandr Dovzhenko and a historical epopee Taras Triasylo 1927. The 1930s totalitarian cinema presented human being as an ideological construct. Dovzhenko strived to oppose this tendency in Shchors 1939 where head of the division Mykola Shchors is shown as a successor of Ivan Bohun, specifically in the scene set in the castle in which he fights with Polish warriors. Dovzhenko was also assigned by Soviet power to document the events of the autumn of 1939, when Soviet troops invaded Poland and annexed Western Ukraine. The episodes of “popular dedications” such as demonstrations, meetings, and elections constituted his journalistic documentary film Liberation 1940. A Russian filmmaker Abram Room while working in Kyiv Film Studios on the film Wind from the East 1941 did not spare on dark tones to denunciate Polish “exploiters” impersonated by countess Janina Pszezynska in her relation to Ukrainian peasant Khoma Habrys. Ihor Savchenko interpreted events of the 17th century according to the topic of that time in his historical film Bohdan Khmelnitsky 1941 where Poles and their acolytes were depicted as cruel and irreconcilable enemies of Ukrainian people both in terms of story and visual language, so that the national liberation war lead by Khmelnytsky appeared as a revenge against the oppressors. The Polish topic virtually disappeared from Ukrainian cinema from the post-war time up until the collapse of the Soviet Union. The minor exclusions from this tendency are Zigmund Kolossovsky, a film about a brave Polish secret service agent shot during the evacuation in 1945 and the later time adaptations of the theatre pieces The Morality of Mrs Dulska 1956 and Cracovians and Highlanders 1976. Filmmakers were able to return to the common Polish-Ukrainian history during the time of independence despite the economic decline of film production. A historical film Bohdan Zinoviy Khmelnitsky by Mykola Mashchenko was released in 2008. It follows the line of interpretation given to Khmelnitsky’s struggle with Polish powers by Norman Davies, according to whom the cause of this appraisal was the peasant fury combined with the actual social, political and religious injustices to Eastern provinces. The film shows how Khmelnitsky was able to win the battles but failed to govern and protect the independence of Hetmanate which he had founded. The tragedies experienced by Poland and Ukraine during the Second World War were shown in a feature film Iron Hundred 2004 by Oles Yanchuk based on the memoirs of Yuri Borets UPA in a Swirl of Struggle as well as in documentaries Bereza Kartuzka 2007, Volyn. The Sign of Disaster 2003 among others.Translated by Larisa Briuchowecka


2016 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 89-150
Author(s):  
Łarysa Briuchowecka

POLAND IN UKRAINIAN CINEMAMultinational Ukraine in the time of Ukrainization conducted a policy which was supportive of the national identity, allowed the possibility of the cultural development of, among others, Jews, Crimean Tatars, and Poles. Cinema was exemplary of such policy, in 1925 through to the 1930s a number of films on Jewish and Crimean Tatar topics were released by Odessa and Yalta Film Studios. However, the Polish topic, which enjoyed most attention, was heavily politicized due to tensions between the USSR and the Second Commonwealth of Poland; the Soviet government could not forgive Poland the refusal to follow the Bolshevik path. The Polish topic was particularly painful for the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic due to the fact that the Western fringe of Ukrainian lands became a part of Poland according to the Treaty of Riga which was signed between Poland and Soviet Russia. This explains why Polish society was constantly denounced in the Ukrainian Soviet films The Shadows of Belvedere, 1927, Behind the Wall, 1928. Particular propagandistic significance in this case was allotted to the film PKP Piłsudski Kupyv Petliuru, Piłsudski Bought Petliura, 1926, which showed Poland subverting the stability of the Ukrainian SSR and reconstructed the episode of joint battles of Ukrainians and Poles against the Bolsheviks in the summer of 1920 as well as the Winter Campaign. The episodes of Ukrainian history were also shown on the screen during this favorable for cinema time, particularly in films Zvenyhora 1927 by Oleksandr Dovzhenko and a historical epopee Taras Triasylo 1927. The 1930s totalitarian cinema presented human being as an ideological construct. Dovzhenko strived to oppose this tendency in Shchors 1939 where head of the division Mykola Shchors is shown as a successor of Ivan Bohun, specifically in the scene set in the castle in which he fights with Polish warriors. Dovzhenko was also assigned by Soviet power to document the events of the autumn of 1939, when Soviet troops invaded Poland and annexed Western Ukraine. The episodes of “popular dedications” such as demonstrations, meetings, and elections constituted his journalistic documentary film Liberation 1940. A Russian filmmaker Abram Room while working in Kyiv Film Studios on the film Wind from the East 1941 did not spare on dark tones to denunciate Polish “exploiters” impersonated by countess Janina Pszezynska in her relation to Ukrainian peasant Khoma Habrys. Ihor Savchenko interpreted events of the 17th century according to the topic of that time in his historical film Bohdan Khmelnitsky 1941 where Poles and their acolytes were depicted as cruel and irreconcilable enemies of Ukrainian people both in terms of story and visual language, so that the national liberation war lead by Khmelnytsky appeared as a revenge against the oppressors. The Polish topic virtually disappeared from Ukrainian cinema from the post-war time up until the collapse of the Soviet Union. The minor exclusions from this tendency are Zigmund Kolossovsky, a film about a brave Polish secret service agent shot during the evacuation in 1945 and the later time adaptations of the theatre pieces The Morality of Mrs Dulska 1956 and Cracovians and Highlanders 1976. Filmmakers were able to return to the common Polish-Ukrainian history during the time of independence despite the economic decline of film production. A historical film Bohdan Zinoviy Khmelnitsky by Mykola Mashchenko was released in 2008. It follows the line of interpretation given to Khmelnitsky’s struggle with Polish powers by Norman Davies, according to whom the cause of this appraisal was the peasant fury combined with the actual social, political and religious injustices to Eastern provinces. The film shows how Khmelnitsky was able to win the battles but failed to govern and protect the independence of Hetmanate which he had founded. The tragedies experienced by Poland and Ukraine during the Second World War were shown in a feature film Iron Hundred 2004 by Oles Yanchuk based on the memoirs of Yuri Borets UPA in a Swirl of Struggle as well as in documentaries Bereza Kartuzka 2007, Volyn. The Sign of Disaster 2003 among others.Translated by Larisa Briuchowecka


2021 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 69-110
Author(s):  
Grzegorz Hryciuk

The changes of political borders between Poland and the Soviet Union in 1944–1945 were accompanied by a relocation campaign lasting until autumn 1946 and affecting the Polish and Jewish populations of Eastern Galicia, Volhynia and Northern Bukovina. An agreement for mutual resettlement of Poles, Jews and Ukrainians, formally referred to as evacuation, was concluded on 9th September 1944 in Lublin between the Polish Committee of National Liberation and the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. The organisation of the relocation was entrusted to a special apparatus subordinated to evacuation representatives of both sides. The Chief Representative for the evacuation of the Polish and Jewish population from the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was based in Lutsk. Initially, he oversaw seventeen and then eighteen regional representatives in larger cities located in the so-called western oblasts of the Ukrainian SSR. Together with representatives of the Ukrainian side they were to carry out a registration campaign and organise transport for the relocated population and its possessions. The relocation apparatus began to be organised by a group of employees who arrived in Lutsk from Lublin in October 1944 with the first Representative, Stanisław Pizło. The process was viewed with distrust and hostility by the Poles, who were reluctant to leave their homeland. The several hundred staff of the resettlement apparatus struggled, similarly to the local population, with numerous problems relating to provisions and subsistence. The Soviet security services saw many officials working for the Representative as individuals hostile to the Soviet authorities. Consequently, Polish officials were quite often arrested, having been accused of collaborating with the Polish independence underground and of sabotaging the resettlement campaign. A lack of a sense of security led to a considerable staff turnover among the resettlement staff. As most of the people entitled to be evacuated from the various resettlement regions left, from the second half of 1945 the staff working for the evacuation apparatus were gradually dismissed. The transfer of population ended in November 1946 and the final protocol closing the post-war resettlements under the agreement of 9th September 1944 concluded between the Polish Committee of National Liberation and the government of the Ukrainian SSR was signed in May 1947.


Author(s):  
Ilkhomjon M. Saidov ◽  

The article is devoted to the participation of natives of the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic in the Baltic operation of 1944. The author states that Soviet historiography did not sufficiently address the problem of participation of individual peoples of the Soviet Union in the Great Patriotic War, and therefore their feat remained undervalued for a long time. More specifically, according to the author, 40–42% of the working age population of the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic fought on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War. Such figure was typical only for a limited number of countries participating in the anti-fascist coalition. Analyzing the participation of Soviet Uzbekistan citizens in the battles for the Baltic States, the author shows that the 51st and 71st guards rifle divisions, which included many natives of the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic, were particularly distinguished. Their heroic deeds were noted by the soviet leadership – a number of Uzbek guards were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. In addition, Uzbekistanis fought as part of partisan detachments – both in the Baltic States, Belarus, Ukraine, the Western regions of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and Moldova. Many Uzbek partisans were awarded the medal “Partisan of the Patriotic War” of I and II degrees.


2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-71
Author(s):  
Melissa Chakars

This article examines the All-Buryat Congress for the Spiritual Rebirth and Consolidation of the Nation that was held in the Buryat Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in February 1991. The congress met to discuss the future of the Buryats, a Mongolian people who live in southeastern Siberia, and to decide on what actions should be taken for the revival, development, and maintenance of their culture. Widespread elections were carried out in the Buryat lands in advance of the congress and voters selected 592 delegates. Delegates also came from other parts of the Soviet Union, as well as from Mongolia and China. Government administrators, Communist Party officials, members of new political parties like the Buryat-Mongolian People’s Party, and non-affiliated individuals shared their ideas and political agendas. Although the congress came to some agreement on the general goals of promoting Buryat traditions, language, religions, and culture, there were disagreements about several of the political and territorial questions. For example, although some delegates hoped for the creation of a larger Buryat territory that would encompass all of Siberia’s Buryats within a future Russian state, others disagreed revealing the tension between the desire to promote ethnic identity and the practical need to consider economic and political issues.


Author(s):  
Amin Tarzi

Since its inception as a separate political entity in 1747, Afghanistan has been embroiled in almost perpetual warfare, but it has never been ruled directly by the military. From initial expansionist military campaigns to involvement in defensive, civil, and internal consolidation campaigns, the Afghan military until the mid-19th century remained mainly a combination of tribal forces and smaller organized units. The central government, however, could only gain tenuous monopoly over the use of violence throughout the country by the end of the 19th century. The military as well as Afghan society remained largely illiterate and generally isolated from the prevailing global political and ideological trends until the middle of the 20th century. Politicization of Afghanistan’s military began in very small numbers after World War II with Soviet-inspired communism gaining the largest foothold. Officers associated with the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan were instrumental in two successful coup d’états in the country. In 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, ending the country’s sovereignty and ushering a period of conflict that continues to the second decade of the 21st century in varying degrees. In 2001, the United States led an international invasion of the country, catalyzing efforts at reorganization of the smaller professional Afghan national defense forces that have remained largely apolitical and also the country’s most effective and trusted governmental institution.


Author(s):  
Dmitriy Myelnikov

The term ‘bacteriophage’ (devourer of bacteria) was coined by Félix d'Herelle in 1917 to describe both the phenomenon of spontaneous destruction of bacterial cultures and an agent responsible. Debates about the nature of bacteriophages raged in the 1920s and 1930s, and there were extensive attempts to use the phenomenon to fight infections. Whereas it eventually became a crucial tool for molecular biology, therapeutic uses of ‘phage’ declined sharply in the West after World War II, but persisted in the Soviet Union, particularly Georgia. Increasingly isolated from Western medical research, Soviet scientists developed their own metaphors of ‘phage’, its nature and action, and communicated them to their peers, medical professionals, and potential patients. In this article, I explore four kinds of narrative that shaped Soviet phage research: the mystique of bacteriophages in the 1920s and 1930s; animated accounts and military metaphors in the 1940s; Lysenkoist notions on bacteriophages as a phase in bacterial development; and the retrospective allocation of credit for the discovery of the bacteriophage during the Cold War. Whereas viruses have been largely seen as barely living, phage narratives consistently featured heroic liveliness or ‘animacy’, which framed the growing consensus on its viral nature. Post-war narratives, shaped by the Lysenkoist movement and the campaigns against adulation of the West, had political power—although many microbiologists remained sceptical, they had to frame their critique within the correct language if they wanted to be published. The dramatic story of bacteriophage research in the Soviet Union is a reminder of the extent to which scientific narratives can be shaped by politics, but it also highlights the diversity of strategies and alternative interpretations possible within those constraints.


2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 268-272
Author(s):  
T Sh Morgoshiia ◽  
V Ya Apchel ◽  
A M Ryzhova

Traumatological assistance to the population of the Soviet Union is analyzed. It is shown that Soviet doctors, using the experience of field surgery of the First World War, in the post-war period sought to improve the entire system of organizing trauma care for the population. Traumatological assistance in industry and agriculture became generally accessible and gradually assumed an organized, harmonious character. Non-governmental organizations were involved in the fight against injuries - labor protection, social insurance, trade unions and police. First aid points were opened at factories, and trauma centers were set up at polyclinics and outpatient hospitals. A lot of health education was ongoing to prevent injuries and provide first aid. At the end of 1939, at the plenum of the Scientific Medical Council of the People’s Commissariat of Health of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, significant successes were noted in organizing trauma care and treating victims. At the first All-Russian meeting on combating injuries and its consequences in 1947, it was established that occupational injuries tend to decrease, despite the difficult post-war situation. The organization and treatment of trauma patients was developed not only in special institutions, but also in individual surgical clinics, in large hospitals, where special trauma departments were also created. Particular attention was paid to childhood injuries. In this case, the methodological guidance of the fight against injuries in children was entrusted to the Leningrad Children’s Orthopedic Institute. G.I. Turner with the involvement of representatives from other cities - Moscow, Sverdlovsk, Lviv, Kazan, Gorky, etc. It is shown that the teaching of traumatology as an integral part of surgery must be included in the programs of higher medical schools. The absolute need for institutes for the improvement of doctors is noted, the allocation of this discipline as an independent.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 88-121
Author(s):  
Oleksandr LUTSKYI

The article analyzes the main directions, course, and consequences of the research and publishing project of 1940-1941 in preparing for printing a 25-volume collection of works of Ivan Franko's literary-artistic heritage in the context of new political and socio-economic realities in Western Ukraine after the accession to the USSR as a part of the Ukrainian SSR at the beginning of World War II. Emphasizing the participation in these events of employees of the Lviv department of the T. Shevchenko Institute of Ukrainian Literature of the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union, the author noted that the main work was carried out by the Lviv philologists, led by Academician Mykhailo Vozniak. They did the search, selection, and scientific verification of the texts, ensuring their linguistic and stylistic design, compiling the edition's reference apparatus, and others. The place and role of some compilers and editors in preparing the collection for publication, particularly M. Vozniak and Professor V. Simovych, are highlighted. The reasons which caused difficulties and insurmountable obstacles in meeting the deadline in a responsible task are revealed. It turned out that the task became much more difficult for the management of the Institute and the employees, and, first of all, for the main compilers and editors from Lviv than it seemed at first. They did not completely achieve what was planned. Before the beginning of the German-Soviet War, the State Publishing House of Ukraine managed to publish only two volumes of I. Franko's writings, although a team of Lviv scientists led by M. Vozniak had prepared for publishing a scientifically done 20-volume set of the writer's works. The German-Soviet War interrupted further printing. The post-war period's new socio-political conditions left very little space for creative activities, so M. Vozniak's attempts to complete the publication of all 25 volumes were unsuccessful in the end. Keywords: Ivan Franko, works, twenty-five-volume edition, compilers, editors, M. Vozniak.


2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 81-110

The last years of existence of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic, as well as the two Post-Soviet decades, became the time of invariable interest and steadfast attention to the phenomena of ethnic and national identity. The growth of this interest, of course, cannot be a great surprise. The collapse of the Soviet Union, for the majority of Azerbaijanis, including (but not only) politicians, experts and social researchers, was directly connected with the nationalistic movements in the former Soviet republics.


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