Digne Ūdre-Lielbārde delivered a guest lecture at the University of Tartu

At the end of September, Digne Ūdre-Lielbārde, a researcher at the Institute of Literature, Folklore and Art of the University of Latvia (LU LFMI), took part in a seminar organised by the Department of Estonian and Comparative Folklore at the University of Tartu, where she delivered the guest lecture “Folkloristics in Exile: Baltic Academic Activities during the Cold War.”

The lecture introduced the audience to folklore research in exile, with particular attention to international connections among the three Baltic countries. After the Second World War, Baltic folklorists found themselves working in very different political and intellectual environments: some continued their work in Soviet-occupied Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, while scholars in exile pursued their academic careers in Western democracies.

The Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies (AABS), founded in 1968, became an important platform for international cooperation among Baltic scholars. The guest lecture examined papers on folklore and mythology presented at AABS conferences, exploring the significance of the interwar legacy of Baltic folkloristics for scholars in exile, as well as the influence of international trends—particularly those in North American folklore studies—on their research.

The guest lecture was one of the activities carried out within the project “Latvian Folkloristics in Exile” (lzp-2024/1-0522).