ILFA to implement three new fundamental and applied research projects
The evaluation of project proposals submitted to the Fundamental and Applied Research Projects Programme (FLPP) has been completed, and a decision has been made to award funding to 56 projects, including three projects submitted by the Institute of Literature, Folklore and Art of the University of Latvia. Project implementation will begin in January 2026.
Project “ANTI-MOB: Anti-Genderism Discourse within Latvia’s Public Sphere and Literature” (Project leader: Kārlis Vērdiņš)
The aim of the project is to study local manifestations of the international anti-genderism discourse in the public sphere and literature, with particular emphasis on recent and forthcoming changes in politics and the economy. Anti-gender mobilization seeks to restore binary gender and sex categories by appealing to “natural” gender roles and the “natural family,” in line with patriarchal and masculinity-oriented worldviews. This movement brings together otherwise unrelated groups—Christians, representatives of secular conservatism, right-wing activists, and even “centrists”—who claim to speak on behalf of the silent majority and “ordinary people.” To achieve its political goals, build international online communities, and suppress opponents, the movement employs a wide range of discursive strategies. Previous research shows that anti-gender mobilization manifests differently across places and historical moments, and that different discursive tools are used in each country. It is therefore essential to examine the specific characteristics of anti-gender mobilization in Latvia, where research on this topic remains limited. The project aims to generate knowledge about anti-gender positions and related discourses in both the public sphere and literary texts over the past decade, as well as to conduct case studies of key actors in the mobilization. One of the project’s most important goals is to promote not only academic but also public understanding of the connections between seemingly separate discourses at both local and international levels.
Project “Post-War Environmental History of Latvia: Landscapes, Power, and Society” (Project leader: Ieva Garda-Rozenberga)
After the Second World War, Europe’s environment underwent profound transformations. The military, economic, and industrial policies of the Eastern Bloc encouraged large-scale reshaping of rural and urban landscapes. From the collectivization of agricultural land and the drainage of wetlands to the modernization of road systems and the construction of high-rise residential districts, Soviet intervention in the environment altered people’s lives and contributed to the emergence of eco-nationalist ideas. Similarly, post-war Western Europe experienced landscape transformations driven by industrialization, modernization, and reconstruction efforts, reshaping both natural and built environments. To expand European environmental history, the project proposes a new research agenda that, through interdisciplinary dialogue and diverse research perspectives and methodologies, will significantly advance knowledge of landscape and environmental changes in Latvia in the second half of the twentieth century, as well as of how eco-social agency developed in society and shaped pre- and post-eco-national processes. The project’s outcomes include at least five peer-reviewed scholarly articles, participation with at least ten papers at international conferences, the organization of a diverse programme of international academic events, and public outreach activities—such as popular science publications, public lectures and presentations, and the organization of a seminar series titled “On the Road to Environmental History in the Baltic Sea Region,” among others.
Project “Spoken Songs: Algorithms of Composition and Improvisation” (Project leader: Ieva Vīvere)
The project focuses on spoken songs, the oldest layer of Latvian traditional vocal music, characterized by narrow-range melodies shaped by the text and by improvisation. By combining algorithmic and qualitative methods, the project aims to understand principles of composition and improvisation that have long been neglected in scholarly research due to the separation and fragmentation of melody and text. An interdisciplinary team of researchers will encode melodies and texts, conduct algorithmic analysis and qualitative case studies, and identify and map compositional and improvisational skills and techniques, focusing on the interaction between text and melody and on local specificities. The project will further develop Baltic and Nordic cooperation and strengthen the presence of digital musicology and folkloristics in Latvia’s research landscape. Its innovations include the use of AI methods in analysis, the integration of music studies with textual prosody, and contributions to digital education. Project outputs will include seven scholarly articles, publicly accessible datasets and corpora, a thematic website, an EU project application, at least seven conference presentations, educational and outreach activities, and student involvement, thereby promoting heritage preservation and skills development in the field of digital humanities.
In total, 623 project proposals from 30 research institutions (four of which participated only as partners) were evaluated in the competition. Of these, 615 proposals met the administrative requirements and underwent scientific evaluation. More information is available HERE.