CFP: Baltic Worldview: From Mythology to Folklore, Vilnius, Lithuania, July 2009

Call for papers

BALTIC WORLDVIEW: FROM MYTHOLOGY TO FOLKLORE

International Conference

July 8–10, 2009, Vilnius, Lithuania

Conference organizers, the Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore in collaboration with the Center of Research in Imagination at Grenoble’s Stendhal University (Centre de recherches sur l’imaginaire Universite Stendhal Grenoble 3), announce “Baltic Worldview: from Mythology to Folklore”, a international conference dedicated to marking the first millennium of Lithuania’s name.

The conference organizers invite the participants to view the Baltic worldview as a cultural content that manifests through a broad multitude of linguistic, religious, mythological, and other spiritual and material forms of culture. The conference aims to emphasize the Baltic worldview’s role in historical and geographical Baltic regional contexts while demonstrating the worldview’s continuity from prehistoric times to modern times. Special emphasis is on Baltic religion and mythology – vitally important subjects that are not sufficiently valued for their cultural, social, and political role in the present day context.

The conference hopes to bring together a variety of interdisciplinary perspectives that present and highlight the urgent issues in the study of Baltic religion and mythology.

Conference goals:

• To bring together international researchers in the Baltic religion and mythology and to present a broader picture of the current research;
• To present a new research perspective that views the Baltic religion not from linguistic exclusiveness (Balts, Indo-Europeans), but from a broader cultural constellation of Baltic regional aspects.

Conference organizers invite participants researching or working with pre-Christian Baltic cultural heritage. This includes researchers who work in the areas of Baltic region’s folklore, mythology and old religions. An important aspect is to highlight common cultural threads and features throughout the Baltic region – typological, textual, gestural, musical, and iconographical models and parallels of cultural expression.

Suggested presentation themes:

• Divinity, myth, folklore narratives
• Universal ritual practice and local elements
• Sacred places and landscapes
• Ethnic culture and worldview
• Linguistic community and religious similarity
• Baltic, Slavic, Germanic, and Finnish religious contacts
• Baltic mythology and comparative mythology
• Religion and ecology
• Baltic worldview today

July 8–9: presentations.

July 10: cultural program.

The deadline for submitting proposals and abstracts is November 1, 2008. Abstracts should be up to 500 words. The conference language will be English.

Please forward electronic proposals to:

Daiva Vaitkevic(ene. (the head of organizing committee) vaidaiva@llti.lt

Ursule. Gedaite. (the secretary of organizing committee) ursule@llti.lt

Organizing committee:

Daiva Vaitkevic(iene. PhD (Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore, Lithuania)

Lina Bu-giene. PhD (Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore, Lithuania)

Ju-rate. Šlekonyte. PhD (Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore, Lithuania)

Philippe Walter PhD (Centre de recherches sur l’imaginaire Universite Stendhal Grenoble 3, France)

Rasa Raudaite. (Centre de recherches sur l’imaginaire Universite Stendhal Grenoble 3, France)

Vykintas Vaitkevičius PhD (Klaipe.da University, Lithuania)

Egle. Trinkauske. PhD (Syracuse University, USA)

Ru-ta Muktupavela PhD (University of Latvia)

Valdis Muktupavels PhD (University of Latvia)

Ilja Lemeškin PhD (Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic)