Photo by Kristina Petrošienė
Biography
Phd., associate professor at History department and head of the Czesław Miłosz Center at Vytautas Magnus University. The Center is studying history, politics and culture of East-Central European states. Director of the Institute of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which organizes researches on history and legacy of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and acts as a promotor of the notion of common past among Lithuanians, Poles, Belarusians and Ukrainians.
One of the two major organizers of the International Congress of Belarusian Studies: the only place in the world, where the most representative numbers of Belarusian academic and social elites can, freely and independently from the influences of the Belarusian as well as other States, discuss history, politics, society and culture of Belarus since 2011.
The author of the first and the only History of Belarus in Lithuanian language: Gudijos istorija, Vilnius 2021 (second edition in 2022).
INVOLVEMENT AND ACTIVITIES:
Member of the Board of directors of the Club of East European Summer School (Warsaw University) that unites more than 600 researches and intellectuals from East-Central Europe. Member of the Association of Slavonic, East European and Eurasian Studies (USA). Representative of the Vytautas Magnus university at the National Committee of Lithuanian Historians; General secretary (2004-2013). Member of the Academic Corporation Convent Ludenia (Minsk) based in the independent Belarusian Flying University. Participant of Santara-Šviesa, a Lithuanian academic corporation of liberal thought. One of the founders of Vytautas Magnus University Labor Union and the first President (2006), later – member of the Committee (till 2020).
ACADEMIC JOURNALS:
Member of the Editorial board of international journals Belarusian Political Science Review, Review the Institute of Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Homo historicus and Annual of the Center for Belarusian Studies (Warsaw U). Member of the Scientific board of Przegląd Geopolityczny and Annales Pomorienses. Ius. A reviewer of Acta Baltico-Slavica, a journal of Polish Academy of Sciences. Member of the Editorial board of BRILL series "Modern Belarusian Studies."
THE MAIN FIELDS OF INTEREST:
Historical relations between Lithuania and Western European countries since the Middle ages. Creator and editor of www.lugano.lt – a site dedicated to Swiss-Italian and Grand Duchy of Lithuania artistic relations.
History, politics, culture and national narratives of Lithuania, Poland and Belarus. Creator and editor of www.gudija.lt – the first and the only Lithuanian site dedicated to Belarus (news, analytics, history).
INFORMATION IN THE SYSTEM OF VYTAUTAS MAGNUS UNIVERSITY:
TEACHING EXPERIENCE:
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Vytautas Magnus University (since 2002). Courses taught to BA students at Humanities and Political Sciences departments on the history of Lithuanian, German and French states and societies, on European historiography, on Historiosophy, on the History of Economics, Everyday Life and Political Philosophy. Courses to MA students on the History of Diplomacy and on Lithuanistics in Western Europe. The latter deals with lituanistics (archival sources and historiography on Lithuania) in Western European countries.
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Warsaw University (since 2011). Various lectures on Lithuanian history and identity.
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Also, lectures given in various Lithuanian, Polish, Belarusian, French, English and Swiss universities and institutions.
FORMATION:
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MA diploma received at Central European University in Budapest.
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PhD studies finished at Vytautas Magnus University (joined PhD program with the Lithuanian Institute of History).
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Studies and probations in Italian (Parma U., Istituto F. Datini di Prato), French (Sorbonne, Maison des sciences de l'Homme), Swiss (Fribourg U.), Hungarian (CEU) and Polish (Warsaw U.) institutes and universities.
Awards and Acknowledgments
Warsaw University Studium Europy Wschodniej. Acknowledgment. (Warsaw, December 20, 2016).
Jerzy Giedroyc Award (Warsaw, 1 December, 2015) for the Institute of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania for "difficult effort to propagate legacy of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and especially the tradition of cohabitation of different cultures, languages, religions and nations in Lithuania, Belarus, Poland and Ukraine."
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