Baltic People on Indigenous Lands: Comparative Study of Histories, Cultures, and Resilience of First Nations and Reluctant Settlers

• In Event: Diasporic Identities

Abstract

Places are links between people, their past, present, and future. What happens when these intimate relationships are violently severed? At the beginning of the 20th century, Baltic peoples, who had resisted various colonial regimes since the 12th century, established independent nation-states. However, since the Soviet Union annexed Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuanian (1940), during the occupation by Nazi Germany (1941-1944), and under the Soviet colonization (1944-1991), the people of Latvia, Lithuanian, and Estonia faced powers trying to prevent any possible national futures and became subaltern on their homelands. At the end of World War II, the communist regime deported more than 100,000 residents of the Baltic States to remote areas of the Soviet Empire, and more than 300,000 fled to the West. Separated from their homelands by the Iron Curtain and dispersed throughout the world, those resilient people created spiritual and physical landscapes that helped to safeguard their heritage. However, in many instances, the physical landscapes of people who are refugees are located on lands that are irreplaceable sources of life and spirituality for Indigenous peoples but were stolen by settler colonial regimes from their original stewards. Can Indigenous people, who strive for self-determination, use the experiences of reluctant settlers who resisted various forms of colonialism, adapted to different political structures, survived, gained independence, and safeguarded their identities?

Short Bio

Kristīne Ziediņa is a doctoral student at the University of Florida’s Historic Preservation program. Her passion for the history of the built environment started in Latvia, where she was born. After relocating to the United States, Kristīne continued her education. In 2017, she graduated from Pennsylvania State University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in American Studies. In May 2019, she received her Master’s Degree from the University of Florida (UF) Historic Preservation Program. For her thesis, Kristīne explored the history of screen block, one of the mid-century charter-defining materials, in relation to the environment of the Caribbean region. Kristīne continues her studies by researching why spaces, places, and landscapes where cultural groups safeguard their heritage are invisible within the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) framework. Among the questions that guide her research are entangled and layered relationships between Native heritage and settlers' heritage. Kristīne enjoys the research process that reveals interactions and influences between cultures, countries, and continents.

Author

• Kristine Ziedina, University of Florida