Lithuania's Views Toward Its Holocaust Past - Ruta Puisyte

18 January 2009

The fifth lecture of the Eighth Herbert Berman Memorial Series

Sunday, 18 January 2009, 22 Tevet 5769, 10:00 AM

Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, 13 Tel Hai Street

Ms. Ruta Puisyte

Lithuania's Views Toward Its Holocaust Past

The lecture will include a brief introduction to Holocaust history in Lithuania 1941-1944; neglect of the Jewish genocide in the Soviet period 1944-1991; Holocaust memory, its commemoration and education in independent Lithuania 1991-2008; Holocaust and Lithuanian collective memory; issues of justice; problem of reconciliation with the past.

Ruta Puisyte is assistant director of the Vilnius Yiddish Institute, Vilnius University. She has extensive experience and knowledge of the Holocaust in Lithuania. She has participated in numerous documentary film productions, academic research and educational projects involving Holocaust survivors, perpetrators, rescuers and Holocaust witnesses. She has also participated in archival and research work with various organizations, among them the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Jerusalem. In collaboration with multiple NGOs, Ms. Puisyte, coordinator many of educational programs, is a well-sought after academician and lecturer.