@article{THESIS,
      recid = {6004},
      author = {Conner, Willem},
      title = {Between Homeland and Exile: Identity Reconstruction and  Ideological Formation among Latvian Refugees During the  Second World War and its Aftermath, 1940-1950},
      publisher = {University of Chicago},
      school = {M.A.},
      address = {2023-06},
      number = {THESIS},
      abstract = {This project seeks to analyze a number of  recently-published English language primary sources written  by refugees who fled Latvia during the Second World War.  These narratives generally depict the author’s experiences  during the ‘war years’ (during which the country underwent  three periods of military occupation by the Soviet Union  and the German Reich) and the subsequent period of  displacement that proceeded from it. Despite the deeply  personal and individualized nature of these biographical  works, certain conclusions can be drawn when they are  considered together. In this thesis, I will argue that the  Second World War was and remains the central historical  event in Latvian national consciousness. The experiences of  invasion, occupation, war, and eventual displacement forced  Latvians of the war generation to forge a new ideology in  their exile by which they could justify their decision to  leave their homeland and to explain the situation in which  they now found themselves. This ideology can be  characterized, at least partially by the following:  emphasis on a narrative of national and personal  victimhood, the central importance of preserving the  Latvian culture and language, and a tendency to downplay  the historical agency of Latvians themselves, particularly  as it relates to the period of the German occupation. Each  of these characteristics is present in these refugee  narratives to varying degrees- thus indicating the  longevity of this ideological formation that initially  emerged in the Displaced Persons camps of postwar Germany.  },
      url = {http://knowledge.uchicago.edu/record/6004},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.6082/uchicago.6004},
}