On 1-4 June, 2026 the PAScapes and Vilnius University Faculty of History hosted a Spring School “Dissonant Heritage, Contested Landscapes and European Identity” in partnership with ARQUS University Alliance (the program was directed by PAScapes PI Marija Drėmaitė, Viltė Janušauskaitė and Ineta Šuopytė-Butkienė, Cultural Landscapes and Heritage group).
During four days 45 students and lecturers from the universities of Vilnius, Padua, Granada, Leipzig, Wroclaw, Minho and Maynooth were engaged in an intensive academic programme examining how contested pasts are embedded in European landscapes and how they continue to shape contemporary identities. The Spring School was focused on post-authoritarian, post-socialist and post-Holocaust contexts. Through interdisciplinary perspectives, participants explored the political, social and ethical challenges involved in addressing difficult heritage and confronting complex historical legacies.
The programme combined keynote lectures, site-based fieldwork, guided tours, and interactive workshops designed to foster critical thinking and collaborative exchange. Vilnius and its surrounding areas served as a living laboratory. Participants were engaged directly with historic university spaces, socialist-era housing districts, and memory sites connected to authoritarian and traumatic histories, examining how these environments reflect layered and often conflicting narratives of the past.
Photos: Steven Rupp, Marija Drėmaitė, Ineta Šuopytė-Butkienė, Agnė Kereišiūtė
