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Displacement

Migration describes the movement of people away from their area of usual habitation, which can be transnational (across an international border) or internal (within a state or area). Compared to migration, displacement is often the forced movement of persons who have been made to flee their homes or places of residence, in particular, because of armed conflict or violence. In 2022, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that 108.4 million people worldwide were forcibly displaced because of oppression, war, violence, rights violations, climate changes or ecocide among other crises. In modern times, transnational migration, and the displacement of people caused by wars, has shifted borders and changed the demography of countries in East-Central Europe. Our Educational Platform offers a range of resources that shed light on the history of migration, property looting, mass deportations, stories of return, and evolving concepts of home. Migration and displacement have always existed and will continue to exist, but history can help us to understand how the movement of groups of people have shaped the world in which we are living now.

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Documents (19)

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Testimonies of Ihor Kostetskyi’s Fate under Nazi Rule
Ihor Kostetskyi was just one example of several hundred thousand individuals who were taken by the Nazi Army from occupied eastern European territories and had to work as “Ostarbeiter” in the German war industry. Before the war, Kostetskyi was an intellectual who – though born in Kyiv, Ukraine – had little consciousness of his “Ukrainiennes” before the fall of Carpatho-Ukraine in 1938 and was involved in several cultural, artistic, and creative projects and initiatives. When he was mobilized to the Soviet Red Army at the start of the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, Kostetskyi was already in the process of changing his Russian-sounding name “Ivan Merzljakov” to his, since then...
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Testimonies on the Material Situation of the Culturally Active Ukrainian Diaspora in Germany, 1946-1951
The Ukrainian DP journal KHORS was initially planned to be quarterly. However, the first KHORS edition in 1946 was also the last. These documents provide an insight into the reasons for the non-publishing of further editions and deliver indicators for the material situation of the Ukrainian diaspora in the American occupation zone of Germany in general.  A second and third editions of KHORS were seemingly planned shortly after publishing the first edition. The indicator for this thesis is the handwritten list of planned content for these two editions. On the back of this document, it is visible that it was initially an old document of the German Air Force from World War Two....
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Principles and Future Aims of the DP Journal KHORS, 1946-1951
The Ukrainian DP journal KHORS was, first and foremost, not a political publication. Published by a small team around the dissident Ihor Kostetskyi, its focus was on arts, culture, and film. In its own statutes, KHORS was not only displayed as a journal. Instead, it should be somewhat of a worldwide movement, that people could join or leave if they wish in the future. The overriding principle is to accept the “primacy of the artistic form,” that art should be created to be art and not for economic, political, or popular reasons. If one does accept this very principle, this core principle, “every artist is allowed to belong to [KHORS] - regardless of...
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Reviews of Film Art as an Instrument of Independence by the Ukrainian DP Journal KHORS, 1946-1951
The Ukrainian DP journal "KHORS" was planned as a quarterly on arts and culture, written by a group of editors around Ihor Kostetskyi. Even though a second edition was never published, the editor's notes and pre-written articles, ready to be published in a long-planned second edition, tell a lot about the potential of the project.  In the statutes of KHORS, the journal, as well as the attaching, desired worldwide idea, distanced itself heavily from Communism and the Soviet Union. The reason that was provided for this positioning was the Soviet understanding of art and the fact that art had to serve a purpose under Soviet Realism. Such distancing from Soviet influence in world...
Image for Kateryna Biletska’s correspondence with Oleh Lashchenko, 1950-1990
Kateryna Biletska’s correspondence with Oleh Lashchenko, 1950-1990
The fund of the Ukrainian publicist and public character Oleh Lashchenko at the Central State Archive of Public Associations of Ukraine contains seven letters and one postcard from Kateryna Biletska (Kandyba by first husband), Oleh Kandyba’s wife (literary pseudonym Oleh Olzhych), a poet and member of the Ukrainian nationalist underground movement, head of the cultural and educational department of the Provid of Ukrainian Nationalists (PUN) and the Revolutionary Tribunal of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) (1939-1941). Lashchenko was not only a longtime friend of the Kandybas, but also the godfather of their only son. He was born in Kyiv in 1914, in 1920 he emigrated to Poland with his parents and elder...
Image for Kateryna Biletska’s memoir of life in Lviv in 1943
Kateryna Biletska’s memoir of life in Lviv in 1943
Kateryna Biletska (Kandyba by her first husband), the wife of Oleh Kandyba (known by the literary pseudonym Oleh Olzhych), a poet and member of the Ukrainian nationalist underground, head of the cultural and educational department of the Provid (Leadership) of Ukrainian Nationalists (PUN) and the Revolutionary Tribunal of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) (1939-1941), wrote her memoirs for decades. She first mentions the idea of writing a memoir in letters to a mutual friend of the Kandybas since the 1950s, Oleh Lashchenko. One of the last surviving memoirs is dated May 1994. She sent some of her memoirs to Lashchenko and wrote that she had more. These memoirs mainly cover the years...
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Images (5)

Image for Title Pages of Never Published Editions of the DP Journal KHORS, 1945-1951
Title Pages of Never Published Editions of the DP Journal KHORS, 1945-1951
The idea of the Ukrainian DP-creation KHORS as a movement and a journal was kept alive for many years, even though the continuous publishing of the journal, initially planned as a quarterly journal, could never be realized beyond a first edition in 1946. These title pages that were planned to be published provide the observer with a view of the used materials, the methods of designing, and the development of the designs.  Starting in 1945, immediately after the war, the first planned title page was drawn by Halyna Mazepa with simple paint on a piece of cardboard. Though, this title page was never published - the published KHORS edition in 1946 did also...
Image for “Jewish Grandmother”, photo by Lewis Hine
“Jewish Grandmother”, photo by Lewis Hine
Lewis Hine (1874-1940) was an American photographer who tried to draw attention to social issues such as migration or child labor. He took two series of photos on Ellis Island, an island near New York City that was the first stop and gateway for new arrivals. Photos of Lewis Hine are trying to show the identity of migrants, who were often exoticized and othered in the American press. The Jewish woman in the photo is dressed in clothes that do not distinguish her from other migrants from Eastern Europe. However, although Jewish migration was often also motivated by economic motives, in the public discourse and historiography of the early twentieth century, it was...
Image for “Slavic Mother”, photo by Lewis Hine
“Slavic Mother”, photo by Lewis Hine
Lewis Hine (1874-1940) was an American photographer who tried to draw attention to social issues such as migration or child labor. He took two series of photos on Ellis Island, an island near New York City that was the first stop and gateway for new arrivals. Photos of Lewis Hine are trying to show the identity of migrants, who were often exoticized and othered in the American press. The name of the photo "Slavic Mother" shows that Eastern Europe for Americans was still a space, which differences and nuances they hardly noticed. Hine perceives the woman in the photo as a person who left Europe forever, taking along all her posessions, and having...
Image for Galician Migrants, Quebec, about 1911
Galician Migrants, Quebec, about 1911
The photo shows a group of migrants from Galicia, probably Ukrainians in Canada. Despite the information that before emigration, peasants bought urban clothes, in this photo we see people in traditional attire, which is different from the Canadian environment. Attitude towards Eastern European migrants was arrogant. In particular, clothing would often become the basis for otherness. Thus, the process of successful integration involved “dressing up” in Western clothes. In the photo, we can see a large family, because often the first migrants who were young men and women, later transported their children or older parents.
Image for Advertising leaflet of Zofia Biesiadetska’s bureau
Advertising leaflet of Zofia Biesiadetska’s bureau
Zofia Biesiadetska's office in Oswiecim in Western Galicia was organizing transportation to America. The promotional leaflet offers tickets for steamboats to America and Canada. The transport revolution in the 19th century proved to be one of the most important factors that enabled mass intercontinental migration. Transport was relatively convenient and fast, as well as relatively inexpensive. With the beginning of mass migration, networks of agents developed, like Zofia Biesiedetska's bureau, who helped with the organization of the trip. This facilitated the migration of people from villages or small towns. At the same time, agents were often accused of lack of integrity and profiteering on migrants. Biesiadetska Bureau was one of the most respectable...
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Audio (3)

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Grine kuzine (Green Cousin), song about emigration, 1921
The song, with a debatable authorship, was written for a Jewish theater. It was performed both in Europe and in the United States, and it became one of the most popular migrant works. The word “green” was an ironic definition of new immigrants who did not navigate well in American reality. The song “Green Cousin” raises the issue of disappointment of migrants in America, where hard work exhausts new-comers and does not bring the expected profit. The “Columbian state” appears not as a dream country where dreams come true, but a society of inequalities. Despite the hilarious music and satirical plot, the song shows the anxiety of emigrants due to the lack of...
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A brivele der mamen (A Little Letter to Mama), song about emigration, 1907
The song was written by a Belarusian composer and singer, Solomon Smulewitz (1868-1943) in 1907. The author also had experience of migration to the United States. The song became very popular. In particular, it was used as a basis for a theatrical production and a film in Yiddish. The work raises the issue of migration caused separation of families. While the son who went to America has a successful life and a new family, his mother feels abandoned. Before her death, she asks her son not to forget to read Kaddish, a memorial prayer for her. The problem of separated families remained common to all migrants, but in this text the Jewish prayer...
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“Goldene land” (Golden land), song about emigration, 1889
The song was written by a Lithuanian Jewish poet, Eliakum Zunser (1840-1913) based on his own experience of emigrating to the United States. The song "Golden Land" touches on the issue of new migrants, whose high expectations fail. The American city turns out to be a space full of dirt, noise, and poverty. Although jobs are available, they are poorly paid and dangerous to health. America is also not a place of social equality, because like in Europe, there is a disproportion in the distribution of wealth. This is an urban experience that was shared by many Jewish migrants who found work in the textile industry, or like Zunser himself, in the printing...
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Modules (2)

This module by literary scholar Olha Petrenko-Tseunova tells the story of Kateryna Biletska-Kandyba, the wife of Oleh Kandyba (known by the literary pseudonym Oleh Olzhych), a poet and member of the Ukrainian nationalist underground, head of the cultural and educational department of the Leadership of Ukrainian Nationalists (PUN) and the Revolutionary Tribunal of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) (1939-1941), and her WWII experience and post-war emigration.
The end of the 19th century through the beginning of the 20th century is known as the period of mass migration from Europe to other continents, when more than 55 million people changed their place of residence. In particular, this process captured the Russian and Austro-Hungarian empires, where a difficult economic situation, job shortages, and persecutions stirred various groups of the population to leave. Such groups included both Ukrainian and Polish peasants, and Jews from urban centers who were small-scale craftsmen or workers. Most often, they moved to the United States, Canada, Argentina, and Brazil, where labor was needed at factories or farms.

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Syllabi (3)

East-Central Europe played a vital role in the global history of mass migration and experienced an enormous variety of mobility processes in the long 19th and short 20th centuries. For instance, mass emigration from the Russian and Austro-Hungarian Empires and the Soviet Union, human trafficking, labor migration, forced migration during WWI and WWII, refugee crises and asylum, travel, and professional mobility. The voluminous scholarship on this chapter of migration history has lots of gaps and, notably, is almost absent from history curricula. This introductory course broadens our lens to examine the role of migration and mobility for the places where it occurred as well as the experiences of migrants, displaced persons, refugees, and...
Our main focus in this class will consist in Jewish experiences with cities in the twentieth century. Geographically, our center of attention will be Central and Eastern Europe (with our main – but not exclusive – emphasis on territories that, at one point or the other, came under Soviet rule); chronologically, we will concentrate (unevenly) on the period between the end of the First World War and the end of the Soviet Union. In particular, the Holocaust and the Second World War were events of central and terrible importance for this period and area. Accordingly, we will pay special attention to them.
This course covers the period from the partitions of Poland through the Russian and Habsburg Empires, the Soviet Union and interwar Poland. Students will familiarize with the geopolitical results of Russia’s westward and Austria’s eastward expansions and will focus among other overarching themes on the shtetl, the unique East European Jewish habitat; on Hasidism, a Ukraine-born popular movement of religious enthusiasm; on the interaction between Zionists and Ukrainian nationalists in Galicia; on the development of Ukrainization and Yiddishization (or Ukrainian and Jewish korenizatsiia) in the 1920s and the situation of Jews in Poland in the 1920s; on the Holocaust and its aftermath; on Ukrainians and Jews in the dissident movement; and on Jewish-Ukrainian...