Free Zoom: "Drawing Borders in the Baltic, 1919-1920"

Petition map of the border region in Vastse-Roosa. National Archives of Estonia: https://www.ra.ee/en/

You are invited to the following event, which I helped to arrange:

Dr. Catherine Gibson: "Mapmakers in Action - Drawing Borders in the Baltic, 1919-1920"

When: Thursday, October 10, 2024, 7:00 PM, EDT

Where: Zoom

Speaker:  Dr. Catherine Gibson, Lecturer in East European Studies, Johan Skytte Institute of Political Studies, University of Tartu, Estonia

Summary: "This talk presents an unconventional history of the uses of ethnographic mapping in the process of delineating the Estonian-Latvian state border in the aftermath of the First World War. While histories of border-making in the post-World War I war period have usually been told from the perspectives of elites, in this presentation I offer a different view by examining the outpouring of written petitions and maps produced by local inhabitants to inform, correct, and challenge decisions about nationality, property ownership, and state borders made by the Estonian-Latvian Boundary Commission.

"I argue that these events can be seen as a culmination of the development of cartographic thinking over the course of the nineteenth century, circulating in schoolbooks and newspapers, which spread cartographic literacy among broad sections of society. When faced with the prospect of a border which left them on the “wrong” side, the inhabitants of the Estonian-Latvian border region turned to maps to communicate alternative arguments about where they thought the state borders should be located and why. This presentation pieces together a story of how the very subjects of ethnographic cartography turned the table to become mapmakers themselves."

Click here to register for this free Zoom event. After you have registered, you will receive an email with the Meeting ID and passcode for the event.

Dr. Gibson's book, "Geographies of Nationhood: Cartography, Science, and Society in the Russian Imperial Baltic," was published in 2022 by Oxford University Press and was the winner of the Cambridge Geopolitics Network Publication Prize. She is technical editor at the Journal of Baltic Studies and series editor of the book series, "Politics and Society in the Baltic Sea Region" published by Tartu University Press.