Etninės tapatybės raiška ir paieškos šiuolaikinės lietuvių literatūros tekstuose

Abstract

The article deals with the expression of Lithuanian ethnic identity and changes in that expression in contemporary Lithuanian literature published in Lithuania and abroad after the reestablishment of independence in 1990. The investigation is based on Manuel Castells’s concept of identity as a concept, Anthony Giddens’s model of identity, Philippe Lejeune’s concept of autobiography, Gabriele Rosenthal’s insights relating an individual’s personal experiences with the social context, and George C. Rosenwald’s and Richard L. Ochberg’s connection of an individual life history to a cultural model. The paper reveals the problematics of identity construction with regard to the influence of historical conditions, the multicultural effect on the author, the growth of cultural variety, and the influences of globalization and socialization. Attention is paid to the effect of autobiographicality on the texts, and to the contribution, to the appearance of the texts, of a sense of ethnicgenealogical nationality and of reflections on language, locality, and memory. The development of intermediary states between here and now, one’s own and another’s, so inevitable when one finds oneself situated among several cultural traditions, is also emphasized.