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2012-04-16
Discussion about Literature in Multicultural Cities

The VYI hosted the discussion "Cities in Translation: Parallels and Departures" about literature in multicultural cities, led by Prof. Sherry Simon (Concordia University, Montreal, Canada) and Dr. Laimonas Briedis (Vilnius University) and organized by the Faculty of Philology as part of the project "Geography of Literature" on the 12th of April, 2012.

Prof. Sherry Simon is the author of the books "Cities in Translation: Intersection of Language and Memory" (2011), "Translating Montreal: Episodes in the Life of the Divided City" (2006), "Gender in Translation: Cultural Identity and the Politics of Translation" (1996). In her latest book, Sherry Simon analyses the relation between language of literature and urban memory. She refers to different historical periods and examples of different geographical cities: 19th century Calcutta, Trieste - the city of the Austrian Empire, modern Barcelona and Montreal in the great immigration period. One of her research topics is the history of the Yiddish literature in multilingual Montreal and its links to the cultural tradition of eastern European Jewry.

Dr. Laimonas Briedis is a senior researcher in the A. J. Greimas Center of Semiotics and Theory of Literature in the Faculty of Philology. He is the author of the book "Vilnius: The City of Strangers" (2008).