Postcolonial encounters: Documentary films created by Lithuanian filmmakers in Africa, Asia and South America during the Soviet era

Project idea

The project “Postcolonial encounters: Documentary films created by Lithuanian filmmakers in Africa, Asia and South America during the Soviet era” aims to examine the imaginaries of multiple colonialisms in Lithuanian documentary cinema of the Soviet era by analysing films made by Lithuanian filmmakers in various countries across Africa, Asia and South America. The research investigates how these films construct perspectives on the colonial experiences and liberation of distant countries, how filmmakers reproduce or transform the ideologically shaped narratives of the Soviet Union and through what visual and narrative strategies they distance themselves from them. The study also examines how representations of newly liberated countries created opportunities to reflect on Lithuania’s own experience of colonisation and its position within structures of multiple colonialism. 

The project will contribute to research on Lithuanian cultural and film history during the Soviet era, as well as to the development of postcolonial and decolonial studies. It will provide a better understanding of how narratives of liberation and the “liberator” are constructed and how they persist in the contemporary information environment. The research findings will be disseminated not only through academic publications but also through a film essay intended for a wider public, which will create a dialogue between Soviet-era representations and contemporary understandings of decolonisation.