Canadians take part in diaspora conference in Chernihiv

Chernihiv University in Ukraine hosted a diaspora conference in May 2009, and Ukrainian Canadians participated actively, according to the Centre for Ukrainian Canadian Studies.

From May 15-17, 2009 The Taras Shevchenko State Pedagogical University in Chernihiv Ukraine hosted a Diaspora Conference entitled “”Ukraine in the World: Ukraine is There Where Ukrainians Live.”

The conference was organized by Prof. Stanislaw Ponomarovskiy, head of the university’s Foundation of Public Innovations: Ukraine-Diaspora. The conference attracted some 100 delegates from Ukraine and the diaspora countries, who presented papers. Another 87 papers were submitted by scholars who could not attend.

Conference sub themes were:

• the analysis and the contemporary situation of diaspora countries and their major institutions and leaders;
• art, folklore and the church in the diaspora;
• language and literature of the diaspora;
• education and schooling in the diaspora;
• holodomor and the diaspora; and
• research projects on the diaspora of young scholars.

The opening preliminary session included papers by nine scholars on various themes of the diaspora. Among the authors were profs

• Oleh Wolowyna of Chapel Hill, USA (on the fourth wave of Ukrainian settlement in USA);
• Roman Yereniuk of the Centre for Ukrainian Canadian Studies, University of Manitoba in Winnipeg (on the religious press in Canada and its reporting on the Holodomor);
• Daryna Teteryna-Blokhin of Munich, Germany (on the political and economic status of Ukraine on the eve of the holodomor); and
• Oleksander Kapitonenko of Sumy, Ukraine (on the Australian period in the life of artist David Buruliuk.

The sectional thematic papers were well received. Many were on the themes on the diaspora of Canada and USA. Many scholars were younger, aged 23-35, and showed excellent research talents in their papers. All the papers will be published and/or formatted on CDs in the late summer and will be available for purchase.

This is the sixth such diaspora conference in the last five years, and shows that the area of diaspora studies has a significant following among scholars in the west as well as in Ukraine.

For more information on this and other Ukrainian Canadian news events contact Professor Roman Yereniuk, Acting Director of the Centre for Ukrainian Canadian Studies at the University of Manitoba by phone at 204-474-8907 or email .