Akadēmiskais centrsConferences
To provide the conference's content to a greater audience, video sessions are available at Riga Jewish Community website: www.jews.lv/en/announcement/international-sonference-jews-changing-world. International Conference “Jews in a Changing World”. History and Culture of Jews in Latvia and Baltic Region.
Conferences are held every 2-3 years.
Brief chronology:
8th International conference JEWS IN A CHANGING WORLD
The Sixth International Conference "Jews in a Changing World". Latvian and Baltic Jews at the Crossroads of European History (September 11-14, 2006) was held in honor of the one-hundredth anniversary of the Peitavas Street Synagogue of Riga and celebrated the one-hundredth birthday of the French-Jewish philosopher Emmanuel Levinas (1906-1995) at the Main Assembly Hall, University of Latvia. A Jewish Book Festival opened the Conference at the Riga Jewish Community Center on 6 Skolas Street.
Preparation of the Book of Proceedings of the Sixth International Conference is in progress.
For more details review the Contents an available articles (in Russian).
The Fifth International Conference "Jews in a Changing World". Jews of Latvia and Baltic Region in European History and Culture (September 16-17, 2003) was held in Riga at the Assembly Hall, University of Latvia.
The Center has published the Book of Proceedings of the previous conferences: the Second, the Third, the Fourth and the Fifth volumes of Conference materials (in Russian).
The opening ceremony of the International Conferences "Jews in a Changing World" is usually addressed by the President of Latvia and the Prime Minister, it attracts a great attention among local academicians, the Jewish community representatives, Latvian state officials, as well as the mass media. Greetings to the Conference are also traditionally delivered by the Minister of Culture of Latvia, Rector of the University of Latvia, President of the Latvian Academy of Sciences, rabbis and Jewish Community leaders. Also the former President, members of the Saeima (the Parliament of Latvia), respresentatives of the diplomatic corps and other prominent guests are invited. The Co-Chairmen of the Organizing Committee are Prof. Herman Branover, the Ben-Gurion University of Beer-Sheva (Israel), and Prof. Ruvin Ferber, the University of Latvia. The funding for the conference is normally given by both local and international supporters.
The Fourth International Conference "Jews in a Changing World" (November 20-22, 2001) was held in Riga at the Assembly Hall of the University of Latvia - a place with rich historical, sociopolitical and academic past.
The Third International Conference "Jews in a Changing World" was held in Riga, October 26-27, 1999.
Since then the Center for Judaic Studies is the chief organizer of the Conference among other Jewish representatives from both Latvia and abroad.