Panevėžys County Gabrielė Petkevičaitė-Bitė Public Library together with its partners invites you to the XXII scientific conference "A Story of History Preservers: Retrospective, Present, and Future Possibilities of Research on the History of Memory Institutions", dedicated to the 100th anniversary of Panevėžys County Gabrielė Petkevičaitė-Bitė Public Library.

The history of any institution is a story that records how the institution emerged, developed and changed over time, what functions it performed and what place it occupied among other organizational structures of society. Without knowing the history of institutions, it is impossible to successfully create visions and strategies for their future activities.
Memory institutions perform the functions of preservers of cultural heritage and disseminators of information recorded in that heritage. They originated as institutions with original purpose of collecting and preserving artefacts of human history. The variety of those artefacts determined the specialization of memory institutions: archive, library, museum.
It is assumed that the object of historical science is the documented experience of mankind. Therefore, from this point of view, memory institutions performed and are currently performing the functions of preservers of the material expression of the object of historical science research. Figuratively speaking, they are the preservers of History.
The main purpose of the Conference is to review the state of research on the emergence, development and role of memory institutions in the life of society in Lithuania and abroad, to present the experience of different countries in this field, to discuss possible research directions, methods and problems, and to outline further research guidelines.
The Conference organizers invite presenters to address the following topics:
• Theoretical aspects, specifics and methods of researching the history of institutions;
• A retrospective review of research into the history of memory institutions of the country/region;
• Sources of research on the history of memory institutions and the possibilities of their use;
• Directions of research into the history of memory institutions: historical development of the institution, history of collection formation and storage, staff who worked in the institution, etc.;
• Presentation of the results of research into the history of specific archives, libraries, museums;
• Practical use and research perspectives of historical studies of memory institutions.

Duration of presentation – 20 min., 5 min. of which are left for questions and discussion.
Candidates are expected to provide summaries of the proposed papers (100-150 words, up to 1500 characters) and entry forms by October 10th, 2022 by e-mail greta.kevelaitiene@pavb.lt
Conference organizers will notify candidates by October 13th, 2022.
Conferees are invited to provide presentation based articles to the scholarly journal Knygotyra (Book Science) issued by Vilnius University. The journal is open-access, reviewed and referenced in the Scopus database. We kindly draw your attention to the requirements for scientific publications and bibliographic description, which can be found here: http://www.zurnalai.vu.lt/knygotyra/about/submissions
Deadline for submission of articles – November 15th, 2022.

Organizer: Panevėžys County Gabrielė Petkevičaitė-Bitė Public Library.
Partners: Vilnius University, Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania, Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas history center, Lithuanian Emigration Institute.
Sponsor: Panevėžys City Municipality.

Conference Steering Group:
Dr. Norbertas Černiauskas, Chairperson (Vilnius University).
Greta Kėvelaitienė, Vice Chairperson (Panevėžys County Gabrielė Petkevičaitė-Bitė Public Library).

Members:
Prof. Dr. Aistė Lazauskienė (Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas History Centre).
Dr. Asta Petraitytė-Briedienė (Vytautas Magnus University, Lithuanian Emigration Institute).
Dr. Jolanta Budriūnienė (Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania).

Contact person:
Greta Kėvelaitienė, phone +370 643 04929, e-mail greta.kevelaitiene@pavb.lt