Monthly Archives: March 2015

Näyttely Saksalaisten ja suomalaisten kohtaamisista Lapin maakuntamuseossa

Lapin alueella oli toisen maailman sodan aikana noin 210 000 saksalaista henkilöä. Yksistään Rovaniemen alueella heitä oli arviolta 6 000 henkilöä eli lähes yhtä paljon kuin paikallista väestöä. Saksalaiset ja suomalaiset kohtasivat toisiaan arkisessa elämässä ja myös vapaa-ajalla. Lapin maakuntamuseossa avautuu tänä keväänä näyttely ”WIR WAREN FREUNDE – OLIMME YSTÄVIÄ” Saksalaisten ja suomalaisten kohtaamisia Lapissa 1940–1944. Näyttelyn avajaiset ovat Arktikumissa Lapin sodan päättymisen 70-vuotismuistopäivänä 27.4.2015 klo 18.

Tutkimusprojektimme kerää näyttelyssä kävijäkyselyn. Kiitämme jo etukäteen Lapin maakuntamuseota yhteistyöstä ja jäämme odottamaan näyttelyn avautumista.

Exhibit about Lapland war at Provincial Museum of Lapland Arktikum, Rovaniemi

During the WWII there were over 200 000 Germans in Finnish Lapland. Rovaniemi alone hosted about 6000 Germans – as many as the Finnish population of the town. Germans and Finns encountered each other in carrying out the daily routines as well as passing free time. The Provincial Museum of Lapland will open this spring an exhibit ”WIR WAREN FREUNDE – OLIMME YSTÄVIÄ” Saksalaisten ja suomalaisten kohtaamisia Lapissa 1940–1944a (We were friends – the Relations between German and Finns in Lapland 1940-1944) which introduces ordinary experiences of the engagements between Germans and Finns. The opening of the exhibit takes place at Arktikum on the day when Lapland War ended 70 year ago on April, 27th of 2015 at 18:00.

Our research project will gather a survey at the exhibit among the museum visitors. We are grateful for the cooperation and look forward to seeing the exhibit.

02 Olimme ystäviä_tiedotuskuva LMM 2015

The photo ”Eine Kleine Finnin.” From photo album of Vuoristojääkäri Kurt Pawlatan. Courtesy of Provincial museum of Lapland.

Kuva: ”Eine Kleine Finnin.” Vuoristojääkäri Kurt Pawlatan valokuva-albumi. Lapin maakuntamuseo.

 

MEDEA: Recording metal-detected finds in Flanders

Suzie Thomas was in Brussels this week for the Project Advisory Panel meeting of MEDEA, a new initiative led by researchers at SKAR and SMIT at Brussels Free University, and PACKED, funded by the Hercules Foundation.

Suzie joined panel members from organizations such as the British Museum, Ashmolean Museum, Aarhus University,  the Coin Cabinet of the Royal Library of Belgium and Flanders Heritage Agency to hear how the project has been developing. MEDEA aims, following recent changes in Flemish legislation, to create a research- and user-friendly database for recording archaeological material discovered by metal detectorists. The panel’s role was to advise based on their own experiences from similar projects in such as the UK and Denmark, and to provide advice based on their research specialisms.

A full day in a long but productive meeting is a day well spent.

A full day in a long but productive meeting is a day well spent.

Following extensive focus groups and consultations and after rounds of careful beta-testing and programming, the MEDEA platform is expected to launch in late 2015 or early 2016.

The Flanders experience is particularly interesting with regard to the Lapland’s Dark Heritage project, due to the interest of many metal detectorists active in Belgium that engage with material from the First World War, and the expansion of First World War tourism in recent years. This, compared to different encounters with Second World War material in Lapland may form the basis of some comparative studies further into the project.

Another project member starts full time work

Oula Seitsonen started working full time in the project in March. He has been involved in the archaeological research of World War II and other recent past sites since 2007, and directed our pilot surveys and excavations in Inari in 2009. Oula starts working on a PhD project on the material heritage of Hitler’s Arctic war both during and after the World War II. He is an archaeological odd-job man and will be in charge of the archaeological and geographical information systems studies in the project.

Oula’s first week is pretty much summed up by this photo series:

Monday: a desk

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Tuesday: took a tablet along

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Wednesday-Thursday: a heap of cardboard boxes had appeared, and out of them appeared heaps of wires and electronic things for time-consuming installation

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Friday: Back in business

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