| Abstract [eng] |
In of June 1940 the Soviet government gave great attention to women with the aim to gain the public acceptance. They used propaganda which criticized the position of women in the interwar Lithuania and focused on the famous women rights. In 1940 women organizations in the Soviet Lithuania were closed and their leaders either emigrated or were exiled to the Siberia, and the Soviet officials claimed that women's issue did not exist. In August 1945 Women department of Lithuanian Communist Party was created. The department initiated establishment of Women Councils in all regions of Lithuania. Women who belonged to the councils most often learnt housework, e.g. sewing, knitting and cooking. From 1946 lectures on the harm of abortion and the importance of motherhood were read to them. Later on, lectures on the Soviet Constitution, the meaning of work were added. These lectures served as the platform for harsh criticism against the interwar Lithuanian society and dissemination of atheistic ideas. The aim was to grow women's loyalty to the soviet government. Sometimes women would raise acute issues of the government in these meetings. In 1946, after the first congress of Lithuanian women workers in Vilnius the councils attempted to mass women and inform the society about the "women's issue". From the 1950s the "women's issue" in Soviet Lithuania was solved following the orders of the Soviet Union. First of all, their rights were equaled to the ones of men. They could freely choose a profession, a place of residence and get education. The principle of equality between a man and a woman was embedded in all important documents of the country, first in the 1940's and later in the I978's Constitution of Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic. The aim of the paper is to explore how the woman's position in the society was portrayed in Lithuania from 1940 to the middle of the 1970s. [...]. |
