5 December 2025

International Conference “Imperial Experiences in Family Violence: Crimes and Criminology in the 19th–20th Centuries”

On December 15-16, 2025, the Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania in Vilnius will host an international conference entitled “Imperial Experiences in Family Violence: Crimes and Criminology in the 19th–20th Centuries”, organized by the Aleksanteri Institute of the University of Helsinki and the Lithuanian Institute of History.

The conference will explore how family violence was understood, regulated, and represented in imperial and post-imperial spaces of the 19th and 20th centuries. It will examine the formation of gendered practices, discipline, and mechanisms of family control; the influence of social and political factors on the perception of these issues; the changing representations of family violence in literature; and the intersections between violence, racial and gender constructs, as well as disciplining mechanisms in authoritarian states.

The keynote speaker is historian and professor emeritus Joanna Bourke, known for her detailed research on the history of violence, particularly military violence, the cultural history of fear, and the evolution of sexual violence. In addition, she has published significant studies on the history of pain and the body. In her presentation, “The Things They Do For Love: Female Violence and Psychiatry in the UK, US, and Canada”, the professor will analyse how 20th-century psychiatry explained female violence in the family and how these explanations differed from interpretations of male violence.

On the second day of the conference, researchers and practitioners will discuss the issue of domestic violence: how can scientific insights enrich everyday work in this field, and how can practical experience provide new perspectives for research?

Admission to the event is free, but advance registration is required.

The conference will be held in English.

The latest conference program can be found here.

This international conference is organized as part of the project Till Death Do Us Part: Four Epochs of Violence in Every Family in Russia – What Makes it Russian? (FEVER), funded by the Research Council of Finland.

Conference sponsors:

The Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania, University College Dublin, NGO Ribologija, The Family, Women and Children History Researchers Network, The National Archives of Latvia and The Lithuanian Association of Criminologists.

Briefly about the event

Date

15–16 December

Time

15 December – 8:30-18:00
16 December – 9:00-16:30

Place

Statehood Room, 2nd floor, Room 237

Attendance

the event is free, but advance registration is required

Supporters

„Ukreate Hub“, Open Lithuania Foundation

Important

the opening of the exhibition will be held in English

More information

„Facebook“
conference program can be found here ›

Organisers

Aleksanteri Institute of the University of Helsinki and the Lithuanian Institute of History

Sponsors

The Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania, University College Dublin, NGO Ribologija, The Family, Women and Children History Researchers Network, The National Archives of Latvia and The Lithuanian Association of Criminologists

Important

the event may be photographed and/or filmed
the conference will be held in English.