School of Historical and Philosophical Studies - Theses
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ItemLithuanians in Melbourne 1947-1980( 1981)Lithuanians in Melbourne, or indeed in Australia as a whole, are a pretty rare species; not as rare as Norwegians, or Bulgarians, less than 500 of whom were listed in the 1976 census living in Melbourne but very much rarer that other eastern European nationals such as the Ukranians or Poles who numbered 2800 and 19500 respectively. Moreover they are a dying community, fewer than 100 people from Lithuania itself have migrated to Australia in the last decade. And of the 2,794 who were living in Victoria in 1954 nearly 600 had vanished by 1976. Melbourne Lithuanians then stood at 1701. A few migrated interstate or overseas but the large majority had died. The census of 1981 will undoubtedly reveal a further depletion in the ranks. The parish records of Fr Vaseris, the Lithuanian Catholic chaplain, reveal 420 deaths in the last 30 years. The rate of demise of the Lithuanians in Melbourne is increasing with each year, as the original immigrants, who reached Australia in the prime of life in the late 40's, are now approaching seventy. This is not a study of some rarified ethnic species of septigenerians living in Melbourne. It is intended, rather, to look at the lives of three generations of Lithuanians now living in Melbourne. This will entail looking at the background, the aspirations and achievements of the core group of settlers who came as refugees in the post war period; at their children, some born in displaced persons camps in Germany and elsewhere, between 1945 and 1949, many more born in Australia during the settling-in period of the early fifties – these I call second generation Lithuanian Australians; and lastly the progeny of these families, many of whom have Australian fathers of mothers, very few of whom can speak Lithuanian, most of whom prefer to be called simply Australians, and yet most of whom are aware of their toots and take a certain pride in their origins. This then is more than simply a look at the Lithuanian community in action, for a community must surely be defined as a body of people with a high degree of social integration, and this would have limited me to 600 people or so, whereas my three generations encompass more than two thousand living in the environs of Melbourne. Instead of looking at a small, fairly cohesive community-orientated group I prefer to look at a wider spectrum of people in terms of age structure and identity awareness. By concentrating on the lifestyles, the likes, the dislikes and aspirations of each of these differing groups or, put more simply, what it means to be a Lithuanian, a Lithuanian Australian or Australian of Lithuanian origin living in Melbourne today. (From Introduction)