We, Too, Are from Vilnius

In the podcast series We, Too, Are from Vilnius, we introduce you to our rarely heard neighbors: the young Jewish people of Vilnius. There are only about a thousand of them. Their names, uncommon in Lithuania, often evoke surprise or prompt English greetings, even in their home city. However, the contemporary Vilnius Jewish experiences—growing up in independent Lithuania, rebuilding the capital's Jewish community, and navigating relationships with the broader society—reveal new, previously untold stories of the city’s life.

This series presents five conversations that concern accounts of community and individuality, belonging and otherness, life within the small world of Jewish schools and camps, and entries into broader societies of Lithuania and the world.

We began creating this series 80 years after the liquidation of the Vilnius (Vilna) Ghetto, which nearly destroyed the city's Jewish community. We are concluding it by celebrating 100 years of the YIVO Institute—a cradle of Yiddish cultural studies founded in Vilnius, that was miraculously relocated to New York during the Holocaust. The podcast's co-creators include young Jewish people of Vilnius, NARA journalists, and a cohort of high school journalism fellows from various Vilnius ethnic communities. The geopolitical background of an escalating war in the Middle East and rising antisemitism in Lithuanian politics inevitably became part of the conversation.

Ultimately, the series We, Too, Are from Vilnius reframes an ethnic minority not as outsiders, but rather as the city's very own; not as foreigners, but as fellow citizens. After all, our cities thrive best when their diverse languages and cultures bloom together.

Happy listening.