Latvian Academy of Culture Invites Visitors to Explore the Nature of Cultural Research at European Researchers’ Night
On 25 September, from 17:00 to 21:30, the Institute of Arts and Cultural Studies of the Latvian Academy of Culture (LAC) invites school students and other interested visitors to European Researchers’ Night at LAC’s “Gara māja”, 58a Miera Street, Riga. Responding to this year’s theme, “Discover the Nature of Science!”, LAC will offer a programme exploring science through the lens of culture and arts research. Visitors will be invited to step into the role of researchers themselves – experimenting, discussing, observing and asking questions about culture, society and human experience. Admission is free.
How can researchers study something as intangible as the atmosphere of a place? What can films reveal about people and the era in which they were made? What shapes our choices in the digital cultural environment? How can ideology influence language and self-representation? And what decisions would we make if we were responsible for cultural policy? Throughout the evening, researchers from the LAC Institute of Culture and Arts will invite visitors not only to learn about culture and arts research, but to experience research methods first-hand.
From 17:00 to 18:00, students in grades 10–12 can take part in the interactive cultural policy simulation “If You Were the Minister of Culture…” Working in teams, participants will decide which cultural services should be prioritised when resources are limited – libraries, concerts, cinema, theatre, museums, youth cultural spaces or digital services. By balancing the needs of different communities and responding to unexpected developments, students will experience how cultural policy decisions are made and explore the role of public participation and research-based evidence. The simulation will be led by Anda Laķe, LAC Vice-Rector for Research and Head of the Institute of Culture and Arts.
At the same time, from 17:00 to 18:00, the Materiality Lab “What Is an Atmosphere Made Of?” will invite students in grades 10–12 to investigate how materials, objects, sound, light, movement, temperature and smell affect our perception of space, emotions and behaviour. Through hands-on experiments and the creation of an “atmosphere map”, participants will discover how even seemingly intangible phenomena can become objects of research. The laboratory will be led by emerging researchers Valts Valters Kronbergs and Anete Liepiņa.
From 17:30 to 19:30, visitors of all ages are invited to the lecture and quiz “The Cinema of Jānis Streičs: Watch Like a Researcher”. Through film excerpts and stills, participants will explore the people, relationships, environments, language, humour and atmosphere characteristic of Jānis Streičs’ films. Together with the LAC Riga Film Museum team, visitors will test their powers of observation and discover how cinema can become a source for understanding people and the times in which they lived.
From 18:30 to 19:30, students in grades 8–12 can join the interactive session “Explore Your Digital Culture Bubble”. Using their own phones as research tools, participants will examine their everyday digital cultural habits and consider what influences their choices – friends, family, school, influencers or platform algorithms. The session will explore whether digital environments broaden our cultural horizons and help us discover something new, or instead keep us within a bubble of what we already know and like. The session will be led by LAC Institute of Culture and Arts researcher Līga Vinogradova.
The evening will conclude from 20:00 to 21:30 with the historical experiment “A Lesson in Self-Criticism: Ideology, Language and the Individual in Soviet Latvia” for students in grades 10–12. Participants will enter a simulated class at a Marxism-Leninism evening university and explore ideological education practices during the Soviet occupation of Latvia. Taking on historical roles – such as a cultural centre employee, young teacher, factory worker, librarian or student – they will consider what the system expected people to say about themselves, what could be criticised and what was better left unsaid. Participants will then write a short “self-criticism report” and discuss with researchers how ideology can shape language, self-representation and behaviour. The experiment will be led by Andris Hiršs, Andrejs Balodis and Ainārs Kamoliņš.
The historical experiment “A Lesson in Self-Criticism: Ideology, Language and the Individual in Soviet Latvia” is organised within the fundamental and applied research project “Conversions and Ruptures: Epistemic Strategies of Latvian Philosophy during the Soviet Period (1944–1991)” (No. lzp-2024/1-0650), funded by the Latvian Council of Science.
The session “Explore Your Digital Culture Bubble” is organised within research application No. 1.1.1.9/LZP/1/24/033 “Bridging the Cultural Gap: Rural Family Strategies in Shaping Young People’s Digital Cultural Consumption Practices”, implemented within the European Union Cohesion Policy Programme 2021–2027, Specific Objective 1.1.1 “Strengthening Research and Innovation Capacity and Introducing Advanced Technologies into the Common R&D System”, Measure 1.1.1.9 “Postdoctoral Research”.
Prepared by:
Aija Lūse
Science Communication Specialist
Institute of Culture and Arts, Latvian Academy of Culture
aija.luse@lka.edu.lv | +371 29107218