Aili Aarelaid-Tart
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Aili Aarelaid-Tart | |
|---|---|
 Aarelaid-Tart in 1999 | |
| Born | Aili Aarelaid 2 May 1947 |
| Died | 9 January 2014 (aged 66) Tallinn, Estonia |
| Other names | Aili Tart |
| Citizenship | Estonian |
| Alma mater | University of Tartu Leningrad State University University of Helsinki |
| Occupations | Sociologist, cultural historian |
| Employer | Tallinn University |
| Known for | Research on cultural trauma, life stories, and social memory |
| Spouse | Indrek Tart |
| Awards | Order of the White Star, Medal Class (2002) |
Aili Aarelaid-Tart (2 May 1947 – 9 January 2014) was an Estonian sociologist and cultural historian whose scholarship focused on cultural theory, biographical research, social memory, and cultural trauma in post-Soviet Estonia and the wider Baltic region.[1][2][3] She was a research professor at Tallinn University and founded its Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies in 1995.[2][4]
Her best-known works included the monograph Cultural Trauma and Life Stories (2006) and the edited collection Baltic Biographies at Historical Crossroads (2012).[5][6] Her work was discussed in reviews in Journal of Baltic Studies, International Sociology, and the Estonian cultural weekly Sirp.[7][8][9]
Aarelaid-Tart graduated in history from Tartu State University in 1972 and completed postgraduate study in philosophy there in 1975.[1][2] In 1978 she received a doctorate in philosophy from Leningrad State University.[1][2] In 2006 she completed a second doctorate at the University of Helsinki with the dissertation Cultural Trauma and Life Stories.[10][5]
In 1980 she married the sociologist and writer Indrek Tart and thereafter published under both Aili Aarelaid and Aili Aarelaid-Tart.[1][2]
Career and scholarship
From 1975 to 1989 Aarelaid-Tart worked at the Institute of History of the Estonian Academy of Sciences.[1][2] She later worked at the Institute of International and Social Studies and at Tallinn Pedagogical University, becoming one of the central figures in the development of contemporary culture research at what became Tallinn University.[2][4] In 1995 she founded the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, which she continued to lead after its transfer to Tallinn University's Estonian Institute of Humanities.[2]
Her research moved from the philosophy of time and cultural theory to the study of civic associations, biographical method, generational experience, and memory.[1][2] Together with Indrek Tart, she published on civil society and culture in post-Soviet Estonia in Nationalities Papers in 1995.[11] With Hank Johnston, she later co-authored an article in Sociological Perspectives on generations and long-term mobilisation in the Estonian national movement.[12]
Her monograph Cultural Trauma and Life Stories synthesized her work on life-story research and argued for reading Estonia's 20th-century ruptures through the concept of cultural trauma.[5][7][8] Reviewers described the book as a major interim summary of roughly fifteen years of research into life stories and cultural change.[7][8] In 2012 she co-edited Baltic Biographies at Historical Crossroads with Li Bennich-Björkman, a volume that brought together life-story studies from across the Baltic states.[6][13]
In her later years she also worked on generational change in Estonian culture. ERR reported in 2014 that in 2012 two volumes of Nullindate kultuur were published under her leadership.[4] In a 2012 ERR interview, she discussed changing identities among Russian-speaking youth in Estonia, reflecting her continuing engagement with questions of integration and social change.[14]
