Zigmas Zinkevičius
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Zigmas Zinkevičius (4 January 1925 – 20 February 2018) was a Lithuanian
academician An academician is a full member of an artistic, literary, engineering, or scientific academy. In many countries, it is an honorific title used to denote a full member of an academy that has a strong influence on national scientific life. Accor ...
, Baltist,
linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...
, linguistic
historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human species; as well as the ...
,
dialectologist Dialectology (from Greek , ''dialektos'', "talk, dialect"; and , '' -logia'') is the scientific study of dialects: subsets of languages. Though in the 19th century a branch of historical linguistics, dialectology is often now considered a sub-fiel ...
, politician, and the former Minister of Education and Science of Lithuania (1996–1998). Zinkevičius authored over a hundred books, including the popular six-volume "History of the Lithuanian Language" (1984–1994), and over a thousand articles, both in Lithuanian and other languages. He was an academician of the Lithuanian Catholic Academy of Science since 1991 and a full member of the
Lithuanian Academy of Sciences The Lithuanian Academy of Sciences or LMA (, ) is a state-funded independent organization in Lithuania dedicated for science and research. Its mission is to mobilize prominent scientists and initiate activities that would strengthen the welfare ...
from 1990 to 2011, when he became an
emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". In some c ...
member. Zinkevičius was a member of the editorial boards of the Lithuanian Language Society () and of the international periodicals "" and "Lituanistica". Zinkevičius created the theory about the three Lithuanian written languages at the beginning of Lithuanian writing. During his 72-year academic career, he taught at Vilnius University for 45 years. Zinkevičius was fluent in a number of languages, including English,
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...
,
Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...
, Polish, Ukrainian, Belarusian and French.Zigmas Zinkevičius
. Central Election Committee. Retrieved on 2008-08-18


Life and career

Zinkevičius was born on 4 January 1925 in the village in Ukmergė district. In 1939, after finishing the six-year school, he transferred to the . In 1945, Zinkevičius entered the Faculty of History and Philology of
Vilnius University Vilnius University ( Lithuanian: ''Vilniaus universitetas'') is a public research university, which is the first and largest university in Lithuania, as well as one of the oldest and most prominent higher education institutions in Central and Ea ...
(VU).


Academics

Zinkevičius's academic career began in 1946, when he held the position of chief laboratory assistant at the Lithuanian Department of Vilnius University until 1950. After finishing his studies in 1950, Zinkevičius taught in VU and the Vilnius Pedagogical Institute until 1956. In 1955, he defended his thesis (). Between 1956 and 1967, he was the
docent The term "docent" is derived from the Latin word , which is the third-person plural present active indicative of ('to teach, to lecture'). Becoming a docent is often referred to as habilitation or doctor of science and is an academic qualifi ...
at the Department of Lithuanian Language of VU. Zinkevičius was also the deputy dean of the Faculty of History and Philology in 1956–1968 and between 1962 and 1964, held the position of chief researcher. Between 1964 and 1966, together with , Zinkevičius prepared a new classification of the dialects of the current Lithuanian language. In 1967, he defended his
doctoral thesis A thesis (: theses), or dissertation (abbreviated diss.), is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings.International Standard ISO 7144: D ...
('Lithuanian Dialectology (Comparative Phonetics and Morphology of Dialects)'). From 1967 to 1973, Zinkevičius received the position of professor at the Department of the Lithuanian Language. He was the head of the Department of Lithuanian Language at the Faculty of Philology of Vilnius University from 1973 until 1988. Then, between 1988 and 1991, Zinkevičius became the head of the Department of Baltic Philology. After Lithuania regained its independence, he also began lecturing at the
Vytautas Magnus University Vytautas Magnus University (VMU) (, VDU) is a public university in Kaunas, Lithuania. The university was founded in 1922 during the interwar period as an alternate national university. Initially it was known as the University of Lithuania, but ...
. He was the director of the Lithuanian Language Institute in 1995 and 1996. From 2001 to 2009, he was the Chairman of the Council of the
Science and Encyclopaedia Publishing Institute The Science and Encyclopaedia Publishing Centre (previously: ''Science and Encyclopaedia Publishing Institute'', or MELC) is a Lithuanian publishing house that specializes in encyclopedias, reference works, and dictionaries. The Institute, head ...
. Zinkevičius was also the editor-in-chief of the (3 vols. 2000–06). While in his nineties, he still worked as many as 10–12 hours a day. The professor was widely-acclaimed as the most famous, productive, and cited Lithuanian linguist of recent times. His works concerned subjects such as
dialectology Dialectology (from Ancient Greek, Greek , ''dialektos'', "talk, dialect"; and , ''-logy, -logia'') is the scientific study of dialects: subsets of languages. Though in the 19th century a branch of historical linguistics, dialectology is often now c ...
and the
Lithuanian language Lithuanian (, ) is an East Baltic languages, East Baltic language belonging to the Baltic languages, Baltic branch of the Indo-European language family. It is the language of Lithuanians and the official language of Lithuania as well as one of t ...
's history, as well as the history of its study, its historical grammar,
onomastics Onomastics (or onomatology in older texts) is the study of proper names, including their etymology, history, and use. An ''alethonym'' ('true name') or an ''orthonym'' ('real name') is the proper name of the object in question, the object of onom ...
, and he reviewed many works of linguistics. Zinkevičius's work was well-received, both in Lithuania and abroad, where he was elected as a foreign member of many academies: the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities from 1982,
Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters (, DNVA) is a learned society based in Oslo, Norway. Its purpose is to support the advancement of science and scholarship in Norway. History The Royal Frederick University in Christiania was establis ...
from 1991,
Latvian Academy of Sciences The Latvian Academy of Sciences (, ) is the official science academy of Latvia and is an association of the country's foremost scientists. The academy was founded as the ''Latvian SSR Academy of Sciences'' (). It is located in Riga. The curren ...
from 1995. Zinkevičius is also the author of the "wicz" theory, according to which Lithuanian Poles whose surnames end in "wicz" constitutes a separate ethnic group, but are really ethnic Lithuanians.


Politics

According to Polish historian Barbara Jundo-Kaliszewska, during the 1980s and 1990s, Zinkevičius was one of the prominent activists of the nationalist and anti-Polish, organization Vilnija, whose main goal was a rapid Lithuanization of the
Vilnius region Vilnius Region is the territory in present-day Lithuania and Belarus that was originally inhabited by ethnic Baltic tribes and was a part of Lithuania proper, but came under East Slavic and Polish cultural influences over time. The territory ...
. Zinkevičius tenured as Minister of Education and Science from December 10, 1996, to March 25, 1998, in Vagnorius Cabinet II and was a state consultant on education and science issues in 1998. During his tenure as Minister of Education and Science, he helped intensify the policy of Lithuanianization of the Polish minority living in Lithuania. On December 17, 1996, in an interview he said that Lithuanian should be the sole language of lectures in state schools, and that youth in
Vilnius Region Vilnius Region is the territory in present-day Lithuania and Belarus that was originally inhabited by ethnic Baltic tribes and was a part of Lithuania proper, but came under East Slavic and Polish cultural influences over time. The territory ...
speak a "
simple Simple or SIMPLE may refer to: *Simplicity, the state or quality of being simple Arts and entertainment * ''Simple'' (album), by Andy Yorke, 2008, and its title track * "Simple" (Florida Georgia Line song), 2018 * "Simple", a song by John ...
" language, while in schools they are forced to speak in a language foreign to them, Polish. He also questioned the citizenship of those who do not speak Lithuanian. The statement prompted a protest from the Polish Foreign Ministry and the Congress of Poles of Lithuania. Prime Minister Gediminas Vagnorius declared that the minister's opinions did not reflect the government's position. On February 3, 2015, he was one of 60 signatories of an open letter addressed, among others, to Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaitė and members of the government, in which he demanded that the Polish minority party LLRA be excluded from the government coalition and that the party's deputies be stripped of their seats in the
Seimas The Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania (), or simply the Seimas ( ; ), is the unicameralism, unicameral legislative body of the Lithuania, Republic of Lithuania. The Seimas constitutes the legislative branch of Government of Lithuania, govern ...
, due to the stated reasons that LLRA's views are openly directed against the state and it repeatedly lies in international forums about discrimination against the Polish minority in Lithuania, without specifying which parts of Lithuanian or international law were broken by Lithuania. On August 28, 2015, he published an open letter addressed to the Minister of Education Juozas Bernatonis protesting a planned reform allowing Poles in Lithuania to spell their names in Polish, arguing that: "Undoubtedly, the supposedly Polish surnames of most Polish-speakers in Southeastern Lithuania are actually of Lithuanian origin. They were Polonized during the Polish and Soviet occupations". After Zinkevičius's death, Lithuania's prime minister between 1996 and 1999 Gediminas Vagnorius said that Zinkevičius "brought a different approach, a sincere, matter-of-fact, professional approach to education policy and forced others to step up" and described him as "very sincere, very benevolent and distinguished by high intelligence". He was elected chairman of the Lithuanian Christian Democratic Party in 1999. He resigned from the leadership of the party on November 17, 2000, in protest against the merger of the Lithuanian Christian Democratic Party with the Christian Democratic Union (KDS) led by Kazys Bobelis. He became a member of the new in 2001.


Personal life

Zigmas Zinkevičius was always a practising Roman Catholic. His wife was Regina Zinkevičienė and they had two children, Laima Zinkevičiūtė and Vytautas Zinkevičius. He died in hospital on 20 February 2018, surrounded by his family. He was buried in the Antakalnis cemetery on February 23. The contemporary president Dalia Grybauskaitė, when expressing her condolences on his death, said that Lithuania lost an outstanding linguist:
The fundamental scientific works of the long-time Vilnius University professor made it possible to learn about the past of our language and nation, to understand its origin, to strengthen Lithuanianness and national self-esteem.
The contemporary Minister of Education and Science Jurgita Petrauskienė said:
Lithuania and the entire educational community lost an authoritative linguist, dialectologist, researcher of Baltistics, a great person. A bright memory of his personality also remains: a prominent scientist and at the same time a modest, benevolent, very hardworking and respectful person.


Reception and legacy

Zinkevičius is highly acclaimed in international sources, where he is described as an "excellent linguistic historian of the greatest professional repute", "eminent", and "great Lithuanian scholar". On the topic of Polish–Lithuanian relations, in his book (''Surnames of the Vilnius Region's Polish-speakers''), Zinkevičius emphasized that today Lithuanians and Poles should coexist in a nice way, but that this could only happen if the relations and history of both nations were based on the truth. He has said that:
They need to look at history correctly, recognizing that Lithuanians are not descended from Polish-speakers, but on the contrary: local Polish-speakers descend from Lithuanian-speaking people.
On his 90th birthday in 2015, Zinkevičius said: "I saw many governments, but I never changed my views, which made me disliked by those who changed them. This is how I am, this is how I will die, I wish everyone every success". Vytautas Landsbergis, the honorary chairman of the Homeland Union at the time, congratulated Zinkevičius on his birthday with the following words:
I want to say, dear academician, that your name and the name of Lithuania are connected. Lithuania is a nation, and the basis of the nation is language. You have done immeasurable work in this area. May God give you the strength to increase the large pile of books about Lithuania.
Other notable people in Lithuania, such as the contemporary President of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaitė,
Prime Minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...
Algirdas Butkevičius, Deputy Speaker of the
Seimas The Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania (), or simply the Seimas ( ; ), is the unicameralism, unicameral legislative body of the Lithuania, Republic of Lithuania. The Seimas constitutes the legislative branch of Government of Lithuania, govern ...
Irena Degutienė, sent representatives also to congratulate Zinkevičius. The contemporary Minister of Education and Science emphasized that Zinkevičius's scientific work made Lithuania famous in the world and thanked Zinkevičius for his strengthening of the Lithuanian schools in southeastern Lithuania while he was a minister: "You achieved that all residents of this region who want to learn Lithuanian could do so." Professor , Zinkevičius's childhood friend, recalled that the years of Soviet occupation was hard for Zinkevičius and was glad that his work remained serious, uninfluenced by the
Communist ideology Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, d ...
, and that he did not ignore the dangerous events for Lithuania and defended Lithuanian language and national identity from those opposed to them. Zigmas Zinkevičius is the focus of the
documentary film A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...
('Zigmas Zinkevičius: Having Fallen in Love with the Lithuanian Language') created by director Algirdas Tarvydas in 2015.


Awards

In 1994, Zinkevičius, as the professor of VMU, was awarded the
regalia Regalia ( ) is the set of emblems, symbols, or paraphernalia indicative of royal status, as well as rights, prerogatives and privileges enjoyed by a sovereign, regardless of title. The word originally referred to the elaborate formal dress and ...
of an Honorary Doctor. For his services to Lithuania in 1995, Zinkevičius was awarded the Order of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas, 3rd Class. He was also the
laureate In English, the word laureate has come to signify eminence or association with literary awards or Military awards and decorations, military glory. It is also used for recipients of the Nobel Prize, the Gandhi Peace Award, the Student Peace Pri ...
of the international
Herder Prize The Herder Prize (), named after the German philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder (1744–1803), was a prestigious international prize awarded every year from 1964 to 2006 to scholars and artists from Central and Southeast Europe whose life and wor ...
in 1994 and the Lithuanian in 1995. In addition, he was awarded the title of Honorary Doctorate of the
University of Latvia University of Latvia (, shortened ''LU'') is a public research university located in Riga, Latvia. The university was established in 1919. History The University of Latvia, initially named as the Higher School of Latvia () was founded on Se ...
. In 2015, on July 6, the Lithuanian Statehood Day, Zinkevičius was awarded the Commander's Grand Cross of the Order for Merits to Lithuania by president Grybauskaitė.


Criticism

American historian Theodore R. Weeks expressed his opinion on Zigmas Zinkevičius lifetime professional work as a "flagship example" of a trend in Lithuanian historiography and linguistics that depicts the
Vilnius region Vilnius Region is the territory in present-day Lithuania and Belarus that was originally inhabited by ethnic Baltic tribes and was a part of Lithuania proper, but came under East Slavic and Polish cultural influences over time. The territory ...
as "always Lithuanian". According to Weeks, Zinkevičius in his book ''Eastern Lithuania in the Past and Now'' (published in 1993) "wishes to argue for the eternal Lithuanian nature of the region, a viewpoint that no historical or linguistic methods seem likely to support." He also defines Zinkevičius' approach as "historical-linguistic ethnocentrism". He emphasizes that Zinkevičius tends to ignore the actual ethnographic data and alleged national self-identification of the inhabitants, in favour of promoting the thesis of the unchanging Lithuanian nature of the region. Polish researcher Robert Boroch is of a similar opinion, in his review of Zinkevičius's work ''The History of the Lithuanian Language'' (published in 1996) Boroch emphasized that "the weakness of the work is the lack of objectivity, mixing ideology and scientific facts".: "Wydaje mi się jednak, że słabością pracy jest brak obiektywizmu, mieszanie ideologii i faktów naukowych." He describes Zinkevičius's thesis about the lack of connection between the Polish language used in Lithuania and the one used in Poland as "wrong, because differences in pronunciation cannot be a distinctive feature sufficient to distinguish a given language", and his position as "justified only from the propaganda point of view", which Boroch believes aims to put the Polish language in Lithuania in the position of "a secondary and dying language".


Publications

In (1966), his most important work in dialectology, Zinkevičius presented the comparative
phonetics Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds or, in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians ...
and
morphology Morphology, from the Greek and meaning "study of shape", may refer to: Disciplines *Morphology (archaeology), study of the shapes or forms of artifacts *Morphology (astronomy), study of the shape of astronomical objects such as nebulae, galaxies, ...
of the Lithuanian dialects, which included 75 maps with the phonetic data of the dialects. For this book, he received the in 1968 and a Habilitated Doctor degree. His most important work for Lithuanian accentology is his work (lit. From Lithuanian Historical Accentology: Accentuation of the 1605 Catechism) from 1975. Zinkevičius was the
editor-in-chief An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The editor-in-chief heads all departments of the organization and is held accoun ...
of the book (1976, 1985). In his 1977 book (lit. Lithuanians' anthroponymics: Vilnius' Lithuanians'
personal name A personal name, full name or prosoponym (from Ancient Greek ''prósōpon'' – person, and ''onoma'' –name) is the set of names by which an individual person or animal is known. When taken together as a word-group, they all relate to that on ...
s in the early 17th century), Zinkevičius looked at more than 5,000 Lithuanian personal names and examined the process of the
polonization Polonization or Polonisation ()In Polish historiography, particularly pre-WWII (e.g., L. Wasilewski. As noted in Смалянчук А. Ф. (Smalyanchuk 2001) Паміж краёвасцю і нацыянальнай ідэяй. Польскі ...
of Lithuanian surnames. Zinkevičius prepared textbooks for
higher education Tertiary education (higher education, or post-secondary education) is the educational level following the completion of secondary education. The World Bank defines tertiary education as including universities, colleges, and vocational schools ...
, e.g. (lit. The Lithuanian language's dialectology; 1978, 1994) and (lit. Lithuanian language's historical grammar; 2 vols. 1980–81). The latter book was the first historical grammar of the Lithuanian language, which thoroughly examined the main issues of Lithuanian grammar. Zinkevičius researched and published the Polish- Yotvingian dictionary "" (1983, 1985). Zinkevičius wrote the monographs (lit. Eastern Lithuania in the past and now; 1993) and the (lit. The History of the Lithuanian Language; 1996, published both in Lithuanian and English). He also authored books to popularize science, for example, (lit. How People Learned to Write; 1958), (lit. The Lithuanian language's dialects; 1968), (lit. Basics of Language research; 1969, 1980), (lit. Linguist K. Būga; 1981), (lit. Nation's origin; 2006). He wrote the book together with others, and it was published in English and German in 2005 and Russian in 2006. In addition, Zinkevičius is also the author of the following books (this list is not comprehensive): * (2000) * (2004) * (2005) * (2005) * (2006) * (2006) * (2007) * (2007) * (2007) * (2008) * (2009) * (2010) * (2010) * (2010) * (2010) * (2011) * (2011) * (2011) * (2012) * (2013, 2014) Zinkevičius has also published studies regarding the Lithuanian language in the writings of
Martynas Mažvydas Martynas Mažvydas (1510 – 21 May 1563) was a Protestant author who edited the first printed book in the Lithuanian language. Variants of his name include Martinus Masvidius, Martinus Maszwidas, M. Mossuids Waytkūnas, Mastwidas, Mažvyda ...
, Konstantinas Sirvydas, , Kristijonas Donelaitis and the Wolfenbüttel postil. He also authored three
autobiographies An autobiography, sometimes informally called an autobio, is a self-written account of one's own life, providing a personal narrative that reflects on the author's experiences, memories, and insights. This Literary genre, genre allows individua ...
: * (1998) * (1999) * (2006) He also published the four-volume book (lit. Selected articles) in 2002–2004, containing his articles that were published in the Lithuanian press. He also prepared the Kazimieras Būga's (lit. Selected articles; 3 vols. 1958–61 and an index volume in 1962) and the book (lit. Kazimieras Būga: Life and Work; 1979). Together with others, he also created the (lit. Lithuanian language textbook for classes IX–XI), which was first published in 1971 and was re-printed a third time in 1997.


References


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Citations


Bibliography


Articles

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Books, journals and theses

* * * * * * * * * * * *


External links


Bibliographical index of works by Zigmas Zinkevičius up to 2003
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zinkevicius, Zigmas Balticists 1925 births 2018 deaths People from Ukmergė District Municipality Lithuanian Roman Catholics Lithuanian Christian Democrats politicians Ministers of education and science of Lithuania Government ministers of Lithuania Members of the Seimas Historians of Lithuania 20th-century Lithuanian historians Linguists from Lithuania Politicians of Catholic political parties Vilnius University alumni Academic staff of Vilnius University Members of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters Commander's Crosses of the Order of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas Herder Prize recipients