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The President of the Republic at the International Congress "Cultural Semiotics, Cultural Mechanisms, Boundaries and Identities" Dedicated to the 80th Anniversary of Academician Juri Lotman at the Knighthood House on March 2, 200202.03.2002
Dear participants of the Congress!
Ladies and Gentlemen!
It is a pleasure to welcome you here in the historical building of the Estonian Knighthood. This building, designed in the neo-Renaissance style at the beginning of the 19th century, has been the focal point of the social and cultural activities of the Baltic Germans and also the site of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Estonia between the two World Wars. For the last fifty years, the House of Knighthood has served the national culture of Estonia. For a long time, it housed our National Library. Since 1993, the building is at the disposal of the Estonian Art Museum.
Dear guests! Recalling those facts, I know that such signs, and the links between the signs, one by one make up the culture of each nation, and that the intertwining of local sign systems in turn results in the emergence of our common semiosphere.
As we know, the theory of secondary sign systems, the theory of a boundary as a translation mechanism, the theory of the semiosphere and culture as a text were born in Tartu. Tartu was the home of the creator of those theories, Academician Juri Lotman, from 1950 till his death in 1993. Tartu is also my home and therefore, I have had the chance to meet this man of great mind personally on several occasions.
To recognise a great mind, whom his colleagues sometimes called the Einstein of Estonia, it was not even necessary to be well acquainted with his works. The humanism, meekness, consideration and devotion characteristic of a great mind were obvious in every public appearance of Juri Lotman, and in his attitude to other people. Juri Lotman was a real enlightener in the circumstances where every word was closely watched and official ideology tried to restrict the scope of free creative minds. It was Juri Lotman's merit that in the atmosphere of mental oppression of the last half-century in Estonia, he proclaimed the primary nature of culture as a condition of human existence. Thus, Lotman's theory also emphasised the necessity of national cultures as a condition of the diversity of world culture.
Dear friends! At the times when Estonia was almost unknown to Europe and the rest of the world, Juri Lotman was the brand-name and the visiting card of Estonia. The series of "Sign System Studies" composed by him was in demand in many distinguished libraries of the world. In the Soviet times, the publications of Juri Lotman were almost the only hard currency that the Tartu University Library could exchange for the monographs written by other top researchers of other countries to enrich its funds.
Thus we can say - Estonian science and culture have gained a lot from the fact that in 1950, Juri Lotman chose Estonia and Tartu as the abode for developing and expressing his talent. And as each gain, also the spiritual legacy of Juri Lotman must be developed further. Today, this is the task of the Department of Semiotics and the Chair of Russian Literature of Tartu University. Also the international congress dedicated to the 80th anniversary of Juri Lotman has been inspired by this task.
The life's work of Academician Lotman is an inseparable part of the scientific culture of Estonia today. On many occasions, Lotman has emphasised that the 21st century will either be humanitarian, focusing on humanity, or bring the risk of losing all contact with our history and our future. Here, Lotman's message concurs with the meaning of life for us, Estonians, expressed by Jakob Hurt, the father of the national movement in Estonia, on the 19th century. He said that it is the spiritual aspirations that constitute the true greatness of a small nation. Certainly, the example of Juri Lotman inspires and influences the spiritual life in Estonia in the present and in the future.
Ladies and gentlemen!
Thank you for participating in this Congress and thus honouring the memory of the Estonian academician Juri Lotman, and also for expressing your readiness for the creative development of his teachings. You are always welcome back to Estonia, to the native home of Juri Lotman's ideas.
Thank you for your attention!
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