Psychologists from USA will talk how to rebuild Spiritual Core
From 23rd to 26th of September in the faculty of Social Sciences we have visiting researchers from Nebraska university (USA) – Ph.D. Doug Tillman, Ph.D.David Hof and Ph.D.Daniel Hof. They kindly agreed to share with their experience with the faculty students and teachers.
We would like to invite you to these lecturers:
On Septerber 26 lecture of Ph.D. Doug Tillman , „Rebuilding my Spiritual Core“. Beginning: 11.15 in faculty of Social Sciences (Jonavos st. 66, room 108).
On Septerber 26 lecture of Ph.D. David Hof and dr. Daniel Hof „Wellness in the Helping Profession“. Beginning: 12.30, in faculty of Social Sciences (Jonavos st. 66, room 108).
COMPETITION FOR THE ERASMUS+ TRAINEESHIP GRANTS FOR THE ACADEMIC YEAR 2018 / 2019
VMU International Cooperation department has announced first competition for Erasmus+ student and recent graduate traineeship grants.
All fulltime degree students who want to participate in the competition for Erasmus+ student or Erasmus+ recent graduate traineeship scholarships should submit their application documents until 13/11/2019. Student traineeship must end before 20-09-2019, recent graduate traineeship must end in a year after graduation (application must be submitted during the last year of studies). Traineeship period – from 2 to 4 months.
More information here.
VMU International Cooperation Department invites students to participate in the competition for Erasmus+ studies
If you want to gain even more international study experience, improve your foreign language skills, become a VMU Ambassador and a part of even bigger international community, participate in the competition and fill in the online application form on https://epasirasymas.vdu.lt/index.php?lang=EN -> Application form for outgoing students / Erasmus+ studies (log in with studentas.vdu.lt account) until September 23rd (23:59), 2018.
Eligible applicants are full time and part time students, except 1st year bachelor’s degree students. Students with disabilities or special needs have an opportunity to receive additional funding.
The results of competition will be announced on October 2nd, 2018 on VMU website. Each selected student will also be informed personally by e-mail.
Additional information about Erasmus+ studies, partnerships with Higher Education Institutions in foreign countries, criteria of the selection, scholarships, contacts here.
Apply Now: BA and MA Degree Studies at VMU (Extended Deadline)
Vytautas Magnus University (VMU) welcomes international students to apply for 11 Bachelor and 21 Master degree study programmes in the English language. Application deadline for studies in the 2018/2019 academic year has been extended to 15 July. Application submissions have to be sent online.
This year VMU offers a wide range of study programmes in the English language, including interdisciplinary, joint, international programmes with foreign partners and others. The programmes are taught in Kaunas or Vilnius. Applications and admissions are managed by the International Cooperation Department.
New and Updated Study Programmes
Two completely new study programmes have been launched this year: BA of Business Administration and MA of Organizational Psychology.
Bachelor degree programme of Business Administration prepares broad profile specialists who are able to take up professional activities of business administrators, lower level managers etc., to work in any business organization’s administration unit, also in small and medium business companies.
Master degree programme of Organizational Psychology is designed to prepare a psychologist capable of applying current knowledge and methods in psychology, research, consultation and counselling skills based on sound scientific and ethical principles that promote psychosocial well-being and organizational effectiveness within the context of economic and social change.
Other updated available BA study programmes include Music Production, Economics and Finance, English Philology, Informatics Systems, Biology and Genetics, Biotechnology, Environmental Science and Ecology, International Politics and Development studies, World Politics and Economy, Society, Culture and Communication.
At MA level, students can apply for Finance, International Economics, Marketing and International Commerce, Sports Business MBA, East Asia Region Studies, Sociolinguistics and Multilingualism, Applied Informatics, International Business Law, Applied Biotechnology, Environmental Management, Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, Diplomacy, Diplomacy and International Relations, Journalism and Media Industries, The Interdisciplinary Master’s in East European Research and Studies (MIREES), Applied Sociology, Educational Management, Social Anthropology, Social Work, Performing Arts.
State Grants for Full-Time MA Studies
The Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Lithuania has opened a call for applications for 70 Lithuanian state grants funding full-time Master degree or Integrated studies at Lithuanian higher education institutions in the academic year 2018/2019. The funding under the Call shall be provided to the nationals of the Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Moldova, Japan, China, South Korea and Israel and foreigners of Lithuanian origin.
All approved candidates will receive a monthly scholarship of 380 euros for the whole duration of the studies. The cost of the full-time MA degree studies will be covered (up to the limit not exceeding the national standard cost of studies) only for the nationals of the Ukraine, Belarus and Georgia and foreign citizens of Lithuanian origin.
More information about studies at VMU
The visit of Higher Education didactics experts
On the 1st of December the higher education didactics experts from the University of Warwick (United Kingdom) – prof. Cathia Jenainath and Dr. His Angouri visited Vytautas Magnus University.
The guests have met with the working group of teacher’s professional development in Vytautas Magnus university and participated in discussions with faculties.
The experts during communication process will help to find out the needs of the university teacher’s didactic development, prioritize and, after the visit, will offer a didactic improvement program in the context of Artes liberales studies. This program will be implemented in spring and autumn semesters in 2018, organizing and conducting a cycle of professional development seminars for Vytautas Magnus university.
Prof. dr Cathia Jenainath is the head of the Department of Interdisciplinary Studies at the University of Warwick and the director of artes liberal studies. Assoc. dr His Angour – Bachelor of Arts in Applied Linguistics at the University.
Atention to all VMU students! Competition for erasmus+ studies in partner countries (non-eu countries)
VMU International Cooperation Department invites all VMU students to use possibility to gain international study experience by studying in Erasmus+ partner countries‘ higher education institution (HEI).
Students have to submit completed online application form until 24th of September, 2017.
More information you will find here
A Graduate of Social Work Master studies manages a children’s home in China
My name is Huang Fengyi. Two years ago I graduated from Vytautas Magnus University with a master degree of social work. There were a lot of people who were curious about why I have chosen VDU. I would say it is like my destiny—being in Lithuania and studying in VDU is an experience which has had great influences on my way of thinking, and my view toward the world.
The education I received as a master student of social work was so different with my previous training as a pharmacist. I have learnt to look at the world in a constructive kind of way. I am able to study people’s problems and social problems in a broader framework. I was taught to be down-to-earth, to be patient, and to be reflective.
Two months after I returned to China, there was an earthquake happened in the south-west part of China, Yunnan. I was assigned to the post-earthquake area, as a program coordinator, trying to build some safe places in the villages or schools for the children , where they could study, play and learn some skills. The post-earthquake area is very poor. A lot of young people have to leave their village and try to look for a living in some bigger cities, however, their children usually can not go with them and they are children left-behind–a sad story behind the fast economic development of China, and all over the poor areas of China.
After the project was ended, I returned to the city and worked as a research assistant in a research institute. I started to write researches for the government, and the minor party. I have to say, the research skills I have learnt from my master degree has little to do with what I was doing in the research institute. It was a painful experience, though I have to admit it did give me some knowledge about social work development in China, which I am a bit pessimistic. Even though now the government is pushing to promote social work service in China, the quality of social workers and their services are not properly emphasized. What is lacked? The spirit of down-to-earth service.
What I have learnt from my NGO management class is not to complain. I stopped whining about my research job, and quitted. Right now I am working as a manager in the children’s home. It is very a challenging job and I am still learning how to work for the children. I feel I am doing something I have been wanting to do.
I have encountered a lot of difficulties after I returned to China. I always miss my life and my study in VDU—it was sweet and bitter. Somehow it gives me courage to move forward—life is a journey and I have tried my best.
COMPETITION FOR EXCHANGE STUDIES AT non-EU COUNTRIES
Students are invited to participate in a competition for one semester long exchange studies at non-EU countries with Erasmus+ or VMU Mobility scholarship.
Students have to submit completed online application form until 25th of September 2018.
More information here.
Organizational psychology: insights from science to practice
On September 28th, 2017 assoc. prof. dr. Aurelija Stelmokiene participated in practitioners’ discussion “Diversity and Inclusion: Code “Generations” as an invited speaker. The main topics for discussion were
* Important generational shifts: changes in employee personalities, work attitudes, values and behavior;
* How to deal with these challenges: if previous success formula fits today‘s situation (what works and what should be changed).
It was a great opportunity to try to build a bridge between science and practice.
More details about discussion here: http://dcc.lt/events/upcoming-events/150-diversity-and-inclusion-code-generations
Social Anthropology: One of the Most Important Sciences
“Lithuania is one of the hardest working countries in the world with probably the lowest pay in Europe. If you make only 700 euros a month you cannot expect to live like a European”, says American Professor Victor De Munck, an anthropologist who has worked in the State University of New York and has conducted extensive research in Sri Lanka, Macedonia, Russia, Lithuania and the USA. Currently the scientist is working at Vytautas Magnus University (VMU): he conducts research at the Social Anthropology Department and teaches lectures to students of social anthropology. This field, he says, is one of the most vital ones today.
Social anthropology is a science that examines cultures and communities of people. How is this science significant today, in your opinion?
It is one of the most important, if not the most important, science, first of all, because social anthropologists research culture, and culture is a symbol system which we use to construct meaning in our lives. Culture is not just a linguistic system but also values, beliefs and gestures, rules that we develop: how we eat, get married, practice religion etc.
Another reason is that anthropologists are one of the few types of scientists who use participant observation, i.e. when the researcher not only observes, but also participates in the researched community, gets involved in the subjects‘ life. All social sciences can be valid only if their theories apply to what is happening in natural life. That is what anthropologists seek to understand: how humans live in a natural setting. When people only answer questionnaires, it may have nothing to do with reality.
The third reason is the world is getting more and more fragmented: there‘s more and more stranger communities amongst us. Even within our own kind, we‘ve become fractured: e.g. in Lithuania there are strong Catholics, atheists, different generations, economic statuses etc. Then immigrants come into the country and we have to have global understanding, to understand other people’s cultural orientations to the world and themselves, to understand their perspective or behaviour. Social anthropology provides this knowledge.
You have conducted research on interesting topics in various countries, including Sri Lanka and Macedonia. One of these researches was done in Lithuania, USA and Russia: you compared how the concept of romantic love is understood in those countries. What have you discovered?
As we become more socially mobile, we’ve become more individuated from one another, so romantic love shifts. There used to be social pressures to marry the proper person and to stay married. Now it’s largely individual choice and if you get divorced, there is hardly any stigma attached to it. The whole culture of courtship has changed tremendously and that has affected the structure of family.
The aim of the research was to compare the cultural constructs of romantic love in the US, Lithuania and Russia. I found some significant differences, but I think things have changed: most of the data in Lithuania was collected in 2003-2005.
In Lithuania there was a tendency to consider romantic love as a passing phase: a poetic transitional period. Many people referred to it as Disneyland, champagne, soap bubbles, something that is evanescent and does not last. And only if you get through this period, true love and friendship may develop. Whereas in the US, romantic love means that the person you love is your best friend, it is not a fantasy, but reality and it is developed through friendship. In Russia, like in Lithuania, people also emphasised the temporariness of romantic love and did not mention friendship.
I asked 80 people in each of the three countries and no one in either in Russia or Lithuania mentioned friendship or feeling secure around someone they love, while in the USA, almost everyone said it. That’s a big difference.
How would you explain this difference? Why is romantic love understood so differently in those countries?
In Lithuania, Russia and other European countries, when you start going to the first grade, you spend almost all the remaining public school education with the same group of people. So your mates at school don’t change much and over the years you develop strong friendships, often for life.
In the US, the people in your class shift, so you learn to have brief friendships. In the seventh grade, groups of people also change in classes of different subjects, e.g. history, maths. So you constantly have weak ties. Meanwhile, in Lithuania and in Russia, friendship is developed in strong ties; therefore romantic love cannot lead to friendship because to establish a strong friendship you need a lot of time, in contrast with the US, where ties are developed easily.
A break up is devastating for an American, because it’s not just your lover, but also your best friend, while Lithuanians and Russians take it easier: yes, it may also be tragic at personal level, but culturally you are supposed to get over it a lot quicker, it is seen as a temporary poetic moment, you were not close friends.
Based on my studies, I’m developing arguments that romantic love is a social and psychological universal. In other words, society needs romantic love to keep people together and psychologically there’s kind of chemistry of love that drives people to be attached to one another. It’s not really cultural universal, as lots of cultures prohibit romantic love as criteria for marriage.
Romantic love inhibits a person’s economic interests, because usually in such relationships you think of what is in the best interest of others, not of yourself. This applies to political activism as well: it doesn’t work unless there’s some aspect of romantic love. For instance, to reduce economic inequalities, people have to make sacrifices, and in order to do that, they need to have some affection for the people they’re making sacrifices for. Romantic love is like an elemental force that allows people to act altruistically towards others. Ideology is not enough if you don’t care about others.
You’ve prepared a book, Experiencing Vilnius, with your wife, anthropologist Trini de Munck, and two students from Lithuania. In the book, you researched life in Vilnius anthropologically. What did you discover about life in the Lithuanian capital?
This book is a dialogue between insiders and outsiders about the culture and experiences in Vilnius. Usually in anthropology it’s only the anthropologist studying people. While in this case the locals could respond back to our observations: two Lithuanians reflected in the book on what the foreigners, my wife and I, discovered. There were a lot of exchanges and comments that we understood something in the wrong way. It was eye-opening: if you live here for 1 year you might think your experiences of Vilnius are pretty valid, but if you haven’t lived in a butas (flat) with the savininkė (owner), who is sitting there guarding her flowers and agurkai (cucumbers) in the fridge, you don’t really know a lot about experiencing life as a student in Vilnius.
The book was published in 2010, you collected data for it even earlier. Did you notice any major changes in the everyday life of Vilnius and Lithuania since then?
The book’s material was written when Lithuania joined the EU, in 2003-2004. There was a bubble of enthusiasm, Lithuanians were excited to join. I remember when the President of the USA George W. Bush came here to give a speech, how all enemies of Lithuania were also the enemies of the US. So it was an exciting time and certainly a time of increased expectations.
However, one person I interviewed talked about the open borders and how everyone will leave Lithuania, go to Europe and the last person will “lock the door”, metaphorically speaking. That hasn’t quite happened but certainly migration is a problem that needs to be dealt with, it is one of the big shifts. In 2004 population was roughly 3.4 million, today it is about 2.8 million and headed downwards. EU hasn’t been the panacea, it was not only the solution but also created some problems as well, so it’s a more paradoxical, dialectically confusing relationship between the EU and Lithuania.
Another difference is the increased split between Vilnius and the remaining part of the country. There are a bit too many capital flows into Vilnius and too few into smaller towns. A demographer said that based on his research 30 percent of countryside lives at the level of Africa. We also have problems with corruption, trust between the people and the government, also, how the refugees or immigrants are perceived locally. Humanizing the immigrants is a very important issue that anthropologists can deal with. Finally, people feel indebted; they are not making enough salary, even though Lithuania is one of the hardest working countries in the world with probably the lowest pay in Europe. If you make only 700 euros a month you cannot expect to live like a European, e.g. in the Netherlands, where you would be making 3000 euros for the same job.
Thank you.
