Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania have for over the past century shown the benefits of shared action and solidarity. The three states sought recognition of their independence following World War I, and following World War II – through the years of Soviet occupation – they maintained that recognition through collaborative efforts. In recent decades the joint efforts of their peoples were seen in the peaceful Baltic Way demonstration in August 1989 when Balts joined hands from Tallinn to Vilnius across a distance of 600 kilometers, and in the three countries’ together joining NATO in 2004. Today, the three Baltic countries are leading the world in per capita aid to Ukraine after Russia’s invasion in February 2022. 

Gathering at the 29th biennial conference of the Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies (AABS), to be held on the campus of Yale University on June 13-16, 2024, will be hundreds of people dedicated to the study of the peoples and lands around the Baltic Sea. The conference features panels from all fields of the humanities and social sciences, education, technology, transnational security, safety, and well-being. The conference draws attention to the larger shared space throughout the Baltic Sea region as well as to the role the peoples of the Baltic are playing on an all-European and global scale. The conference is co-hosted by Yale University and the University of New Haven.