ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the Latvian American community and its political experience brings together the main themes that have emerged from this story. It outlines some of the characteristics of a political refugee community and draw larger generalizations about the nature of political exile and its consequences. American Latvians experienced a number of mnemonic battles that led to painful internal conflicts. Repatriation is a particularly interesting aspect of the experience of political refugees, because it deals with how one stops being an emigre and whether it is possible. As refugees running from Tsarist Russia's persecutions, they brought to America radical socialist and communist ideas, which then ran into some dramatic conflicts with those Latvians in America who had become interested in the idea of an independent statehood. The significant aspect of the experience of political refugees such as American Latvians relates to the problems of collective memory.
