Suvalkija

Suvalkija or Sudovia (Lithuanian: Sūduva or Suvalkija or Užnemunė, Polish: Suwalszczyzna) is the smallest of the five cultural regions of Lithuania. Its unofficial capital is Marijampolė. People from Suvalkija are called suvalkiečiai (plural) or suvalkietis (singular). It is located south of the Neman River, in the former territory of Vilkaviškis bishopric. Historically, it is the newest ethnographic region as its most distinct characteristics and separate identity formed during the 19th century when the territory was part of Congress Poland. It was never a separate political entity and even today it has no official status in the administrative division of Lithuania. However, it continues to be the subject of studies focusing on Lithuanian folk culture of the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Most of Lithuania's cultural differences blended or disappeared during the Soviet era (1944–1990), remaining the longest in southeastern Lithuania. The concept remains popular among Lithuanian people. A 2008 survey of freshmen and sophomores at Kaunas' Vytautas Magnus University found that 80% of the students continued to identify themselves with one of the regions. Efforts are made to preserve, record, and promote any remaining aspects of the original folk culture.

In Lithuania three different names have been applied to region, causing some confusion:

In recent years there has been a public debate as to which name, Suvalkija or Sudovia, is preferable. Historians have argued that Sudovia is an anachronism that refers to the land in the 13th and 14th centuries. One commentator labeled the effort to rename the region as "neotribalism" – an artificial attempt to find connections with the long-extinct tribe. Supporters of Sudovia protested against using a term imposed on the region by the Russian Empire, especially since the city of Suwałki is in Poland and the current region has no connection with it. They have also argued that the term Suvalkija is a fairly recent and artificial political development, popularized by Soviet historians, and that the more archaic Sudovia more correctly reflects the region's historical roots. The suffix -ija is not generally used in the Lithuanian language to derive placenames from city names (the only exception is Vilnija, used to describe the Vilnius Region). An official petition from the Council for Protection of the Suvalkija Regional Ethnic Culture to the Commission of the Lithuanian Language, requesting an official name change from Suvalkija to Sudovia, was rejected in 2005. The Commission based the decision on its finding that Suvalkija prevails in both academic literature and everyday life. The decision was not voted on by the inhabitants of the region.

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