Food is central to human societies, and local ecologies shape how food is named and valued. Among the Evenki, however, dairy products remain marginal and historically contingent within traditional subsistence food practices. This study analyzes fourteen dairy-related terms recorded in Tsintsius’ Comparative Dictionary of Tunguso-Manchu Languages (1975–1977) to determine whether they reflect indigenous developments or contact-induced borrowings. Using a comparative-historical and contact-linguistic approach, the article examines their etymology, semantics, and dialectal distribution, with particular attention to Turkic and Mongolic influence. The analysis shows that most dairy terms entered Evenki through language contact and were later adapted to reindeer-based subsistence practices. Rather than indicating a developed dairy tradition, the Evenki dairy lexicon reflects historical interaction, ecological adaptation, and semantic reinterpretation within a reindeer-centered cultural system.

Food is central to human societies, and local ecologies shape how food is named and valued. Among the Evenki, however, dairy products remain marginal and historically contingent within traditional subsistence food practices. This study analyzes fourteen dairy-related terms recorded in Tsintsius’ Comparative Dictionary of Tunguso-Manchu Languages (1975–1977) to determine whether they reflect indigenous developments or contact-induced borrowings. Using a comparative-historical and contact-linguistic approach, the article examines their etymology, semantics, and dialectal distribution, with particular attention to Turkic and Mongolic influence. The analysis shows that most dairy terms entered Evenki through language contact and were later adapted to reindeer-based subsistence practices. Rather than indicating a developed dairy tradition, the Evenki dairy lexicon reflects historical interaction, ecological adaptation, and semantic reinterpretation within a reindeer-centered cultural system.

This article examines inauguration ceremonies in the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic between 1991 and 2023 as political events reflecting transformations in post-Soviet regional statehood, ethnopolitics, and relations between federal and regional authority in the Russian Federation. Drawing on theories of political ritual and symbolic power, the article demonstrates that inauguration ceremonies in Sakha (Yakutia) function as mechanisms of dual legitimation. On the one hand, they formalize the constitutional transfer of political authority within the framework of the Russian state; on the other, they symbolically embed political leadership within Sakha cultural memory, ethnocultural symbolism, and regional narratives of sovereignty and continuity. Three interconnected dimensions mark the evolution of these ceremonies: a stable ceremonial core; variable elements shaped by changing political conditions; and innovations reflecting new ideological and technological contexts.

Food is central to human societies, and local ecologies shape how food is named and valued. Among the Evenki, however, dairy products remain marginal and historically contingent within traditional subsistence food practices. This study analyzes fourteen dairy-related terms recorded in Tsintsius’ Comparative Dictionary of Tunguso-Manchu Languages (1975–1977) to determine whether they reflect indigenous developments or contact-induced borrowings. Using a comparative-historical and contact-linguistic approach, the article examines their etymology, semantics, and dialectal distribution, with particular attention to Turkic and Mongolic influence. The analysis shows that most dairy terms entered Evenki through language contact and were later adapted to reindeer-based subsistence practices. Rather than indicating a developed dairy tradition, the Evenki dairy lexicon reflects historical interaction, ecological adaptation, and semantic reinterpretation within a reindeer-centered cultural system.

This article examines inauguration ceremonies in the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic between 1991 and 2023 as political events reflecting transformations in post-Soviet regional statehood, ethnopolitics, and relations between federal and regional authority in the Russian Federation. Drawing on theories of political ritual and symbolic power, the article demonstrates that inauguration ceremonies in Sakha (Yakutia) function as mechanisms of dual legitimation. On the one hand, they formalize the constitutional transfer of political authority within the framework of the Russian state; on the other, they symbolically embed political leadership within Sakha cultural memory, ethnocultural symbolism, and regional narratives of sovereignty and continuity. Three interconnected dimensions mark the evolution of these ceremonies: a stable ceremonial core; variable elements shaped by changing political conditions; and innovations reflecting new ideological and technological contexts.

A commonplace in the literature on traditional Siberian uses of Amanita muscaria is the belief that reindeer become intoxicated by eating this mushroom, a belief enriched by misunderstandings in the Western culture literature. Ethnographers have reported contradictory data concerning the attraction of reindeer for any mushrooms or specifically for fly agaric, and the attraction of reindeer for any human urine or specifically for that of humans who have ingested the fly agaric. Siberian reindeer herders consider the meat of reindeer intoxicated by fly agaric to be intoxicating for humans, and they use the attraction of reindeer for fly agaric for the purpose of its capture or domestication. The preferential or accidental relationship of reindeer with fly agaric has been neither confirmed nor denied, due to the lack of specific studies on the subject.

Food is central to human societies, and local ecologies shape how food is named and valued. Among the Evenki, however, dairy products remain marginal and historically contingent within traditional subsistence food practices. This study analyzes fourteen dairy-related terms recorded in Tsintsius’ Comparative Dictionary of Tunguso-Manchu Languages (1975–1977) to determine whether they reflect indigenous developments or contact-induced borrowings. Using a comparative-historical and contact-linguistic approach, the article examines their etymology, semantics, and dialectal distribution, with particular attention to Turkic and Mongolic influence. The analysis shows that most dairy terms entered Evenki through language contact and were later adapted to reindeer-based subsistence practices. Rather than indicating a developed dairy tradition, the Evenki dairy lexicon reflects historical interaction, ecological adaptation, and semantic reinterpretation within a reindeer-centered cultural system.

This article examines inauguration ceremonies in the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic between 1991 and 2023 as political events reflecting transformations in post-Soviet regional statehood, ethnopolitics, and relations between federal and regional authority in the Russian Federation. Drawing on theories of political ritual and symbolic power, the article demonstrates that inauguration ceremonies in Sakha (Yakutia) function as mechanisms of dual legitimation. On the one hand, they formalize the constitutional transfer of political authority within the framework of the Russian state; on the other, they symbolically embed political leadership within Sakha cultural memory, ethnocultural symbolism, and regional narratives of sovereignty and continuity. Three interconnected dimensions mark the evolution of these ceremonies: a stable ceremonial core; variable elements shaped by changing political conditions; and innovations reflecting new ideological and technological contexts.

A commonplace in the literature on traditional Siberian uses of Amanita muscaria is the belief that reindeer become intoxicated by eating this mushroom, a belief enriched by misunderstandings in the Western culture literature. Ethnographers have reported contradictory data concerning the attraction of reindeer for any mushrooms or specifically for fly agaric, and the attraction of reindeer for any human urine or specifically for that of humans who have ingested the fly agaric. Siberian reindeer herders consider the meat of reindeer intoxicated by fly agaric to be intoxicating for humans, and they use the attraction of reindeer for fly agaric for the purpose of its capture or domestication. The preferential or accidental relationship of reindeer with fly agaric has been neither confirmed nor denied, due to the lack of specific studies on the subject.

This photo essay explores the changing role of the Megino-Bogorodskaia Church, located in the village of Byuteydyakh in Megino-Kangalasskii Ulus of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia), over the past two centuries. Recognized not only as a monument of wooden architecture but also as a historical and cultural center, the church has played an important role in the life of the local community. Through historical and contemporary photographs, this photo essay highlights the church's religious, educational, and social functions, as well as its unique wall paintings, which reflect both Orthodox and European artistic influences and are not found elsewhere in the region. The essay also considers how the use of the church building for social and economic purposes during the Soviet period contributed to its preservation and protected it from destruction.

Food is central to human societies, and local ecologies shape how food is named and valued. Among the Evenki, however, dairy products remain marginal and historically contingent within traditional subsistence food practices. This study analyzes fourteen dairy-related terms recorded in Tsintsius’ Comparative Dictionary of Tunguso-Manchu Languages (1975–1977) to determine whether they reflect indigenous developments or contact-induced borrowings. Using a comparative-historical and contact-linguistic approach, the article examines their etymology, semantics, and dialectal distribution, with particular attention to Turkic and Mongolic influence. The analysis shows that most dairy terms entered Evenki through language contact and were later adapted to reindeer-based subsistence practices. Rather than indicating a developed dairy tradition, the Evenki dairy lexicon reflects historical interaction, ecological adaptation, and semantic reinterpretation within a reindeer-centered cultural system.

This article examines inauguration ceremonies in the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic between 1991 and 2023 as political events reflecting transformations in post-Soviet regional statehood, ethnopolitics, and relations between federal and regional authority in the Russian Federation. Drawing on theories of political ritual and symbolic power, the article demonstrates that inauguration ceremonies in Sakha (Yakutia) function as mechanisms of dual legitimation. On the one hand, they formalize the constitutional transfer of political authority within the framework of the Russian state; on the other, they symbolically embed political leadership within Sakha cultural memory, ethnocultural symbolism, and regional narratives of sovereignty and continuity. Three interconnected dimensions mark the evolution of these ceremonies: a stable ceremonial core; variable elements shaped by changing political conditions; and innovations reflecting new ideological and technological contexts.

A commonplace in the literature on traditional Siberian uses of Amanita muscaria is the belief that reindeer become intoxicated by eating this mushroom, a belief enriched by misunderstandings in the Western culture literature. Ethnographers have reported contradictory data concerning the attraction of reindeer for any mushrooms or specifically for fly agaric, and the attraction of reindeer for any human urine or specifically for that of humans who have ingested the fly agaric. Siberian reindeer herders consider the meat of reindeer intoxicated by fly agaric to be intoxicating for humans, and they use the attraction of reindeer for fly agaric for the purpose of its capture or domestication. The preferential or accidental relationship of reindeer with fly agaric has been neither confirmed nor denied, due to the lack of specific studies on the subject.

This photo essay explores the changing role of the Megino-Bogorodskaia Church, located in the village of Byuteydyakh in Megino-Kangalasskii Ulus of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia), over the past two centuries. Recognized not only as a monument of wooden architecture but also as a historical and cultural center, the church has played an important role in the life of the local community. Through historical and contemporary photographs, this photo essay highlights the church's religious, educational, and social functions, as well as its unique wall paintings, which reflect both Orthodox and European artistic influences and are not found elsewhere in the region. The essay also considers how the use of the church building for social and economic purposes during the Soviet period contributed to its preservation and protected it from destruction.

This photo essay examines public celebrations in Verkhoianskii District of Soviet Yakutia (Sakha Republic) during the second half of the twentieth century. It explores the influence of Soviet festive culture on local communities and the ways in which public celebrations shaped everyday life in Arctic settlements. During the Soviet period, the district was inhabited by Indigenous populations engaged in reindeer husbandry as well as an increasing number of newcomers employed in mining. The influence of one tradition on another contributed to the acculturation and transformation of the festive culture elements. Drawing on archival and family photographs, the essay highlights the key features of public celebrations in Verkhoianskii District. Public festivities not only brought color and excitement to life in remote settlements but also fostered a sense of community and belonging.

Food is central to human societies, and local ecologies shape how food is named and valued. Among the Evenki, however, dairy products remain marginal and historically contingent within traditional subsistence food practices. This study analyzes fourteen dairy-related terms recorded in Tsintsius’ Comparative Dictionary of Tunguso-Manchu Languages (1975–1977) to determine whether they reflect indigenous developments or contact-induced borrowings. Using a comparative-historical and contact-linguistic approach, the article examines their etymology, semantics, and dialectal distribution, with particular attention to Turkic and Mongolic influence. The analysis shows that most dairy terms entered Evenki through language contact and were later adapted to reindeer-based subsistence practices. Rather than indicating a developed dairy tradition, the Evenki dairy lexicon reflects historical interaction, ecological adaptation, and semantic reinterpretation within a reindeer-centered cultural system.

This article examines inauguration ceremonies in the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic between 1991 and 2023 as political events reflecting transformations in post-Soviet regional statehood, ethnopolitics, and relations between federal and regional authority in the Russian Federation. Drawing on theories of political ritual and symbolic power, the article demonstrates that inauguration ceremonies in Sakha (Yakutia) function as mechanisms of dual legitimation. On the one hand, they formalize the constitutional transfer of political authority within the framework of the Russian state; on the other, they symbolically embed political leadership within Sakha cultural memory, ethnocultural symbolism, and regional narratives of sovereignty and continuity. Three interconnected dimensions mark the evolution of these ceremonies: a stable ceremonial core; variable elements shaped by changing political conditions; and innovations reflecting new ideological and technological contexts.

A commonplace in the literature on traditional Siberian uses of Amanita muscaria is the belief that reindeer become intoxicated by eating this mushroom, a belief enriched by misunderstandings in the Western culture literature. Ethnographers have reported contradictory data concerning the attraction of reindeer for any mushrooms or specifically for fly agaric, and the attraction of reindeer for any human urine or specifically for that of humans who have ingested the fly agaric. Siberian reindeer herders consider the meat of reindeer intoxicated by fly agaric to be intoxicating for humans, and they use the attraction of reindeer for fly agaric for the purpose of its capture or domestication. The preferential or accidental relationship of reindeer with fly agaric has been neither confirmed nor denied, due to the lack of specific studies on the subject.

This photo essay explores the changing role of the Megino-Bogorodskaia Church, located in the village of Byuteydyakh in Megino-Kangalasskii Ulus of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia), over the past two centuries. Recognized not only as a monument of wooden architecture but also as a historical and cultural center, the church has played an important role in the life of the local community. Through historical and contemporary photographs, this photo essay highlights the church's religious, educational, and social functions, as well as its unique wall paintings, which reflect both Orthodox and European artistic influences and are not found elsewhere in the region. The essay also considers how the use of the church building for social and economic purposes during the Soviet period contributed to its preservation and protected it from destruction.

This photo essay examines public celebrations in Verkhoianskii District of Soviet Yakutia (Sakha Republic) during the second half of the twentieth century. It explores the influence of Soviet festive culture on local communities and the ways in which public celebrations shaped everyday life in Arctic settlements. During the Soviet period, the district was inhabited by Indigenous populations engaged in reindeer husbandry as well as an increasing number of newcomers employed in mining. The influence of one tradition on another contributed to the acculturation and transformation of the festive culture elements. Drawing on archival and family photographs, the essay highlights the key features of public celebrations in Verkhoianskii District. Public festivities not only brought color and excitement to life in remote settlements but also fostered a sense of community and belonging.

Facing the Fire, Taking the Stage: Ritual, Performance, and Belonging in Buryat Communities of Siberia Joseph J. Long (Indiana University Press, 2025), 280 pp. ISBN: 978-0-25307119-4.

Narrative Objects: Museums, the Sakha Summer Festival, and Cultural Revival in Siberia Tatiana Argounova-Low and Alison K. Brown (Routledge, 2025), 226 pp. ISBN: 978-1-13831-533-4.

Bear Tales in Minority Languages: Beliefs and Visions Tatiana B. Agranat and Leyli R. Dodykhudoeva, eds. (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2025), 291 pp. ISBN: 9781036418915.

This article examines gendered representations of women in the Sakha heroic epic olonkho through the figures concepts of kuo and kyys, arguing that these archetypes function not merely as descriptive character types but as a normative system that actively produces and regulates femininity. Rather than treating olonkho as a repository of mythological images, the article conceptualizes epic narrative as a site of gender governance, where acceptable forms of female subjectivity are articulated, policed, and hierarchized. The study demonstrates that the warrior woman's autonomy and martial power are structurally dependent on, and ultimately subordinated to, a patriarchal epic order that privileges beauty, reproductive value, and domestic conformity. The article contributes to Siberian and Indigenous gender studies by showing how epic traditions operate as enduring mechanisms of gender regulation and contestation rather than as static cultural heritage.

This article examines gendered representations of women in the Sakha heroic epic olonkho through the figures concepts of kuo and kyys, arguing that these archetypes function not merely as descriptive character types but as a normative system that actively produces and regulates femininity. Rather than treating olonkho as a repository of mythological images, the article conceptualizes epic narrative as a site of gender governance, where acceptable forms of female subjectivity are articulated, policed, and hierarchized. The study demonstrates that the warrior woman's autonomy and martial power are structurally dependent on, and ultimately subordinated to, a patriarchal epic order that privileges beauty, reproductive value, and domestic conformity. The article contributes to Siberian and Indigenous gender studies by showing how epic traditions operate as enduring mechanisms of gender regulation and contestation rather than as static cultural heritage.

This study presents a comprehensive account of British nurse Kate Marsden's 1891–1892 expedition to visit people affected by leprosy in Siberia, as well as the consequences that followed her journey. In search of a plant believed to cure leprosy, Marsden traveled a long route from Moscow to Vilyuisk. Despite the courage and endurance demonstrated in her travels, Marsden's reputation in her homeland, Great Britain, became highly controversial. The purpose of this research is to reconstruct the fuller story of Marsden's experiences by drawing on a range of historical sources, including British accounts and oral testimonies from Vilyui Sakha elders. A critical discourse analysis reveals that the oral histories of the Vilyui Sakha challenge the dominant narrative.

This article examines gendered representations of women in the Sakha heroic epic olonkho through the figures concepts of kuo and kyys, arguing that these archetypes function not merely as descriptive character types but as a normative system that actively produces and regulates femininity. Rather than treating olonkho as a repository of mythological images, the article conceptualizes epic narrative as a site of gender governance, where acceptable forms of female subjectivity are articulated, policed, and hierarchized. The study demonstrates that the warrior woman's autonomy and martial power are structurally dependent on, and ultimately subordinated to, a patriarchal epic order that privileges beauty, reproductive value, and domestic conformity. The article contributes to Siberian and Indigenous gender studies by showing how epic traditions operate as enduring mechanisms of gender regulation and contestation rather than as static cultural heritage.

This study presents a comprehensive account of British nurse Kate Marsden's 1891–1892 expedition to visit people affected by leprosy in Siberia, as well as the consequences that followed her journey. In search of a plant believed to cure leprosy, Marsden traveled a long route from Moscow to Vilyuisk. Despite the courage and endurance demonstrated in her travels, Marsden's reputation in her homeland, Great Britain, became highly controversial. The purpose of this research is to reconstruct the fuller story of Marsden's experiences by drawing on a range of historical sources, including British accounts and oral testimonies from Vilyui Sakha elders. A critical discourse analysis reveals that the oral histories of the Vilyui Sakha challenge the dominant narrative.

This article examines some cultural codes in the epic tradition of the Evens and Sakha based on the Even epic nimkan “Emcheni” [Өмчэни] and the Sakha heroic epic olonkho “Djuluruyar Nyurgun Bootur” (Nurgun Botur the Swift) by Platon Alekseevich Oyunskii. The zoomorphic—in particular, ornithomorphic—cultural code inherent in the Even epic nimkan and the Sakha heroic epic olonkho are revealed. In the course of the study, some concepts encoded in the images of animals were identified; mythological parallels inherent in these cultural traditions were established, and differences in ornithomorphic codes were determined. It was established that epic symbolism in the mythology of the Evens and Sakha is associated with relics of magic and developed shamanic ideas, with various rituals and cult beliefs.

This article examines gendered representations of women in the Sakha heroic epic olonkho through the figures concepts of kuo and kyys, arguing that these archetypes function not merely as descriptive character types but as a normative system that actively produces and regulates femininity. Rather than treating olonkho as a repository of mythological images, the article conceptualizes epic narrative as a site of gender governance, where acceptable forms of female subjectivity are articulated, policed, and hierarchized. The study demonstrates that the warrior woman's autonomy and martial power are structurally dependent on, and ultimately subordinated to, a patriarchal epic order that privileges beauty, reproductive value, and domestic conformity. The article contributes to Siberian and Indigenous gender studies by showing how epic traditions operate as enduring mechanisms of gender regulation and contestation rather than as static cultural heritage.

This study presents a comprehensive account of British nurse Kate Marsden's 1891–1892 expedition to visit people affected by leprosy in Siberia, as well as the consequences that followed her journey. In search of a plant believed to cure leprosy, Marsden traveled a long route from Moscow to Vilyuisk. Despite the courage and endurance demonstrated in her travels, Marsden's reputation in her homeland, Great Britain, became highly controversial. The purpose of this research is to reconstruct the fuller story of Marsden's experiences by drawing on a range of historical sources, including British accounts and oral testimonies from Vilyui Sakha elders. A critical discourse analysis reveals that the oral histories of the Vilyui Sakha challenge the dominant narrative.

This article examines some cultural codes in the epic tradition of the Evens and Sakha based on the Even epic nimkan “Emcheni” [Өмчэни] and the Sakha heroic epic olonkho “Djuluruyar Nyurgun Bootur” (Nurgun Botur the Swift) by Platon Alekseevich Oyunskii. The zoomorphic—in particular, ornithomorphic—cultural code inherent in the Even epic nimkan and the Sakha heroic epic olonkho are revealed. In the course of the study, some concepts encoded in the images of animals were identified; mythological parallels inherent in these cultural traditions were established, and differences in ornithomorphic codes were determined. It was established that epic symbolism in the mythology of the Evens and Sakha is associated with relics of magic and developed shamanic ideas, with various rituals and cult beliefs.

This photo essay, based on archival images from the National Archive of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) (NARS), documents the practices and ideology of Soviet fur farming. Focusing on the Pokrovskaia fur farm, one of the largest in Yakutia during the Soviet period, it traces the industrial logics behind the management of animal life and labor, particularly in the breeding and selection of silver foxes.

This article examines gendered representations of women in the Sakha heroic epic olonkho through the figures concepts of kuo and kyys, arguing that these archetypes function not merely as descriptive character types but as a normative system that actively produces and regulates femininity. Rather than treating olonkho as a repository of mythological images, the article conceptualizes epic narrative as a site of gender governance, where acceptable forms of female subjectivity are articulated, policed, and hierarchized. The study demonstrates that the warrior woman's autonomy and martial power are structurally dependent on, and ultimately subordinated to, a patriarchal epic order that privileges beauty, reproductive value, and domestic conformity. The article contributes to Siberian and Indigenous gender studies by showing how epic traditions operate as enduring mechanisms of gender regulation and contestation rather than as static cultural heritage.

This study presents a comprehensive account of British nurse Kate Marsden's 1891–1892 expedition to visit people affected by leprosy in Siberia, as well as the consequences that followed her journey. In search of a plant believed to cure leprosy, Marsden traveled a long route from Moscow to Vilyuisk. Despite the courage and endurance demonstrated in her travels, Marsden's reputation in her homeland, Great Britain, became highly controversial. The purpose of this research is to reconstruct the fuller story of Marsden's experiences by drawing on a range of historical sources, including British accounts and oral testimonies from Vilyui Sakha elders. A critical discourse analysis reveals that the oral histories of the Vilyui Sakha challenge the dominant narrative.

This article examines some cultural codes in the epic tradition of the Evens and Sakha based on the Even epic nimkan “Emcheni” [Өмчэни] and the Sakha heroic epic olonkho “Djuluruyar Nyurgun Bootur” (Nurgun Botur the Swift) by Platon Alekseevich Oyunskii. The zoomorphic—in particular, ornithomorphic—cultural code inherent in the Even epic nimkan and the Sakha heroic epic olonkho are revealed. In the course of the study, some concepts encoded in the images of animals were identified; mythological parallels inherent in these cultural traditions were established, and differences in ornithomorphic codes were determined. It was established that epic symbolism in the mythology of the Evens and Sakha is associated with relics of magic and developed shamanic ideas, with various rituals and cult beliefs.

This photo essay, based on archival images from the National Archive of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) (NARS), documents the practices and ideology of Soviet fur farming. Focusing on the Pokrovskaia fur farm, one of the largest in Yakutia during the Soviet period, it traces the industrial logics behind the management of animal life and labor, particularly in the breeding and selection of silver foxes.

A Fractured North (3 volumes) Edited by Erich Kasten, Igor Krupnik, and Gail Fondahl

A Fractured North – Facing Dilemmas (2024, Fürstenberg/Havel: Kulturstiftung Sibirien), 255 pp., ISBN: 978-3-942883-41-2.

A Fractured North – Journeys on Hold (2024, Fürstenberg/Havel: Kulturstiftung Sibirien), 295 pp., ISBN: 978-3-942883-42-9.

A Fractured North – Maintaining Connections (2025, Fürstenberg/Havel: Kulturstiftung Sibirien), 266 pp., ISBN: 978-3-942883-43-6.

Shamanism in Siberia: Sound and Turbulence in Cursing Practices in Tuva Mally Stelmaszyk (Routledge Contemporary Russia and Eastern Europe Series, 2022), 152 pp. ISBN: 978-1-032-15699-6.

Despite cold weather, few direct flights, and low popularity in China, Siberian universities successfully attract self-funded Chinese students. Due to low tuition and living costs, these regional universities enable Chinese and other international students from humbler economic backgrounds to receive education abroad. Our ethnography examines the adaptation strategies of Chinese students who study in Tomsk, a higher education hub in Siberia. To many, studying in Siberia is a short-term transition stage in their future professional trajectory. Students rarely familiarize themselves with study requirements or opportunities to diversify their social life. The predisposition not to adapt and limited socialization with the local community are connected with students’ temporariness. Chinese students’ self-understandings in Siberia show us that (non-)adaptation strategies and vocabularies get perpetuated discursively within the Chinese student community.

Despite cold weather, few direct flights, and low popularity in China, Siberian universities successfully attract self-funded Chinese students. Due to low tuition and living costs, these regional universities enable Chinese and other international students from humbler economic backgrounds to receive education abroad. Our ethnography examines the adaptation strategies of Chinese students who study in Tomsk, a higher education hub in Siberia. To many, studying in Siberia is a short-term transition stage in their future professional trajectory. Students rarely familiarize themselves with study requirements or opportunities to diversify their social life. The predisposition not to adapt and limited socialization with the local community are connected with students’ temporariness. Chinese students’ self-understandings in Siberia show us that (non-)adaptation strategies and vocabularies get perpetuated discursively within the Chinese student community.

This article explores human–brown bear encounters in the Magadan region (Kolyma), Russia, through the lens of mediatization. While brown bear ceremonialism and hunting are well-established topics in Siberian anthropology, the experiences of urban settlers have received little attention. I examine how the growing presence of cameras in daily life has shaped the eventfulness of bear encounters in the former Soviet industrial frontier. Analyzing media reports, I trace shifts in how these encounters have been framed over time. I argue that historical changes in the media ecology have transformed how brown bears are seen and represented, as well as the broader wildlife expertise and politics in Russia, by introducing a punctuated, presentist, and moment-oriented logic. I conclude by reflecting on the recent prominence of “encounter” in human–animal anthropological research.

Despite cold weather, few direct flights, and low popularity in China, Siberian universities successfully attract self-funded Chinese students. Due to low tuition and living costs, these regional universities enable Chinese and other international students from humbler economic backgrounds to receive education abroad. Our ethnography examines the adaptation strategies of Chinese students who study in Tomsk, a higher education hub in Siberia. To many, studying in Siberia is a short-term transition stage in their future professional trajectory. Students rarely familiarize themselves with study requirements or opportunities to diversify their social life. The predisposition not to adapt and limited socialization with the local community are connected with students’ temporariness. Chinese students’ self-understandings in Siberia show us that (non-)adaptation strategies and vocabularies get perpetuated discursively within the Chinese student community.

This article explores human–brown bear encounters in the Magadan region (Kolyma), Russia, through the lens of mediatization. While brown bear ceremonialism and hunting are well-established topics in Siberian anthropology, the experiences of urban settlers have received little attention. I examine how the growing presence of cameras in daily life has shaped the eventfulness of bear encounters in the former Soviet industrial frontier. Analyzing media reports, I trace shifts in how these encounters have been framed over time. I argue that historical changes in the media ecology have transformed how brown bears are seen and represented, as well as the broader wildlife expertise and politics in Russia, by introducing a punctuated, presentist, and moment-oriented logic. I conclude by reflecting on the recent prominence of “encounter” in human–animal anthropological research.

The article considers the characteristics of spatial development processes in the northeast of Russia together with issues of the preservation of native languages in this region, in order to investigate the research hypothesis that processes of spatial change are followed by multidirectional processes in native language use. The article describes spatial shrinking and processes of polarization and regionalization via examination of statistical data and satellite images. This allows the authors to compare—for the first time—the processes of spatial changes and native language usage by Luoravetlan in Chukotka.

Despite cold weather, few direct flights, and low popularity in China, Siberian universities successfully attract self-funded Chinese students. Due to low tuition and living costs, these regional universities enable Chinese and other international students from humbler economic backgrounds to receive education abroad. Our ethnography examines the adaptation strategies of Chinese students who study in Tomsk, a higher education hub in Siberia. To many, studying in Siberia is a short-term transition stage in their future professional trajectory. Students rarely familiarize themselves with study requirements or opportunities to diversify their social life. The predisposition not to adapt and limited socialization with the local community are connected with students’ temporariness. Chinese students’ self-understandings in Siberia show us that (non-)adaptation strategies and vocabularies get perpetuated discursively within the Chinese student community.

This article explores human–brown bear encounters in the Magadan region (Kolyma), Russia, through the lens of mediatization. While brown bear ceremonialism and hunting are well-established topics in Siberian anthropology, the experiences of urban settlers have received little attention. I examine how the growing presence of cameras in daily life has shaped the eventfulness of bear encounters in the former Soviet industrial frontier. Analyzing media reports, I trace shifts in how these encounters have been framed over time. I argue that historical changes in the media ecology have transformed how brown bears are seen and represented, as well as the broader wildlife expertise and politics in Russia, by introducing a punctuated, presentist, and moment-oriented logic. I conclude by reflecting on the recent prominence of “encounter” in human–animal anthropological research.

The article considers the characteristics of spatial development processes in the northeast of Russia together with issues of the preservation of native languages in this region, in order to investigate the research hypothesis that processes of spatial change are followed by multidirectional processes in native language use. The article describes spatial shrinking and processes of polarization and regionalization via examination of statistical data and satellite images. This allows the authors to compare—for the first time—the processes of spatial changes and native language usage by Luoravetlan in Chukotka.

A Siberian History of Soviet Film: Manufacturing Visions of the Indigenous Peoples of the North Caroline Damiens, Translated into English by Adrian Morfee (Bloomsbury Academic, 2024), 320 pp. ISBN 978-1350269880.

The Horse in My Blood: Multispecies Kinship in the Altai and Sayan Mountains Victoria Soyan Peemot (Berghahn Books, 2024), 210 pp. ISBN 978-1-80539-295-8.

U kazhdogo svoia Sibir’: Rasskazy kalmykov o ssylke Elza-Bair Guchinova (Moscow: Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology RAS, 2024), 466 pp. ISBN: 978-5-4211-0333-2.

Solon, a Northern Tungusic language spoken in Hulunbuir, China, is currently the most viable Tungusic language, with approximately 20,000 speakers. This article presents a sociolinguistic survey based on two months of fieldwork in the Ewenke Autonomous Banner, a key Solon-speaking area with 10,000 speakers. The data was gathered through observation, interviews, and questionnaires across different age groups, focusing on language proficiency, language use, intermarriage of the Solon community, and language attitudes. Although Solon retains certain language vitality, it faces severe danger due to declining language assessments among younger generations (aged 13–25). The endangerment level of the Solon language is rapidly approaching the “definitely endangered” status, underscoring the urgency of preservation efforts.

Solon, a Northern Tungusic language spoken in Hulunbuir, China, is currently the most viable Tungusic language, with approximately 20,000 speakers. This article presents a sociolinguistic survey based on two months of fieldwork in the Ewenke Autonomous Banner, a key Solon-speaking area with 10,000 speakers. The data was gathered through observation, interviews, and questionnaires across different age groups, focusing on language proficiency, language use, intermarriage of the Solon community, and language attitudes. Although Solon retains certain language vitality, it faces severe danger due to declining language assessments among younger generations (aged 13–25). The endangerment level of the Solon language is rapidly approaching the “definitely endangered” status, underscoring the urgency of preservation efforts.

The expansion of state capacity as a prerogative for increased penal practices in the first quarter of the nineteenth century forced the Russian Empire to renegotiate its relationship with the Siberian Cossack Hosts, and most notably, their inorodets troops. This article will explore the consolidation of Turkic “ethno-estates” across the West Siberian Plain in the early nineteenth century, focusing on the empire's courtship of Tatar and Kazakh service elites as a response to its growing policing needs within the ever-expanding exile system. Although the material condition of most Siberian inorodtsy continued to decline during this period, a closer analysis of the reforms leading up to Speransky's Statute of 1822 demonstrates that the empire's chronic shortage of able-bodied men placed the service Tatars and Kazakhs in a relatively fortuitous position.

Solon, a Northern Tungusic language spoken in Hulunbuir, China, is currently the most viable Tungusic language, with approximately 20,000 speakers. This article presents a sociolinguistic survey based on two months of fieldwork in the Ewenke Autonomous Banner, a key Solon-speaking area with 10,000 speakers. The data was gathered through observation, interviews, and questionnaires across different age groups, focusing on language proficiency, language use, intermarriage of the Solon community, and language attitudes. Although Solon retains certain language vitality, it faces severe danger due to declining language assessments among younger generations (aged 13–25). The endangerment level of the Solon language is rapidly approaching the “definitely endangered” status, underscoring the urgency of preservation efforts.

The expansion of state capacity as a prerogative for increased penal practices in the first quarter of the nineteenth century forced the Russian Empire to renegotiate its relationship with the Siberian Cossack Hosts, and most notably, their inorodets troops. This article will explore the consolidation of Turkic “ethno-estates” across the West Siberian Plain in the early nineteenth century, focusing on the empire's courtship of Tatar and Kazakh service elites as a response to its growing policing needs within the ever-expanding exile system. Although the material condition of most Siberian inorodtsy continued to decline during this period, a closer analysis of the reforms leading up to Speransky's Statute of 1822 demonstrates that the empire's chronic shortage of able-bodied men placed the service Tatars and Kazakhs in a relatively fortuitous position.

The article discusses the activity of extracting mammoth tusks in the Arctic regions in the context of the cultural and ethnic characteristics of the Indigenous people of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). It identifies factors affecting the contemporary activity around collecting mammoth fauna. Findings of surveys carried out among the population of Yakutia yield a profile of contemporary mammoth collectors and reasons why some members of the population have a fear of obtaining mammoth remains. In addition, the article describes specific features of the attitude of the local population towards the collection of mammoth tusks, such as their reluctance to disturb the peace of nature, as well as their perception of mammoth tusks as a source of additional income.

Solon, a Northern Tungusic language spoken in Hulunbuir, China, is currently the most viable Tungusic language, with approximately 20,000 speakers. This article presents a sociolinguistic survey based on two months of fieldwork in the Ewenke Autonomous Banner, a key Solon-speaking area with 10,000 speakers. The data was gathered through observation, interviews, and questionnaires across different age groups, focusing on language proficiency, language use, intermarriage of the Solon community, and language attitudes. Although Solon retains certain language vitality, it faces severe danger due to declining language assessments among younger generations (aged 13–25). The endangerment level of the Solon language is rapidly approaching the “definitely endangered” status, underscoring the urgency of preservation efforts.

The expansion of state capacity as a prerogative for increased penal practices in the first quarter of the nineteenth century forced the Russian Empire to renegotiate its relationship with the Siberian Cossack Hosts, and most notably, their inorodets troops. This article will explore the consolidation of Turkic “ethno-estates” across the West Siberian Plain in the early nineteenth century, focusing on the empire's courtship of Tatar and Kazakh service elites as a response to its growing policing needs within the ever-expanding exile system. Although the material condition of most Siberian inorodtsy continued to decline during this period, a closer analysis of the reforms leading up to Speransky's Statute of 1822 demonstrates that the empire's chronic shortage of able-bodied men placed the service Tatars and Kazakhs in a relatively fortuitous position.

The article discusses the activity of extracting mammoth tusks in the Arctic regions in the context of the cultural and ethnic characteristics of the Indigenous people of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). It identifies factors affecting the contemporary activity around collecting mammoth fauna. Findings of surveys carried out among the population of Yakutia yield a profile of contemporary mammoth collectors and reasons why some members of the population have a fear of obtaining mammoth remains. In addition, the article describes specific features of the attitude of the local population towards the collection of mammoth tusks, such as their reluctance to disturb the peace of nature, as well as their perception of mammoth tusks as a source of additional income.

This article focuses on the revitalization of the Koryak language, one of the seven Indigenous languages in Kamchatka, Russia. It begins by framing the ethnolinguistic situation in Kamchatka in the context of demographic and statistical data, and continues with an overview of efforts to preserve and develop endangered Indigenous languages in the region. It then introduces the uptake of digital technology for Koryak language learning. To support technology inclusion with remote communities, a mobile language learning application called “Koryak Tuyu” has been developed to facilitate the study of Koryak as a supplemental tool through both home-based individual learning and classroom learning. The article provides a description of the language application and a discussion of the application's features and components.

Solon, a Northern Tungusic language spoken in Hulunbuir, China, is currently the most viable Tungusic language, with approximately 20,000 speakers. This article presents a sociolinguistic survey based on two months of fieldwork in the Ewenke Autonomous Banner, a key Solon-speaking area with 10,000 speakers. The data was gathered through observation, interviews, and questionnaires across different age groups, focusing on language proficiency, language use, intermarriage of the Solon community, and language attitudes. Although Solon retains certain language vitality, it faces severe danger due to declining language assessments among younger generations (aged 13–25). The endangerment level of the Solon language is rapidly approaching the “definitely endangered” status, underscoring the urgency of preservation efforts.

The expansion of state capacity as a prerogative for increased penal practices in the first quarter of the nineteenth century forced the Russian Empire to renegotiate its relationship with the Siberian Cossack Hosts, and most notably, their inorodets troops. This article will explore the consolidation of Turkic “ethno-estates” across the West Siberian Plain in the early nineteenth century, focusing on the empire's courtship of Tatar and Kazakh service elites as a response to its growing policing needs within the ever-expanding exile system. Although the material condition of most Siberian inorodtsy continued to decline during this period, a closer analysis of the reforms leading up to Speransky's Statute of 1822 demonstrates that the empire's chronic shortage of able-bodied men placed the service Tatars and Kazakhs in a relatively fortuitous position.

The article discusses the activity of extracting mammoth tusks in the Arctic regions in the context of the cultural and ethnic characteristics of the Indigenous people of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). It identifies factors affecting the contemporary activity around collecting mammoth fauna. Findings of surveys carried out among the population of Yakutia yield a profile of contemporary mammoth collectors and reasons why some members of the population have a fear of obtaining mammoth remains. In addition, the article describes specific features of the attitude of the local population towards the collection of mammoth tusks, such as their reluctance to disturb the peace of nature, as well as their perception of mammoth tusks as a source of additional income.

This article focuses on the revitalization of the Koryak language, one of the seven Indigenous languages in Kamchatka, Russia. It begins by framing the ethnolinguistic situation in Kamchatka in the context of demographic and statistical data, and continues with an overview of efforts to preserve and develop endangered Indigenous languages in the region. It then introduces the uptake of digital technology for Koryak language learning. To support technology inclusion with remote communities, a mobile language learning application called “Koryak Tuyu” has been developed to facilitate the study of Koryak as a supplemental tool through both home-based individual learning and classroom learning. The article provides a description of the language application and a discussion of the application's features and components.

Risky Futures: Climate, Geopolitics and Local Realities in the Uncertain Circumpolar North Olga Ulturgasheva and Barbara Bodenhorn, eds. (London: Berghahn Books, 2023). 234 pp., ISBN 978-1-80073-593-4.

Evil Spirits and Rocket Debris: In Search of Lost Souls in Siberia Ludek Broz (New York: Berghahn Books, 2024), 240 pp., ISBN: 978-1-80539-260-6.

Taking the practices of reindeer ear- and fur-marking in northern European Russia and Western Siberia as its primary focus, this article analyses modifications of informal “traditional” practices as a part of their appropriation by state institutions and highly bureaucratized state-owned enterprises. The practice of making and reading ear- and fur-marks is highly situated and workable only when embedded in a wider web of social communication. Analyzing three cases of the practice in formal institutions, we show that the modifications represent attempts to eliminate the situatedness and embeddedness of the practice. Some modifications can be explained by the attempt to extend the scope of the practice to the level of individuals, but this has made the practice unworkable without reference to special databases and is useless for reindeer herders.

Taking the practices of reindeer ear- and fur-marking in northern European Russia and Western Siberia as its primary focus, this article analyses modifications of informal “traditional” practices as a part of their appropriation by state institutions and highly bureaucratized state-owned enterprises. The practice of making and reading ear- and fur-marks is highly situated and workable only when embedded in a wider web of social communication. Analyzing three cases of the practice in formal institutions, we show that the modifications represent attempts to eliminate the situatedness and embeddedness of the practice. Some modifications can be explained by the attempt to extend the scope of the practice to the level of individuals, but this has made the practice unworkable without reference to special databases and is useless for reindeer herders.

This article focuses on informal road networks in remote Siberian communities: their connectivity and the relations between road owners and road users. These informal roads serve both as conduits and hindrances for local connectivities. Data was collected in the villages Vershina Khandy and Tokma of the Irkutsk region, and the study describes the variety of informal roads in the region: subsistence trails and tracks, inter-settlement roads, forest roads, and oil and gas service roads. Different actors participate in the expansion of the informal road network; our research demonstrates that communities accommodate new infrastructures and negotiate their mobility and connectivity informally according to their needs and desires under uneven power hierarchies. In conclusion, we discuss the possibilities and constraints that different groups of roads users experience because of the informal character of roads.

Taking the practices of reindeer ear- and fur-marking in northern European Russia and Western Siberia as its primary focus, this article analyses modifications of informal “traditional” practices as a part of their appropriation by state institutions and highly bureaucratized state-owned enterprises. The practice of making and reading ear- and fur-marks is highly situated and workable only when embedded in a wider web of social communication. Analyzing three cases of the practice in formal institutions, we show that the modifications represent attempts to eliminate the situatedness and embeddedness of the practice. Some modifications can be explained by the attempt to extend the scope of the practice to the level of individuals, but this has made the practice unworkable without reference to special databases and is useless for reindeer herders.

This article focuses on informal road networks in remote Siberian communities: their connectivity and the relations between road owners and road users. These informal roads serve both as conduits and hindrances for local connectivities. Data was collected in the villages Vershina Khandy and Tokma of the Irkutsk region, and the study describes the variety of informal roads in the region: subsistence trails and tracks, inter-settlement roads, forest roads, and oil and gas service roads. Different actors participate in the expansion of the informal road network; our research demonstrates that communities accommodate new infrastructures and negotiate their mobility and connectivity informally according to their needs and desires under uneven power hierarchies. In conclusion, we discuss the possibilities and constraints that different groups of roads users experience because of the informal character of roads.

the young Polish anthropologist Stanisław Poniatowski undertook fieldwork in the Russian Far East in summer 1914. He collected almost five hundred various artifacts (objects, photographs, anthropometric measurement forms, etc.) and linguistic material from the local Nanai and Udege communities along the Amur River. The outbreak of World War I changed Poniatowski's plans and caused the separation (fragmentation) of his original collections, now housed at the Polish Ethnological Society in Wrocław, Poland and at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC in the US. The article describes a new multistep effort to digitally “reunite” Poniatowski's collections and convert them into a cultural resource for researchers, museum specialists, and Indigenous communities for heritage and language preservation.

Taking the practices of reindeer ear- and fur-marking in northern European Russia and Western Siberia as its primary focus, this article analyses modifications of informal “traditional” practices as a part of their appropriation by state institutions and highly bureaucratized state-owned enterprises. The practice of making and reading ear- and fur-marks is highly situated and workable only when embedded in a wider web of social communication. Analyzing three cases of the practice in formal institutions, we show that the modifications represent attempts to eliminate the situatedness and embeddedness of the practice. Some modifications can be explained by the attempt to extend the scope of the practice to the level of individuals, but this has made the practice unworkable without reference to special databases and is useless for reindeer herders.

This article focuses on informal road networks in remote Siberian communities: their connectivity and the relations between road owners and road users. These informal roads serve both as conduits and hindrances for local connectivities. Data was collected in the villages Vershina Khandy and Tokma of the Irkutsk region, and the study describes the variety of informal roads in the region: subsistence trails and tracks, inter-settlement roads, forest roads, and oil and gas service roads. Different actors participate in the expansion of the informal road network; our research demonstrates that communities accommodate new infrastructures and negotiate their mobility and connectivity informally according to their needs and desires under uneven power hierarchies. In conclusion, we discuss the possibilities and constraints that different groups of roads users experience because of the informal character of roads.

the young Polish anthropologist Stanisław Poniatowski undertook fieldwork in the Russian Far East in summer 1914. He collected almost five hundred various artifacts (objects, photographs, anthropometric measurement forms, etc.) and linguistic material from the local Nanai and Udege communities along the Amur River. The outbreak of World War I changed Poniatowski's plans and caused the separation (fragmentation) of his original collections, now housed at the Polish Ethnological Society in Wrocław, Poland and at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC in the US. The article describes a new multistep effort to digitally “reunite” Poniatowski's collections and convert them into a cultural resource for researchers, museum specialists, and Indigenous communities for heritage and language preservation.

Nenets reindeer pastoralists of Yamal in the Russian Arctic, successfully deal with rapidly changing climate and natural gas industrialization. We present results from our long-term ethnographic study (2001–present) on the adaptive strategies that Nenets nomadic households have employed over time, their tradeoffs, inherent risks, and social implications of these strategies. While some strategies limit the adaptive flexibility of herding, they simultaneously enable agency that keeps Nenets households on the land—critical for maintaining their nomadism. Rapid climate change in the Arctic, which could lead to increased icing of pastures, makes reindeer herding more vulnerable. We examine meteorological data from Yamal to better understand the climatic trends challenging reindeer nomadism. Our analysis is relevant for policymakers through understanding Nenets adaptation and interactions with ecological processes and institutions.

Taking the practices of reindeer ear- and fur-marking in northern European Russia and Western Siberia as its primary focus, this article analyses modifications of informal “traditional” practices as a part of their appropriation by state institutions and highly bureaucratized state-owned enterprises. The practice of making and reading ear- and fur-marks is highly situated and workable only when embedded in a wider web of social communication. Analyzing three cases of the practice in formal institutions, we show that the modifications represent attempts to eliminate the situatedness and embeddedness of the practice. Some modifications can be explained by the attempt to extend the scope of the practice to the level of individuals, but this has made the practice unworkable without reference to special databases and is useless for reindeer herders.

This article focuses on informal road networks in remote Siberian communities: their connectivity and the relations between road owners and road users. These informal roads serve both as conduits and hindrances for local connectivities. Data was collected in the villages Vershina Khandy and Tokma of the Irkutsk region, and the study describes the variety of informal roads in the region: subsistence trails and tracks, inter-settlement roads, forest roads, and oil and gas service roads. Different actors participate in the expansion of the informal road network; our research demonstrates that communities accommodate new infrastructures and negotiate their mobility and connectivity informally according to their needs and desires under uneven power hierarchies. In conclusion, we discuss the possibilities and constraints that different groups of roads users experience because of the informal character of roads.

the young Polish anthropologist Stanisław Poniatowski undertook fieldwork in the Russian Far East in summer 1914. He collected almost five hundred various artifacts (objects, photographs, anthropometric measurement forms, etc.) and linguistic material from the local Nanai and Udege communities along the Amur River. The outbreak of World War I changed Poniatowski's plans and caused the separation (fragmentation) of his original collections, now housed at the Polish Ethnological Society in Wrocław, Poland and at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC in the US. The article describes a new multistep effort to digitally “reunite” Poniatowski's collections and convert them into a cultural resource for researchers, museum specialists, and Indigenous communities for heritage and language preservation.

Nenets reindeer pastoralists of Yamal in the Russian Arctic, successfully deal with rapidly changing climate and natural gas industrialization. We present results from our long-term ethnographic study (2001–present) on the adaptive strategies that Nenets nomadic households have employed over time, their tradeoffs, inherent risks, and social implications of these strategies. While some strategies limit the adaptive flexibility of herding, they simultaneously enable agency that keeps Nenets households on the land—critical for maintaining their nomadism. Rapid climate change in the Arctic, which could lead to increased icing of pastures, makes reindeer herding more vulnerable. We examine meteorological data from Yamal to better understand the climatic trends challenging reindeer nomadism. Our analysis is relevant for policymakers through understanding Nenets adaptation and interactions with ecological processes and institutions.

Embracing Landscape: Living with Reindeer and Hunting among Spirits in South Siberia Selcen Küçüküstel (New York: Berghahn Books, 2021) 238 pp., ISBN 978-1-80073-062-5.

This article presents two ethnographic case studies illustrating the practices and perceptions of contemporary wolf hunters (volchatniki) in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia). We aim to show how contemporary volchatniki rely on individual strategies such as self-crafted technologies and hunting magic. Hunting of wolves must be understood in terms of mutual intimate sensory interplay, an exchange that can be perceived as intersubjective communication between human and non-human persons. This personal interaction creates bonds between humans and certain wolves, allowing some wolves to survive. Despite the technocratic attitude of the Soviet era that wolves were a pest species to be exterminated, volchatniki of today perceive wolves as conscious subjects displaying personality and character. Animistic assumptions of non-human agency play an important role in wolf hunting, in combination with technological advances.

This article presents two ethnographic case studies illustrating the practices and perceptions of contemporary wolf hunters (volchatniki) in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia). We aim to show how contemporary volchatniki rely on individual strategies such as self-crafted technologies and hunting magic. Hunting of wolves must be understood in terms of mutual intimate sensory interplay, an exchange that can be perceived as intersubjective communication between human and non-human persons. This personal interaction creates bonds between humans and certain wolves, allowing some wolves to survive. Despite the technocratic attitude of the Soviet era that wolves were a pest species to be exterminated, volchatniki of today perceive wolves as conscious subjects displaying personality and character. Animistic assumptions of non-human agency play an important role in wolf hunting, in combination with technological advances.

This study investigates the impact of the geographical location of uluses (municipal districts) and their climate on intraregional migration in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). Six of the most common indices describing the intensity of migration were used for the analysis. Despite strong outflows of population from the north, the disparities between the Arctic uluses and the rest of the Republic were statistically insignificant. Disparities between geographical parts of Yakutia and clusters by temperature were more marked, but they were not observed for all indices. This is due to a very low migration turnover in the south. The study finds that the geographical location of the uluses and their climate had some influence on intraregional migration, but socioeconomic determinants were much more important.

This article presents two ethnographic case studies illustrating the practices and perceptions of contemporary wolf hunters (volchatniki) in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia). We aim to show how contemporary volchatniki rely on individual strategies such as self-crafted technologies and hunting magic. Hunting of wolves must be understood in terms of mutual intimate sensory interplay, an exchange that can be perceived as intersubjective communication between human and non-human persons. This personal interaction creates bonds between humans and certain wolves, allowing some wolves to survive. Despite the technocratic attitude of the Soviet era that wolves were a pest species to be exterminated, volchatniki of today perceive wolves as conscious subjects displaying personality and character. Animistic assumptions of non-human agency play an important role in wolf hunting, in combination with technological advances.

This study investigates the impact of the geographical location of uluses (municipal districts) and their climate on intraregional migration in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). Six of the most common indices describing the intensity of migration were used for the analysis. Despite strong outflows of population from the north, the disparities between the Arctic uluses and the rest of the Republic were statistically insignificant. Disparities between geographical parts of Yakutia and clusters by temperature were more marked, but they were not observed for all indices. This is due to a very low migration turnover in the south. The study finds that the geographical location of the uluses and their climate had some influence on intraregional migration, but socioeconomic determinants were much more important.

This article considers regionalism (oblastnichestvo) as an independent direction in the history of Russian thought and culture. Four varieties of regionalism are pointed out: Russian, Ukrainian, Siberian, and Western Russianism (zapadnorussizm), which held the principles of federalism in common. The philosophical and methodological basis of regionalism was narodnichestvo (populism)—the ideology and movement of the intelligentsia in Russia in the second half of the nineteenth century. Narodnichestvo was against serfdom and capitalist development in Russia, and for the overthrow of the autocracy by means of a peasant revolution, positivism, and Slavophilism. The program of the regionalists was addressed to the provincial intelligentsia and was largely aimed at the formation of an intelligentsia called to serve their region. The program of Siberian regionalism is considered in more detail.

This article presents two ethnographic case studies illustrating the practices and perceptions of contemporary wolf hunters (volchatniki) in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia). We aim to show how contemporary volchatniki rely on individual strategies such as self-crafted technologies and hunting magic. Hunting of wolves must be understood in terms of mutual intimate sensory interplay, an exchange that can be perceived as intersubjective communication between human and non-human persons. This personal interaction creates bonds between humans and certain wolves, allowing some wolves to survive. Despite the technocratic attitude of the Soviet era that wolves were a pest species to be exterminated, volchatniki of today perceive wolves as conscious subjects displaying personality and character. Animistic assumptions of non-human agency play an important role in wolf hunting, in combination with technological advances.

This study investigates the impact of the geographical location of uluses (municipal districts) and their climate on intraregional migration in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). Six of the most common indices describing the intensity of migration were used for the analysis. Despite strong outflows of population from the north, the disparities between the Arctic uluses and the rest of the Republic were statistically insignificant. Disparities between geographical parts of Yakutia and clusters by temperature were more marked, but they were not observed for all indices. This is due to a very low migration turnover in the south. The study finds that the geographical location of the uluses and their climate had some influence on intraregional migration, but socioeconomic determinants were much more important.

This article considers regionalism (oblastnichestvo) as an independent direction in the history of Russian thought and culture. Four varieties of regionalism are pointed out: Russian, Ukrainian, Siberian, and Western Russianism (zapadnorussizm), which held the principles of federalism in common. The philosophical and methodological basis of regionalism was narodnichestvo (populism)—the ideology and movement of the intelligentsia in Russia in the second half of the nineteenth century. Narodnichestvo was against serfdom and capitalist development in Russia, and for the overthrow of the autocracy by means of a peasant revolution, positivism, and Slavophilism. The program of the regionalists was addressed to the provincial intelligentsia and was largely aimed at the formation of an intelligentsia called to serve their region. The program of Siberian regionalism is considered in more detail.

The Man Who Loved Siberia Roy Jacobsen and Anneliese Pitz (London: Maclehose Press, 2023), 302 pp., ISBN: 9781529413038.

A Life in Music from the Soviet Union to Canada: Memoirs of a Madrigal Ensemble Singer Alexander Tumanov, translated and edited by Vladimir Tumanov (Denton, TX: University of North Texas Press, 2019), 435 pp., ISBN: 9781574417555.

It is generally believed that if the languages of indigenous peoples of Siberia are preserved anywhere, it would be within the spheres of traditional environmental management: reindeer husbandry, hunting, fishing, etc. However, among Yupik communities in coastal Chukotka, another domain where the Yupik language remains in use is the religious (ritual) sphere—in particular, in various practices for communicating with the spirits of ancestors. This article focuses on Yupik spells, and, more broadly, the Yupik language in a modern ritual context. This allows us to identify and reflect on some characteristic features of the indigenous ritual space that are often insufficiently discussed in ethnographic literature: secrecy and indeterminacy. In addition, the article raises key issues surrounding family memory and heritage as well as the (dis)continuity of ritual knowledge.

It is generally believed that if the languages of indigenous peoples of Siberia are preserved anywhere, it would be within the spheres of traditional environmental management: reindeer husbandry, hunting, fishing, etc. However, among Yupik communities in coastal Chukotka, another domain where the Yupik language remains in use is the religious (ritual) sphere—in particular, in various practices for communicating with the spirits of ancestors. This article focuses on Yupik spells, and, more broadly, the Yupik language in a modern ritual context. This allows us to identify and reflect on some characteristic features of the indigenous ritual space that are often insufficiently discussed in ethnographic literature: secrecy and indeterminacy. In addition, the article raises key issues surrounding family memory and heritage as well as the (dis)continuity of ritual knowledge.

Most languages spoken by the “small-numbered indigenous peoples of the North” are currently highly endangered or extinct, yet there are big differences in vitality between languages and even dialects. I here discuss the factors that have shaped the current levels of endangerment of three Northern Tungusic lects: the Lamunkhin dialect of Even, the Bystraia dialect of Even, and Negidal. All three communities have lived through the sociopolitical changes associated with the Soviet era, and yet Negidal is nearly extinct, Bystraia Even is spoken only by adults, and Lamunkhin Even is still being passed on to children. The factors favoring language vitality that emerge from this study are the maintenance of cohesive and compact speech communities without forced resettlements and a relative minority of newcomers.

It is generally believed that if the languages of indigenous peoples of Siberia are preserved anywhere, it would be within the spheres of traditional environmental management: reindeer husbandry, hunting, fishing, etc. However, among Yupik communities in coastal Chukotka, another domain where the Yupik language remains in use is the religious (ritual) sphere—in particular, in various practices for communicating with the spirits of ancestors. This article focuses on Yupik spells, and, more broadly, the Yupik language in a modern ritual context. This allows us to identify and reflect on some characteristic features of the indigenous ritual space that are often insufficiently discussed in ethnographic literature: secrecy and indeterminacy. In addition, the article raises key issues surrounding family memory and heritage as well as the (dis)continuity of ritual knowledge.

Most languages spoken by the “small-numbered indigenous peoples of the North” are currently highly endangered or extinct, yet there are big differences in vitality between languages and even dialects. I here discuss the factors that have shaped the current levels of endangerment of three Northern Tungusic lects: the Lamunkhin dialect of Even, the Bystraia dialect of Even, and Negidal. All three communities have lived through the sociopolitical changes associated with the Soviet era, and yet Negidal is nearly extinct, Bystraia Even is spoken only by adults, and Lamunkhin Even is still being passed on to children. The factors favoring language vitality that emerge from this study are the maintenance of cohesive and compact speech communities without forced resettlements and a relative minority of newcomers.

This article examines the local history of the Northern Sea Route using the Yamal settlement of Novy Port as a case study. Shifting the focus of research from the capital-based decision-making centers to the anchor points of the Transpolar Route makes it possible to see complex collisions, alternative options, deviations from plans, and other failures, without which it is impossible to implement such large-scale projects as the Northern Sea Route. Novy Port was assigned the role of one of the outposts of the Soviet colonization of the Arctic. At each of the identified stages of the history of Novy Port, its modus vivendi was formulated anew, which reflected a change in paradigms in the development of the Northern Sea Route.

It is generally believed that if the languages of indigenous peoples of Siberia are preserved anywhere, it would be within the spheres of traditional environmental management: reindeer husbandry, hunting, fishing, etc. However, among Yupik communities in coastal Chukotka, another domain where the Yupik language remains in use is the religious (ritual) sphere—in particular, in various practices for communicating with the spirits of ancestors. This article focuses on Yupik spells, and, more broadly, the Yupik language in a modern ritual context. This allows us to identify and reflect on some characteristic features of the indigenous ritual space that are often insufficiently discussed in ethnographic literature: secrecy and indeterminacy. In addition, the article raises key issues surrounding family memory and heritage as well as the (dis)continuity of ritual knowledge.

Most languages spoken by the “small-numbered indigenous peoples of the North” are currently highly endangered or extinct, yet there are big differences in vitality between languages and even dialects. I here discuss the factors that have shaped the current levels of endangerment of three Northern Tungusic lects: the Lamunkhin dialect of Even, the Bystraia dialect of Even, and Negidal. All three communities have lived through the sociopolitical changes associated with the Soviet era, and yet Negidal is nearly extinct, Bystraia Even is spoken only by adults, and Lamunkhin Even is still being passed on to children. The factors favoring language vitality that emerge from this study are the maintenance of cohesive and compact speech communities without forced resettlements and a relative minority of newcomers.

This article examines the local history of the Northern Sea Route using the Yamal settlement of Novy Port as a case study. Shifting the focus of research from the capital-based decision-making centers to the anchor points of the Transpolar Route makes it possible to see complex collisions, alternative options, deviations from plans, and other failures, without which it is impossible to implement such large-scale projects as the Northern Sea Route. Novy Port was assigned the role of one of the outposts of the Soviet colonization of the Arctic. At each of the identified stages of the history of Novy Port, its modus vivendi was formulated anew, which reflected a change in paradigms in the development of the Northern Sea Route.

This research considers issues of interaction between language and culture; it studies the phenomenon of lacunarity in general, as well as identifying lexical gaps in olonkho texts and ways of eliminating them in translation. Here, we investigate the need for more in-depth study of the translation of works of art in which a culture-specific component has a high degree of presence; the importance of studying the lacuna phenomenon as one of the main factors influencing translation, and, in turn, the need to study to the misunderstanding of a text by a foreign reader. The problem of translating culturally related phenomena necessitates a description of their origins and development, and attention to notions of linguistic worldview and linguistic universals regarding culture-specific vocabulary, including lexical gaps.

This article is devoted to the work of ivory carving artists in Sakha (Yakutia). It analyzes the ways craftsmen use, engage, and relate to mammoth ivory in their creative work. They start each carving project with consideration of the material, its quality and condition. Material often dictates the ways the creative idea develops and predetermines the outcome. Attention to the material is an important aspect of the relational engagement with it. Mammoth ivory, due to its structure, responds to climatic fluctuations, which is often described by artists as “breathing,” and it therefore demonstrates the qualities of an active material. For craftsmen, mammoth ivory is an agent and sentient material. The article contributes to the discussion of the importance of material in creative work.

This article is devoted to the work of ivory carving artists in Sakha (Yakutia). It analyzes the ways craftsmen use, engage, and relate to mammoth ivory in their creative work. They start each carving project with consideration of the material, its quality and condition. Material often dictates the ways the creative idea develops and predetermines the outcome. Attention to the material is an important aspect of the relational engagement with it. Mammoth ivory, due to its structure, responds to climatic fluctuations, which is often described by artists as “breathing,” and it therefore demonstrates the qualities of an active material. For craftsmen, mammoth ivory is an agent and sentient material. The article contributes to the discussion of the importance of material in creative work.

The historical memory of Siberia is heterogeneous and diverse; different parts of this region have their own emphases in the politics of historical memory. This article focuses on the historical memory of Yugra (a historical territory roughly coterminous with the Khanty-Mansiiskii Autonomous Okrug), as it is from this territory that the development of Siberian oil lands began. Oil has become the central focus of memory for the northern region of Western Siberia, and oil workers are symbols of territorial development in Yugra. The creation of the oil and gas complex is portrayed as a victory over nature, and oil workers are portrayed not only as pioneers who opened the region, but also as soldiers.

This article is devoted to the work of ivory carving artists in Sakha (Yakutia). It analyzes the ways craftsmen use, engage, and relate to mammoth ivory in their creative work. They start each carving project with consideration of the material, its quality and condition. Material often dictates the ways the creative idea develops and predetermines the outcome. Attention to the material is an important aspect of the relational engagement with it. Mammoth ivory, due to its structure, responds to climatic fluctuations, which is often described by artists as “breathing,” and it therefore demonstrates the qualities of an active material. For craftsmen, mammoth ivory is an agent and sentient material. The article contributes to the discussion of the importance of material in creative work.

The historical memory of Siberia is heterogeneous and diverse; different parts of this region have their own emphases in the politics of historical memory. This article focuses on the historical memory of Yugra (a historical territory roughly coterminous with the Khanty-Mansiiskii Autonomous Okrug), as it is from this territory that the development of Siberian oil lands began. Oil has become the central focus of memory for the northern region of Western Siberia, and oil workers are symbols of territorial development in Yugra. The creation of the oil and gas complex is portrayed as a victory over nature, and oil workers are portrayed not only as pioneers who opened the region, but also as soldiers.

This paper presents an analysis of how neo-shamanic communicative practices have evolved in Siberia and the Russian Far East over the last four decades. We identify three social cultural factors that have facilitated the spread of neo-shamanism: the ideological vacuum left by the collapse of the Soviet system; foreign missionaries and their work; and ethnic revival. We discern three periods in the development of the communicative practices according to a respective key process in each of them. During glocalization, followers of experiential neo-shamanism and initiators of the revival of indigenous shamanic traditions act as agents of communication. During institutionalization, what takes place is typification and streamlining interactions with mass audiences, with government agencies, tourism industry and artistic practices. The period of hybridization is the time when neo-shamanic elements merge with parapsychology, business consulting, fine arts, and when neo-syncretic forms are created.

This article is devoted to the work of ivory carving artists in Sakha (Yakutia). It analyzes the ways craftsmen use, engage, and relate to mammoth ivory in their creative work. They start each carving project with consideration of the material, its quality and condition. Material often dictates the ways the creative idea develops and predetermines the outcome. Attention to the material is an important aspect of the relational engagement with it. Mammoth ivory, due to its structure, responds to climatic fluctuations, which is often described by artists as “breathing,” and it therefore demonstrates the qualities of an active material. For craftsmen, mammoth ivory is an agent and sentient material. The article contributes to the discussion of the importance of material in creative work.

The historical memory of Siberia is heterogeneous and diverse; different parts of this region have their own emphases in the politics of historical memory. This article focuses on the historical memory of Yugra (a historical territory roughly coterminous with the Khanty-Mansiiskii Autonomous Okrug), as it is from this territory that the development of Siberian oil lands began. Oil has become the central focus of memory for the northern region of Western Siberia, and oil workers are symbols of territorial development in Yugra. The creation of the oil and gas complex is portrayed as a victory over nature, and oil workers are portrayed not only as pioneers who opened the region, but also as soldiers.

This paper presents an analysis of how neo-shamanic communicative practices have evolved in Siberia and the Russian Far East over the last four decades. We identify three social cultural factors that have facilitated the spread of neo-shamanism: the ideological vacuum left by the collapse of the Soviet system; foreign missionaries and their work; and ethnic revival. We discern three periods in the development of the communicative practices according to a respective key process in each of them. During glocalization, followers of experiential neo-shamanism and initiators of the revival of indigenous shamanic traditions act as agents of communication. During institutionalization, what takes place is typification and streamlining interactions with mass audiences, with government agencies, tourism industry and artistic practices. The period of hybridization is the time when neo-shamanic elements merge with parapsychology, business consulting, fine arts, and when neo-syncretic forms are created.

The Tuvan language is a South Siberian Turkic language spoken by the Tuvan people who live in the Republic of Tyva, an autonomous republic in the South Siberian region of Russia. The Republic of Tyva is a bilingual region where both Russian and Tuvan are spoken. However, Russian is the dominant language, and therefore Tuvan has fallen to the status of a second language for the Tuvan people. In such an environment, the teaching of Tuvan as a native language is of great importance. In this article, two primary schoolbooks used in the teaching of Tuvan have been considered from the aspect of visual semiotics. Through this article, I aim to show the effects of visual semiotics on native language education.

This article is devoted to the work of ivory carving artists in Sakha (Yakutia). It analyzes the ways craftsmen use, engage, and relate to mammoth ivory in their creative work. They start each carving project with consideration of the material, its quality and condition. Material often dictates the ways the creative idea develops and predetermines the outcome. Attention to the material is an important aspect of the relational engagement with it. Mammoth ivory, due to its structure, responds to climatic fluctuations, which is often described by artists as “breathing,” and it therefore demonstrates the qualities of an active material. For craftsmen, mammoth ivory is an agent and sentient material. The article contributes to the discussion of the importance of material in creative work.

The historical memory of Siberia is heterogeneous and diverse; different parts of this region have their own emphases in the politics of historical memory. This article focuses on the historical memory of Yugra (a historical territory roughly coterminous with the Khanty-Mansiiskii Autonomous Okrug), as it is from this territory that the development of Siberian oil lands began. Oil has become the central focus of memory for the northern region of Western Siberia, and oil workers are symbols of territorial development in Yugra. The creation of the oil and gas complex is portrayed as a victory over nature, and oil workers are portrayed not only as pioneers who opened the region, but also as soldiers.

This paper presents an analysis of how neo-shamanic communicative practices have evolved in Siberia and the Russian Far East over the last four decades. We identify three social cultural factors that have facilitated the spread of neo-shamanism: the ideological vacuum left by the collapse of the Soviet system; foreign missionaries and their work; and ethnic revival. We discern three periods in the development of the communicative practices according to a respective key process in each of them. During glocalization, followers of experiential neo-shamanism and initiators of the revival of indigenous shamanic traditions act as agents of communication. During institutionalization, what takes place is typification and streamlining interactions with mass audiences, with government agencies, tourism industry and artistic practices. The period of hybridization is the time when neo-shamanic elements merge with parapsychology, business consulting, fine arts, and when neo-syncretic forms are created.

The Tuvan language is a South Siberian Turkic language spoken by the Tuvan people who live in the Republic of Tyva, an autonomous republic in the South Siberian region of Russia. The Republic of Tyva is a bilingual region where both Russian and Tuvan are spoken. However, Russian is the dominant language, and therefore Tuvan has fallen to the status of a second language for the Tuvan people. In such an environment, the teaching of Tuvan as a native language is of great importance. In this article, two primary schoolbooks used in the teaching of Tuvan have been considered from the aspect of visual semiotics. Through this article, I aim to show the effects of visual semiotics on native language education.

Nick Fielding (Oxford: Signal Books, Ltd., 2020), xv +320pp. £16.99 Hardcover. ISBN 978-1-909930-865.

The purpose of this article is a comparative analysis of the post-Soviet reappearance of the Russian Orthodox Church in two rural Komi communities. We aimed to study local perceptions of restoring the Russian Orthodox Church's presence in particular localities. We conducted ethnographic fieldwork in two communities and spoke to local clerics and the inhabitants of the villages under study. Our field research also involved participant observation and literature analysis. The collected evidence indicates that the community with more distinctive folk Orthodox traditions more or less plainly contested the priests’ authority. Still, people generally perceived the renewal of the Russian Orthodox Church's presence positively. We argue that the Russian Orthodox institutions and priests did not necessarily replace folk Orthodox specialists’ authority, but rather diversified local religious scenes.

The purpose of this article is a comparative analysis of the post-Soviet reappearance of the Russian Orthodox Church in two rural Komi communities. We aimed to study local perceptions of restoring the Russian Orthodox Church's presence in particular localities. We conducted ethnographic fieldwork in two communities and spoke to local clerics and the inhabitants of the villages under study. Our field research also involved participant observation and literature analysis. The collected evidence indicates that the community with more distinctive folk Orthodox traditions more or less plainly contested the priests’ authority. Still, people generally perceived the renewal of the Russian Orthodox Church's presence positively. We argue that the Russian Orthodox institutions and priests did not necessarily replace folk Orthodox specialists’ authority, but rather diversified local religious scenes.

Nostalgia for the Soviet figures prominently in public imaginaries. Such nostalgia has been viewed as subverting and critiquing the post-Socialist neoliberal order. Others have suggested that “nostalgia” is a poor vocabulary for talking about post-Soviet affect. Ethnographic attention to nostalgia reveals a multiplicity of nostalgic registers. I argue that Soviet nostalgias can be roughly divided into lyrical, heroic, and practical. Lyrical nostalgia is for the Soviet time but without the corresponding ideological purchase. Heroic nostalgia pines for overcoming the difficulties associated with the Soviet period and its mission of constructing Communism. Practical nostalgia would like to restore the good associated with the Socialist period. Heroic nostalgia does not seem to be easily enlisted for restorative projects, and lyrical nostalgia is largely apolitical. Practical nostalgia, however, is deeply rooted in the conviction that the Soviet order of things was superior to the capitalistic order.

The purpose of this article is a comparative analysis of the post-Soviet reappearance of the Russian Orthodox Church in two rural Komi communities. We aimed to study local perceptions of restoring the Russian Orthodox Church's presence in particular localities. We conducted ethnographic fieldwork in two communities and spoke to local clerics and the inhabitants of the villages under study. Our field research also involved participant observation and literature analysis. The collected evidence indicates that the community with more distinctive folk Orthodox traditions more or less plainly contested the priests’ authority. Still, people generally perceived the renewal of the Russian Orthodox Church's presence positively. We argue that the Russian Orthodox institutions and priests did not necessarily replace folk Orthodox specialists’ authority, but rather diversified local religious scenes.

Nostalgia for the Soviet figures prominently in public imaginaries. Such nostalgia has been viewed as subverting and critiquing the post-Socialist neoliberal order. Others have suggested that “nostalgia” is a poor vocabulary for talking about post-Soviet affect. Ethnographic attention to nostalgia reveals a multiplicity of nostalgic registers. I argue that Soviet nostalgias can be roughly divided into lyrical, heroic, and practical. Lyrical nostalgia is for the Soviet time but without the corresponding ideological purchase. Heroic nostalgia pines for overcoming the difficulties associated with the Soviet period and its mission of constructing Communism. Practical nostalgia would like to restore the good associated with the Socialist period. Heroic nostalgia does not seem to be easily enlisted for restorative projects, and lyrical nostalgia is largely apolitical. Practical nostalgia, however, is deeply rooted in the conviction that the Soviet order of things was superior to the capitalistic order.

The project “Great Vladivostok,” conducted during the period of Nikita Khrushchev, was very important for the Primorye region and state, but remained little known in the wider history of the USSR due to the policy of the Soviet government after 1964. It was not only part of the great housing reform in the country but was also an attempt at establishing the Soviet position (through the large new city of Vladivostok) in the East Asian region. However, many processes within this project are unknown for various reasons—primarily political ones. We consider and analyze one of these processes, the question of “art-house” and “economic” styles in “Great Vladivostok.” The authors have used oral history materials (for example, collected interviews), visual sources, written works, and records from Russian archives to consider and analyze the results of the “art-house” and economic styles in “Great Vladivostok” as applied to housing developments.

The purpose of this article is a comparative analysis of the post-Soviet reappearance of the Russian Orthodox Church in two rural Komi communities. We aimed to study local perceptions of restoring the Russian Orthodox Church's presence in particular localities. We conducted ethnographic fieldwork in two communities and spoke to local clerics and the inhabitants of the villages under study. Our field research also involved participant observation and literature analysis. The collected evidence indicates that the community with more distinctive folk Orthodox traditions more or less plainly contested the priests’ authority. Still, people generally perceived the renewal of the Russian Orthodox Church's presence positively. We argue that the Russian Orthodox institutions and priests did not necessarily replace folk Orthodox specialists’ authority, but rather diversified local religious scenes.

Nostalgia for the Soviet figures prominently in public imaginaries. Such nostalgia has been viewed as subverting and critiquing the post-Socialist neoliberal order. Others have suggested that “nostalgia” is a poor vocabulary for talking about post-Soviet affect. Ethnographic attention to nostalgia reveals a multiplicity of nostalgic registers. I argue that Soviet nostalgias can be roughly divided into lyrical, heroic, and practical. Lyrical nostalgia is for the Soviet time but without the corresponding ideological purchase. Heroic nostalgia pines for overcoming the difficulties associated with the Soviet period and its mission of constructing Communism. Practical nostalgia would like to restore the good associated with the Socialist period. Heroic nostalgia does not seem to be easily enlisted for restorative projects, and lyrical nostalgia is largely apolitical. Practical nostalgia, however, is deeply rooted in the conviction that the Soviet order of things was superior to the capitalistic order.

The project “Great Vladivostok,” conducted during the period of Nikita Khrushchev, was very important for the Primorye region and state, but remained little known in the wider history of the USSR due to the policy of the Soviet government after 1964. It was not only part of the great housing reform in the country but was also an attempt at establishing the Soviet position (through the large new city of Vladivostok) in the East Asian region. However, many processes within this project are unknown for various reasons—primarily political ones. We consider and analyze one of these processes, the question of “art-house” and “economic” styles in “Great Vladivostok.” The authors have used oral history materials (for example, collected interviews), visual sources, written works, and records from Russian archives to consider and analyze the results of the “art-house” and economic styles in “Great Vladivostok” as applied to housing developments.

The purpose of this article is to present information on the exploits of early Russian mariners, probably coming from settlements in the Russian North, in the development of the Arctic, in particular, the northeastern sea route. Historical artifacts of the seventeenth century found on the Faddey Islands and in Simsa Bay indicate that the entrepreneurial Russian polar sailors mastered the harsh Arctic regions long before European sailors. Archaeologist Aleksei P. Okladnikov has shown that these polar sailors of the seventeenth century were skilled shipbuilders, knew navigation, used nautical equipment, knew the languages of the indigenous population, had writing skills, and played chess.

The purpose of this article is a comparative analysis of the post-Soviet reappearance of the Russian Orthodox Church in two rural Komi communities. We aimed to study local perceptions of restoring the Russian Orthodox Church's presence in particular localities. We conducted ethnographic fieldwork in two communities and spoke to local clerics and the inhabitants of the villages under study. Our field research also involved participant observation and literature analysis. The collected evidence indicates that the community with more distinctive folk Orthodox traditions more or less plainly contested the priests’ authority. Still, people generally perceived the renewal of the Russian Orthodox Church's presence positively. We argue that the Russian Orthodox institutions and priests did not necessarily replace folk Orthodox specialists’ authority, but rather diversified local religious scenes.

Nostalgia for the Soviet figures prominently in public imaginaries. Such nostalgia has been viewed as subverting and critiquing the post-Socialist neoliberal order. Others have suggested that “nostalgia” is a poor vocabulary for talking about post-Soviet affect. Ethnographic attention to nostalgia reveals a multiplicity of nostalgic registers. I argue that Soviet nostalgias can be roughly divided into lyrical, heroic, and practical. Lyrical nostalgia is for the Soviet time but without the corresponding ideological purchase. Heroic nostalgia pines for overcoming the difficulties associated with the Soviet period and its mission of constructing Communism. Practical nostalgia would like to restore the good associated with the Socialist period. Heroic nostalgia does not seem to be easily enlisted for restorative projects, and lyrical nostalgia is largely apolitical. Practical nostalgia, however, is deeply rooted in the conviction that the Soviet order of things was superior to the capitalistic order.

The project “Great Vladivostok,” conducted during the period of Nikita Khrushchev, was very important for the Primorye region and state, but remained little known in the wider history of the USSR due to the policy of the Soviet government after 1964. It was not only part of the great housing reform in the country but was also an attempt at establishing the Soviet position (through the large new city of Vladivostok) in the East Asian region. However, many processes within this project are unknown for various reasons—primarily political ones. We consider and analyze one of these processes, the question of “art-house” and “economic” styles in “Great Vladivostok.” The authors have used oral history materials (for example, collected interviews), visual sources, written works, and records from Russian archives to consider and analyze the results of the “art-house” and economic styles in “Great Vladivostok” as applied to housing developments.

The purpose of this article is to present information on the exploits of early Russian mariners, probably coming from settlements in the Russian North, in the development of the Arctic, in particular, the northeastern sea route. Historical artifacts of the seventeenth century found on the Faddey Islands and in Simsa Bay indicate that the entrepreneurial Russian polar sailors mastered the harsh Arctic regions long before European sailors. Archaeologist Aleksei P. Okladnikov has shown that these polar sailors of the seventeenth century were skilled shipbuilders, knew navigation, used nautical equipment, knew the languages of the indigenous population, had writing skills, and played chess.

An Urban Future for Sápmi? Indigenous Urbanization in the Nordic States and Russia. Mikkel Berg-Nordlie, Astri Dankertsen, and Marte Winsvold (eds.) (New York: Berghahn Books, 2022, Studies in the Circumpolar North Series), xvi +281 pp. ISBN: 978-1800-732-643.

Earth, Ice, Bone, Blood: Permafrost and Extinction in the Russian Arctic. Charlotte Wrigley. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2023), 236 pp. ISBN: 978-1517911829.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

Inspiring Girls* Expeditions is a global organization that empowers 16- to 18-year-old youth through 12-day backcountry science and art expeditions, including in the US Arctic and Subarctic. Because science and outdoor fields are historically white- and male-dominated, Inspiring Girls* follows an intersectional approach to welcome youth with marginalized genders, people of color, Indigenous people, and other marginalized groups into these arenas. Inspiring Girls* also provides professional development for early career scientist, artist, and outdoor guide instructors. We discuss how Inspiring Girls* leverages our own research as well as best practices from the literature to prioritize such strategies as intentionally building diverse teams, offering a tuition-free format, and participating in community learning to reimagine the inclusivity of science and outdoor fields in the Arctic and beyond.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

Inspiring Girls* Expeditions is a global organization that empowers 16- to 18-year-old youth through 12-day backcountry science and art expeditions, including in the US Arctic and Subarctic. Because science and outdoor fields are historically white- and male-dominated, Inspiring Girls* follows an intersectional approach to welcome youth with marginalized genders, people of color, Indigenous people, and other marginalized groups into these arenas. Inspiring Girls* also provides professional development for early career scientist, artist, and outdoor guide instructors. We discuss how Inspiring Girls* leverages our own research as well as best practices from the literature to prioritize such strategies as intentionally building diverse teams, offering a tuition-free format, and participating in community learning to reimagine the inclusivity of science and outdoor fields in the Arctic and beyond.

While historical depictions of gender and sexuality propagated by outsiders continue to resonate through contemporary representations of Arctic peoples, researchers have only now begun to unpack these persistent ideas and their role in shaping current struggles for access, inclusion, and equality. This article aims to contribute to this growing discussion by examining the depictions of Greenlandic women and sexuality in Rockwell Kent's Salamina (1935). Drawing on a sensationalism that has long been a fixture of Arctic accounts and later media, Kent described Greenlandic women as childlike and highly sexual but still knowable, reinforcing existing hierarchies of power built on constructions of gender and race. This article interrogates the artist's depiction of Greenlandic women and its relation to broader representation of Indigenous peoples in the Arctic.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

Inspiring Girls* Expeditions is a global organization that empowers 16- to 18-year-old youth through 12-day backcountry science and art expeditions, including in the US Arctic and Subarctic. Because science and outdoor fields are historically white- and male-dominated, Inspiring Girls* follows an intersectional approach to welcome youth with marginalized genders, people of color, Indigenous people, and other marginalized groups into these arenas. Inspiring Girls* also provides professional development for early career scientist, artist, and outdoor guide instructors. We discuss how Inspiring Girls* leverages our own research as well as best practices from the literature to prioritize such strategies as intentionally building diverse teams, offering a tuition-free format, and participating in community learning to reimagine the inclusivity of science and outdoor fields in the Arctic and beyond.

While historical depictions of gender and sexuality propagated by outsiders continue to resonate through contemporary representations of Arctic peoples, researchers have only now begun to unpack these persistent ideas and their role in shaping current struggles for access, inclusion, and equality. This article aims to contribute to this growing discussion by examining the depictions of Greenlandic women and sexuality in Rockwell Kent's Salamina (1935). Drawing on a sensationalism that has long been a fixture of Arctic accounts and later media, Kent described Greenlandic women as childlike and highly sexual but still knowable, reinforcing existing hierarchies of power built on constructions of gender and race. This article interrogates the artist's depiction of Greenlandic women and its relation to broader representation of Indigenous peoples in the Arctic.

In 2021, The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women examined Denmark's (including Greenland and the Faroe Islands) fulfillment of the rights ensured in The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. This article analyses gender equality in Greenland through investigating documents related to the Committee's examinations. The reason for focusing on women's rights in Greenland is the intersectional identity of the majority of Greenlandic women as both female and indigenous (Inuit). The article identifies several issues and explains the status of these issues, including how the Greenlandic government has tried to overcome them. The aim is to create an overview of the official status of women's rights in Greenland to help further the process of ensuring equality.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

Inspiring Girls* Expeditions is a global organization that empowers 16- to 18-year-old youth through 12-day backcountry science and art expeditions, including in the US Arctic and Subarctic. Because science and outdoor fields are historically white- and male-dominated, Inspiring Girls* follows an intersectional approach to welcome youth with marginalized genders, people of color, Indigenous people, and other marginalized groups into these arenas. Inspiring Girls* also provides professional development for early career scientist, artist, and outdoor guide instructors. We discuss how Inspiring Girls* leverages our own research as well as best practices from the literature to prioritize such strategies as intentionally building diverse teams, offering a tuition-free format, and participating in community learning to reimagine the inclusivity of science and outdoor fields in the Arctic and beyond.

While historical depictions of gender and sexuality propagated by outsiders continue to resonate through contemporary representations of Arctic peoples, researchers have only now begun to unpack these persistent ideas and their role in shaping current struggles for access, inclusion, and equality. This article aims to contribute to this growing discussion by examining the depictions of Greenlandic women and sexuality in Rockwell Kent's Salamina (1935). Drawing on a sensationalism that has long been a fixture of Arctic accounts and later media, Kent described Greenlandic women as childlike and highly sexual but still knowable, reinforcing existing hierarchies of power built on constructions of gender and race. This article interrogates the artist's depiction of Greenlandic women and its relation to broader representation of Indigenous peoples in the Arctic.

In 2021, The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women examined Denmark's (including Greenland and the Faroe Islands) fulfillment of the rights ensured in The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. This article analyses gender equality in Greenland through investigating documents related to the Committee's examinations. The reason for focusing on women's rights in Greenland is the intersectional identity of the majority of Greenlandic women as both female and indigenous (Inuit). The article identifies several issues and explains the status of these issues, including how the Greenlandic government has tried to overcome them. The aim is to create an overview of the official status of women's rights in Greenland to help further the process of ensuring equality.

The Ethnological Impact Assessments (EIA) procedure in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is used to protect the interests of indigenous minorities living in areas where extractive companies are planning to operate. Rural women are active in the process of exercising conscious, free choice in the planned activities of industrial companies. Industrial companies, when seeking the consent of indigenous minorities to develop resources, agree to conduct ethnological research and enter contracts for compensation payments. The role of women in the compensation process is virtually ignored. The article discusses economic and socio-cultural aspects of indigenous peoples’ sustainability and the possibility of “structural restoration” of their local system. The proposes ways to preserve traditional knowledge, women's proposals for assuring wellbeing and quality of life for rural families.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

Inspiring Girls* Expeditions is a global organization that empowers 16- to 18-year-old youth through 12-day backcountry science and art expeditions, including in the US Arctic and Subarctic. Because science and outdoor fields are historically white- and male-dominated, Inspiring Girls* follows an intersectional approach to welcome youth with marginalized genders, people of color, Indigenous people, and other marginalized groups into these arenas. Inspiring Girls* also provides professional development for early career scientist, artist, and outdoor guide instructors. We discuss how Inspiring Girls* leverages our own research as well as best practices from the literature to prioritize such strategies as intentionally building diverse teams, offering a tuition-free format, and participating in community learning to reimagine the inclusivity of science and outdoor fields in the Arctic and beyond.

While historical depictions of gender and sexuality propagated by outsiders continue to resonate through contemporary representations of Arctic peoples, researchers have only now begun to unpack these persistent ideas and their role in shaping current struggles for access, inclusion, and equality. This article aims to contribute to this growing discussion by examining the depictions of Greenlandic women and sexuality in Rockwell Kent's Salamina (1935). Drawing on a sensationalism that has long been a fixture of Arctic accounts and later media, Kent described Greenlandic women as childlike and highly sexual but still knowable, reinforcing existing hierarchies of power built on constructions of gender and race. This article interrogates the artist's depiction of Greenlandic women and its relation to broader representation of Indigenous peoples in the Arctic.

In 2021, The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women examined Denmark's (including Greenland and the Faroe Islands) fulfillment of the rights ensured in The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. This article analyses gender equality in Greenland through investigating documents related to the Committee's examinations. The reason for focusing on women's rights in Greenland is the intersectional identity of the majority of Greenlandic women as both female and indigenous (Inuit). The article identifies several issues and explains the status of these issues, including how the Greenlandic government has tried to overcome them. The aim is to create an overview of the official status of women's rights in Greenland to help further the process of ensuring equality.

The Ethnological Impact Assessments (EIA) procedure in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is used to protect the interests of indigenous minorities living in areas where extractive companies are planning to operate. Rural women are active in the process of exercising conscious, free choice in the planned activities of industrial companies. Industrial companies, when seeking the consent of indigenous minorities to develop resources, agree to conduct ethnological research and enter contracts for compensation payments. The role of women in the compensation process is virtually ignored. The article discusses economic and socio-cultural aspects of indigenous peoples’ sustainability and the possibility of “structural restoration” of their local system. The proposes ways to preserve traditional knowledge, women's proposals for assuring wellbeing and quality of life for rural families.

Indigenous women's activism occupies a specific niche within local and global Indigenous politics and plays a particularly important role in the socio-cultural and political development of Indigenous communities. In this regard, it is vital to explore not only activist strategies of grassroots Indigenous women's organizing but also their histories, contexts, and activist scopes. The women's collectives in the Olenek Evenki National District of the Sakha Republic (Russian Federation) have a long history of cultural and political activism. In this photo-essay, we aim to narrativize women's activism in Olenek as well as visually represent the activists themselves. Through the photos and the analytical narratives complimenting them, we also want to explore distinct (and diverse) articulations of Indigenous identities and of Indigenous activisms in the post-Soviet Indigenous Arctic.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

Inspiring Girls* Expeditions is a global organization that empowers 16- to 18-year-old youth through 12-day backcountry science and art expeditions, including in the US Arctic and Subarctic. Because science and outdoor fields are historically white- and male-dominated, Inspiring Girls* follows an intersectional approach to welcome youth with marginalized genders, people of color, Indigenous people, and other marginalized groups into these arenas. Inspiring Girls* also provides professional development for early career scientist, artist, and outdoor guide instructors. We discuss how Inspiring Girls* leverages our own research as well as best practices from the literature to prioritize such strategies as intentionally building diverse teams, offering a tuition-free format, and participating in community learning to reimagine the inclusivity of science and outdoor fields in the Arctic and beyond.

While historical depictions of gender and sexuality propagated by outsiders continue to resonate through contemporary representations of Arctic peoples, researchers have only now begun to unpack these persistent ideas and their role in shaping current struggles for access, inclusion, and equality. This article aims to contribute to this growing discussion by examining the depictions of Greenlandic women and sexuality in Rockwell Kent's Salamina (1935). Drawing on a sensationalism that has long been a fixture of Arctic accounts and later media, Kent described Greenlandic women as childlike and highly sexual but still knowable, reinforcing existing hierarchies of power built on constructions of gender and race. This article interrogates the artist's depiction of Greenlandic women and its relation to broader representation of Indigenous peoples in the Arctic.

In 2021, The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women examined Denmark's (including Greenland and the Faroe Islands) fulfillment of the rights ensured in The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. This article analyses gender equality in Greenland through investigating documents related to the Committee's examinations. The reason for focusing on women's rights in Greenland is the intersectional identity of the majority of Greenlandic women as both female and indigenous (Inuit). The article identifies several issues and explains the status of these issues, including how the Greenlandic government has tried to overcome them. The aim is to create an overview of the official status of women's rights in Greenland to help further the process of ensuring equality.

The Ethnological Impact Assessments (EIA) procedure in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is used to protect the interests of indigenous minorities living in areas where extractive companies are planning to operate. Rural women are active in the process of exercising conscious, free choice in the planned activities of industrial companies. Industrial companies, when seeking the consent of indigenous minorities to develop resources, agree to conduct ethnological research and enter contracts for compensation payments. The role of women in the compensation process is virtually ignored. The article discusses economic and socio-cultural aspects of indigenous peoples’ sustainability and the possibility of “structural restoration” of their local system. The proposes ways to preserve traditional knowledge, women's proposals for assuring wellbeing and quality of life for rural families.

Indigenous women's activism occupies a specific niche within local and global Indigenous politics and plays a particularly important role in the socio-cultural and political development of Indigenous communities. In this regard, it is vital to explore not only activist strategies of grassroots Indigenous women's organizing but also their histories, contexts, and activist scopes. The women's collectives in the Olenek Evenki National District of the Sakha Republic (Russian Federation) have a long history of cultural and political activism. In this photo-essay, we aim to narrativize women's activism in Olenek as well as visually represent the activists themselves. Through the photos and the analytical narratives complimenting them, we also want to explore distinct (and diverse) articulations of Indigenous identities and of Indigenous activisms in the post-Soviet Indigenous Arctic.

The celebration of Día de Muertos (Spanish for Day of the Dead) has been hosted by the Latino community in Anchorage, Alaska, every second of November since 2004, where the ritual to honor ancestors is shared, and a symbolic bridge between the communities that converge within the territory is built. During the 2021 celebration, the Indigenous women Christina Edwin (Denaa and Chicana) and Itzel Zagal (Mexica Xochimilca) collaborated on an altar that was culturally appropriate for Olga Ezi (Ahtna Dene, South Central Dena'ina matriarch). It was a tribute the Alaska Native women (Chedas or grandmothers) and brought together Indigenous perspectives with a common respect for ancestries. This collaboration found that Día de Muertos is a spiritual practice and an act of cultural resistance and solidarity.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

Inspiring Girls* Expeditions is a global organization that empowers 16- to 18-year-old youth through 12-day backcountry science and art expeditions, including in the US Arctic and Subarctic. Because science and outdoor fields are historically white- and male-dominated, Inspiring Girls* follows an intersectional approach to welcome youth with marginalized genders, people of color, Indigenous people, and other marginalized groups into these arenas. Inspiring Girls* also provides professional development for early career scientist, artist, and outdoor guide instructors. We discuss how Inspiring Girls* leverages our own research as well as best practices from the literature to prioritize such strategies as intentionally building diverse teams, offering a tuition-free format, and participating in community learning to reimagine the inclusivity of science and outdoor fields in the Arctic and beyond.

While historical depictions of gender and sexuality propagated by outsiders continue to resonate through contemporary representations of Arctic peoples, researchers have only now begun to unpack these persistent ideas and their role in shaping current struggles for access, inclusion, and equality. This article aims to contribute to this growing discussion by examining the depictions of Greenlandic women and sexuality in Rockwell Kent's Salamina (1935). Drawing on a sensationalism that has long been a fixture of Arctic accounts and later media, Kent described Greenlandic women as childlike and highly sexual but still knowable, reinforcing existing hierarchies of power built on constructions of gender and race. This article interrogates the artist's depiction of Greenlandic women and its relation to broader representation of Indigenous peoples in the Arctic.

In 2021, The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women examined Denmark's (including Greenland and the Faroe Islands) fulfillment of the rights ensured in The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. This article analyses gender equality in Greenland through investigating documents related to the Committee's examinations. The reason for focusing on women's rights in Greenland is the intersectional identity of the majority of Greenlandic women as both female and indigenous (Inuit). The article identifies several issues and explains the status of these issues, including how the Greenlandic government has tried to overcome them. The aim is to create an overview of the official status of women's rights in Greenland to help further the process of ensuring equality.

The Ethnological Impact Assessments (EIA) procedure in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is used to protect the interests of indigenous minorities living in areas where extractive companies are planning to operate. Rural women are active in the process of exercising conscious, free choice in the planned activities of industrial companies. Industrial companies, when seeking the consent of indigenous minorities to develop resources, agree to conduct ethnological research and enter contracts for compensation payments. The role of women in the compensation process is virtually ignored. The article discusses economic and socio-cultural aspects of indigenous peoples’ sustainability and the possibility of “structural restoration” of their local system. The proposes ways to preserve traditional knowledge, women's proposals for assuring wellbeing and quality of life for rural families.

Indigenous women's activism occupies a specific niche within local and global Indigenous politics and plays a particularly important role in the socio-cultural and political development of Indigenous communities. In this regard, it is vital to explore not only activist strategies of grassroots Indigenous women's organizing but also their histories, contexts, and activist scopes. The women's collectives in the Olenek Evenki National District of the Sakha Republic (Russian Federation) have a long history of cultural and political activism. In this photo-essay, we aim to narrativize women's activism in Olenek as well as visually represent the activists themselves. Through the photos and the analytical narratives complimenting them, we also want to explore distinct (and diverse) articulations of Indigenous identities and of Indigenous activisms in the post-Soviet Indigenous Arctic.

The celebration of Día de Muertos (Spanish for Day of the Dead) has been hosted by the Latino community in Anchorage, Alaska, every second of November since 2004, where the ritual to honor ancestors is shared, and a symbolic bridge between the communities that converge within the territory is built. During the 2021 celebration, the Indigenous women Christina Edwin (Denaa and Chicana) and Itzel Zagal (Mexica Xochimilca) collaborated on an altar that was culturally appropriate for Olga Ezi (Ahtna Dene, South Central Dena'ina matriarch). It was a tribute the Alaska Native women (Chedas or grandmothers) and brought together Indigenous perspectives with a common respect for ancestries. This collaboration found that Día de Muertos is a spiritual practice and an act of cultural resistance and solidarity.

This article explores social identity borders at the intersection of gender, sexuality, and race in the Circumpolar North. Perspectives of those living in the Arctic who self-identify as women, LGBTQ+, Indigenous, or any combination thereof, is presented. An intersectional lens frames lived realities among marginalized communities within context of ongoing challenges and advocacy in the Circumpolar North. This exploration of social identity borders, or border digs, shows mutual imbrications of inequity across marginalized communities. Advocacy for equitable futures supports sustainable futures and these futures require cultural safety – a call to action.

This first special issue of 2023 began with a call for papers that highlighted a key facet of the population often overlooked by outsiders to the Arctic—despite its relatively sparse overall numbers and low population density, the region is full of human diversity. This diversity exists within the inhabitants, both Indigenous and (im)migrant (whether temporary or permanent), rural and urban, and by sexual orientation, gender roles, class, and ethnicity, on multiple parameters. For this issue, we go beyond the borders of Siberia to examine some of those key factors and their impacts on the lives of neighboring circumpolar peoples in North America, Greenland, and Scandinavia as well, in order to better understand commonalities as well as divergences in the experiences of those living in northern regions.

Environmental issues such as climate change benefit from intersectional analysis that uncovers various forms of discrimination and oppression and explores links to other social issues. Intersectionality calls attention to the experiences of different population groups with several intersecting aspects of social identity. Climate justice addresses the ethical dimensions of climate change, including its discriminatory effects. Communities and individuals within Arctic countries and even within Arctic regions are affected differently by climate change. To strive for a comprehensive climate justice that encompasses various human and non-human entities, we must take into account who benefits and who is harmed by climate change along with actions to mitigate and adapt to it, and through which processes. In this article, I examine gender and Indigeneity in the Arctic with regard to climate change.

Inspiring Girls* Expeditions is a global organization that empowers 16- to 18-year-old youth through 12-day backcountry science and art expeditions, including in the US Arctic and Subarctic. Because science and outdoor fields are historically white- and male-dominated, Inspiring Girls* follows an intersectional approach to welcome youth with marginalized genders, people of color, Indigenous people, and other marginalized groups into these arenas. Inspiring Girls* also provides professional development for early career scientist, artist, and outdoor guide instructors. We discuss how Inspiring Girls* leverages our own research as well as best practices from the literature to prioritize such strategies as intentionally building diverse teams, offering a tuition-free format, and participating in community learning to reimagine the inclusivity of science and outdoor fields in the Arctic and beyond.

While historical depictions of gender and sexuality propagated by outsiders continue to resonate through contemporary representations of Arctic peoples, researchers have only now begun to unpack these persistent ideas and their role in shaping current struggles for access, inclusion, and equality. This article aims to contribute to this growing discussion by examining the depictions of Greenlandic women and sexuality in Rockwell Kent's Salamina (1935). Drawing on a sensationalism that has long been a fixture of Arctic accounts and later media, Kent described Greenlandic women as childlike and highly sexual but still knowable, reinforcing existing hierarchies of power built on constructions of gender and race. This article interrogates the artist's depiction of Greenlandic women and its relation to broader representation of Indigenous peoples in the Arctic.

In 2021, The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women examined Denmark's (including Greenland and the Faroe Islands) fulfillment of the rights ensured in The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. This article analyses gender equality in Greenland through investigating documents related to the Committee's examinations. The reason for focusing on women's rights in Greenland is the intersectional identity of the majority of Greenlandic women as both female and indigenous (Inuit). The article identifies several issues and explains the status of these issues, including how the Greenlandic government has tried to overcome them. The aim is to create an overview of the official status of women's rights in Greenland to help further the process of ensuring equality.

The Ethnological Impact Assessments (EIA) procedure in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is used to protect the interests of indigenous minorities living in areas where extractive companies are planning to operate. Rural women are active in the process of exercising conscious, free choice in the planned activities of industrial companies. Industrial companies, when seeking the consent of indigenous minorities to develop resources, agree to conduct ethnological research and enter contracts for compensation payments. The role of women in the compensation process is virtually ignored. The article discusses economic and socio-cultural aspects of indigenous peoples’ sustainability and the possibility of “structural restoration” of their local system. The proposes ways to preserve traditional knowledge, women's proposals for assuring wellbeing and quality of life for rural families.

Indigenous women's activism occupies a specific niche within local and global Indigenous politics and plays a particularly important role in the socio-cultural and political development of Indigenous communities. In this regard, it is vital to explore not only activist strategies of grassroots Indigenous women's organizing but also their histories, contexts, and activist scopes. The women's collectives in the Olenek Evenki National District of the Sakha Republic (Russian Federation) have a long history of cultural and political activism. In this photo-essay, we aim to narrativize women's activism in Olenek as well as visually represent the activists themselves. Through the photos and the analytical narratives complimenting them, we also want to explore distinct (and diverse) articulations of Indigenous identities and of Indigenous activisms in the post-Soviet Indigenous Arctic.

The celebration of Día de Muertos (Spanish for Day of the Dead) has been hosted by the Latino community in Anchorage, Alaska, every second of November since 2004, where the ritual to honor ancestors is shared, and a symbolic bridge between the communities that converge within the territory is built. During the 2021 celebration, the Indigenous women Christina Edwin (Denaa and Chicana) and Itzel Zagal (Mexica Xochimilca) collaborated on an altar that was culturally appropriate for Olga Ezi (Ahtna Dene, South Central Dena'ina matriarch). It was a tribute the Alaska Native women (Chedas or grandmothers) and brought together Indigenous perspectives with a common respect for ancestries. This collaboration found that Día de Muertos is a spiritual practice and an act of cultural resistance and solidarity.

This article explores social identity borders at the intersection of gender, sexuality, and race in the Circumpolar North. Perspectives of those living in the Arctic who self-identify as women, LGBTQ+, Indigenous, or any combination thereof, is presented. An intersectional lens frames lived realities among marginalized communities within context of ongoing challenges and advocacy in the Circumpolar North. This exploration of social identity borders, or border digs, shows mutual imbrications of inequity across marginalized communities. Advocacy for equitable futures supports sustainable futures and these futures require cultural safety – a call to action.

Tunguska: A Siberian Mystery and Its Environmental Legacy Andy Bruno (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2022), 305 pp. ISBN 978-1-108-84091-0.

Galvanizing Nostalgia? Indigeneity and Sovereignty in Siberia Marjorie Mandelstam Balzer (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2021), 270 pp. ISBN: 978-1501761317.

Prikladnaia etnologiia Chukotki: Narodnye znaniia, muzei, kul'turnoe nasledie (K 125-letiiu poezdki N.L. Gondatti na Chukotskii poluostrov v 1895 godu): Kollektivnaia monografiia [Applied ethnology in Chukotka: Indigenous knowledge, museums, cultural heritage (Celebrating 125th Anniversary of N.L. Gondatti's Trip to the Chukchi Peninsula in 1895)] O. P. Kolomiets and I. I. Krupnik, eds. (Moscow: PressPass, 2020), 468 pp.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Even folklore, represented by original epic canvases, original texts of fairy tale and non-fairy tale prose, samples of ritual song and dance art, and a variety of other genres, represents unique spiritual wealth, a component of the common cultural heritage of the Even people. Even folklore is a stable and well-established system, having an oral form that has been handed down by storytellers from generation to generation since ancient times. At present, the Even, like all indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East, are experiencing a gradual loss of folklore traditions and a narrowing of their repertoire, which is illustrated by the authors’ field material. This article deals with the circumstances of Even people concentrated in thirteen regions of Yakutia. A brief review of the history of Even epic folklore collecting from the eighteenth century to the present is provided. The modern repertoire and the degree of preservation of Even folklore genres in all regions of Even settlement in Yakutia are characterized. There is a gradual extinction of minor genres, such as riddles, proverbs, and sayings, along with the disappearance of archaic epos and fairy tales.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Even folklore, represented by original epic canvases, original texts of fairy tale and non-fairy tale prose, samples of ritual song and dance art, and a variety of other genres, represents unique spiritual wealth, a component of the common cultural heritage of the Even people. Even folklore is a stable and well-established system, having an oral form that has been handed down by storytellers from generation to generation since ancient times. At present, the Even, like all indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East, are experiencing a gradual loss of folklore traditions and a narrowing of their repertoire, which is illustrated by the authors’ field material. This article deals with the circumstances of Even people concentrated in thirteen regions of Yakutia. A brief review of the history of Even epic folklore collecting from the eighteenth century to the present is provided. The modern repertoire and the degree of preservation of Even folklore genres in all regions of Even settlement in Yakutia are characterized. There is a gradual extinction of minor genres, such as riddles, proverbs, and sayings, along with the disappearance of archaic epos and fairy tales.

Under conditions of intensive development in the northern and Arctic territories, the issue of preserving the linguistic and cultural diversity of the Peoples of the North and the Arctic of Russia is becoming increasingly relevant. Within this context, this article studies linguistic ecology in light of sustainable development and wellbeing in communities of Dolgan and Evenki—small-numbered indigenous peoples living in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Russia. Linguistic ecology is associated with the study of factors affecting the functioning and development of language, as well as with the search for ways and means of preserving and enriching language. Monitoring the processes taking place in the speech practices of society makes it possible to judge some negative phenomena and trends in the language.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Even folklore, represented by original epic canvases, original texts of fairy tale and non-fairy tale prose, samples of ritual song and dance art, and a variety of other genres, represents unique spiritual wealth, a component of the common cultural heritage of the Even people. Even folklore is a stable and well-established system, having an oral form that has been handed down by storytellers from generation to generation since ancient times. At present, the Even, like all indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East, are experiencing a gradual loss of folklore traditions and a narrowing of their repertoire, which is illustrated by the authors’ field material. This article deals with the circumstances of Even people concentrated in thirteen regions of Yakutia. A brief review of the history of Even epic folklore collecting from the eighteenth century to the present is provided. The modern repertoire and the degree of preservation of Even folklore genres in all regions of Even settlement in Yakutia are characterized. There is a gradual extinction of minor genres, such as riddles, proverbs, and sayings, along with the disappearance of archaic epos and fairy tales.

Under conditions of intensive development in the northern and Arctic territories, the issue of preserving the linguistic and cultural diversity of the Peoples of the North and the Arctic of Russia is becoming increasingly relevant. Within this context, this article studies linguistic ecology in light of sustainable development and wellbeing in communities of Dolgan and Evenki—small-numbered indigenous peoples living in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Russia. Linguistic ecology is associated with the study of factors affecting the functioning and development of language, as well as with the search for ways and means of preserving and enriching language. Monitoring the processes taking place in the speech practices of society makes it possible to judge some negative phenomena and trends in the language.

This article presents an anthropological analysis of the relationship between landscape, culture, and identity of Indigenous Peoples of the North of Yakutia. The topic of the study is focused on an important marker and resource of identity that encompasses the landscapes of the North, its physical, geographical, natural, and climatic features, the integrated system of northern occupations and traditional practices—the domestic reindeer. This research also considers various cultural texts and personal and collective narratives of the “imagination” and “experience” of the cold space associated with reindeer in the construction and modern representations of the ethnicity of Indigenous Peoples of the North.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Even folklore, represented by original epic canvases, original texts of fairy tale and non-fairy tale prose, samples of ritual song and dance art, and a variety of other genres, represents unique spiritual wealth, a component of the common cultural heritage of the Even people. Even folklore is a stable and well-established system, having an oral form that has been handed down by storytellers from generation to generation since ancient times. At present, the Even, like all indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East, are experiencing a gradual loss of folklore traditions and a narrowing of their repertoire, which is illustrated by the authors’ field material. This article deals with the circumstances of Even people concentrated in thirteen regions of Yakutia. A brief review of the history of Even epic folklore collecting from the eighteenth century to the present is provided. The modern repertoire and the degree of preservation of Even folklore genres in all regions of Even settlement in Yakutia are characterized. There is a gradual extinction of minor genres, such as riddles, proverbs, and sayings, along with the disappearance of archaic epos and fairy tales.

Under conditions of intensive development in the northern and Arctic territories, the issue of preserving the linguistic and cultural diversity of the Peoples of the North and the Arctic of Russia is becoming increasingly relevant. Within this context, this article studies linguistic ecology in light of sustainable development and wellbeing in communities of Dolgan and Evenki—small-numbered indigenous peoples living in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Russia. Linguistic ecology is associated with the study of factors affecting the functioning and development of language, as well as with the search for ways and means of preserving and enriching language. Monitoring the processes taking place in the speech practices of society makes it possible to judge some negative phenomena and trends in the language.

This article presents an anthropological analysis of the relationship between landscape, culture, and identity of Indigenous Peoples of the North of Yakutia. The topic of the study is focused on an important marker and resource of identity that encompasses the landscapes of the North, its physical, geographical, natural, and climatic features, the integrated system of northern occupations and traditional practices—the domestic reindeer. This research also considers various cultural texts and personal and collective narratives of the “imagination” and “experience” of the cold space associated with reindeer in the construction and modern representations of the ethnicity of Indigenous Peoples of the North.

This article examines various aspects of identities conveyed by urban populations, factors of transformation and development of urban spaces, and historical memory as tools for the socialization, stratification, and integration of a polyethnic society in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The empirical base of the study is a variety of material, including a questionnaire survey of the urban population of Yakutia, spontaneous polls, and in-depth expert interviews. The novelty is the research strategy itself, aimed at identifying all the listed actors through the prism of symbolic representations. The study of the symbolic value of the northern cities of Yakutia as informational and cultural spaces, understanding the heritage as a certain mediative mental-material cultural layer with symbolic codes and texts, provides key registers for considering the fundamental problems of the spatial and socio-cultural development of territories in general. The results of the study show that the political identity of the population of Yakutia has been formed according to the historical memory of the Soviet past. A trend towards positioning the region as “northern” or “arctic” has emerged in recent years, which also depends on government policy in the Arctic.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Even folklore, represented by original epic canvases, original texts of fairy tale and non-fairy tale prose, samples of ritual song and dance art, and a variety of other genres, represents unique spiritual wealth, a component of the common cultural heritage of the Even people. Even folklore is a stable and well-established system, having an oral form that has been handed down by storytellers from generation to generation since ancient times. At present, the Even, like all indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East, are experiencing a gradual loss of folklore traditions and a narrowing of their repertoire, which is illustrated by the authors’ field material. This article deals with the circumstances of Even people concentrated in thirteen regions of Yakutia. A brief review of the history of Even epic folklore collecting from the eighteenth century to the present is provided. The modern repertoire and the degree of preservation of Even folklore genres in all regions of Even settlement in Yakutia are characterized. There is a gradual extinction of minor genres, such as riddles, proverbs, and sayings, along with the disappearance of archaic epos and fairy tales.

Under conditions of intensive development in the northern and Arctic territories, the issue of preserving the linguistic and cultural diversity of the Peoples of the North and the Arctic of Russia is becoming increasingly relevant. Within this context, this article studies linguistic ecology in light of sustainable development and wellbeing in communities of Dolgan and Evenki—small-numbered indigenous peoples living in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Russia. Linguistic ecology is associated with the study of factors affecting the functioning and development of language, as well as with the search for ways and means of preserving and enriching language. Monitoring the processes taking place in the speech practices of society makes it possible to judge some negative phenomena and trends in the language.

This article presents an anthropological analysis of the relationship between landscape, culture, and identity of Indigenous Peoples of the North of Yakutia. The topic of the study is focused on an important marker and resource of identity that encompasses the landscapes of the North, its physical, geographical, natural, and climatic features, the integrated system of northern occupations and traditional practices—the domestic reindeer. This research also considers various cultural texts and personal and collective narratives of the “imagination” and “experience” of the cold space associated with reindeer in the construction and modern representations of the ethnicity of Indigenous Peoples of the North.

This article examines various aspects of identities conveyed by urban populations, factors of transformation and development of urban spaces, and historical memory as tools for the socialization, stratification, and integration of a polyethnic society in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The empirical base of the study is a variety of material, including a questionnaire survey of the urban population of Yakutia, spontaneous polls, and in-depth expert interviews. The novelty is the research strategy itself, aimed at identifying all the listed actors through the prism of symbolic representations. The study of the symbolic value of the northern cities of Yakutia as informational and cultural spaces, understanding the heritage as a certain mediative mental-material cultural layer with symbolic codes and texts, provides key registers for considering the fundamental problems of the spatial and socio-cultural development of territories in general. The results of the study show that the political identity of the population of Yakutia has been formed according to the historical memory of the Soviet past. A trend towards positioning the region as “northern” or “arctic” has emerged in recent years, which also depends on government policy in the Arctic.

This article aims to determine the way languages are represented in the linguistic landscape of the city of Yakutsk, in particular, the representation of Sakha and ethnic (minority) languages: Even, Evenki, Yukaghir, Chukchi, and Dolgan. To meet this aim, the following objectives were completed: a systematic compilation of texts from outdoor signs available on two main streets of Yakutsk; field research on the linguistic landscape of the city; formation of a linguistic corpus of urban texts; and a comprehensive analysis of the linguistic landscape. This analysis solves two research questions: 1) What languages are represented in the linguistic landscape of Yakutsk and what is their share? 2) What are some of the characteristics of bilingual/multilingual signs?

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Even folklore, represented by original epic canvases, original texts of fairy tale and non-fairy tale prose, samples of ritual song and dance art, and a variety of other genres, represents unique spiritual wealth, a component of the common cultural heritage of the Even people. Even folklore is a stable and well-established system, having an oral form that has been handed down by storytellers from generation to generation since ancient times. At present, the Even, like all indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East, are experiencing a gradual loss of folklore traditions and a narrowing of their repertoire, which is illustrated by the authors’ field material. This article deals with the circumstances of Even people concentrated in thirteen regions of Yakutia. A brief review of the history of Even epic folklore collecting from the eighteenth century to the present is provided. The modern repertoire and the degree of preservation of Even folklore genres in all regions of Even settlement in Yakutia are characterized. There is a gradual extinction of minor genres, such as riddles, proverbs, and sayings, along with the disappearance of archaic epos and fairy tales.

Under conditions of intensive development in the northern and Arctic territories, the issue of preserving the linguistic and cultural diversity of the Peoples of the North and the Arctic of Russia is becoming increasingly relevant. Within this context, this article studies linguistic ecology in light of sustainable development and wellbeing in communities of Dolgan and Evenki—small-numbered indigenous peoples living in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Russia. Linguistic ecology is associated with the study of factors affecting the functioning and development of language, as well as with the search for ways and means of preserving and enriching language. Monitoring the processes taking place in the speech practices of society makes it possible to judge some negative phenomena and trends in the language.

This article presents an anthropological analysis of the relationship between landscape, culture, and identity of Indigenous Peoples of the North of Yakutia. The topic of the study is focused on an important marker and resource of identity that encompasses the landscapes of the North, its physical, geographical, natural, and climatic features, the integrated system of northern occupations and traditional practices—the domestic reindeer. This research also considers various cultural texts and personal and collective narratives of the “imagination” and “experience” of the cold space associated with reindeer in the construction and modern representations of the ethnicity of Indigenous Peoples of the North.

This article examines various aspects of identities conveyed by urban populations, factors of transformation and development of urban spaces, and historical memory as tools for the socialization, stratification, and integration of a polyethnic society in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The empirical base of the study is a variety of material, including a questionnaire survey of the urban population of Yakutia, spontaneous polls, and in-depth expert interviews. The novelty is the research strategy itself, aimed at identifying all the listed actors through the prism of symbolic representations. The study of the symbolic value of the northern cities of Yakutia as informational and cultural spaces, understanding the heritage as a certain mediative mental-material cultural layer with symbolic codes and texts, provides key registers for considering the fundamental problems of the spatial and socio-cultural development of territories in general. The results of the study show that the political identity of the population of Yakutia has been formed according to the historical memory of the Soviet past. A trend towards positioning the region as “northern” or “arctic” has emerged in recent years, which also depends on government policy in the Arctic.

This article aims to determine the way languages are represented in the linguistic landscape of the city of Yakutsk, in particular, the representation of Sakha and ethnic (minority) languages: Even, Evenki, Yukaghir, Chukchi, and Dolgan. To meet this aim, the following objectives were completed: a systematic compilation of texts from outdoor signs available on two main streets of Yakutsk; field research on the linguistic landscape of the city; formation of a linguistic corpus of urban texts; and a comprehensive analysis of the linguistic landscape. This analysis solves two research questions: 1) What languages are represented in the linguistic landscape of Yakutsk and what is their share? 2) What are some of the characteristics of bilingual/multilingual signs?

The findings of this study relate primarily to the processes of globalization that directly affect linguistic shift and present a threat of extinction to the cultures and languages of the peoples of the world. The article is based on the results of sociolinguistic research conducted in 2021 by the authors in the Eveno-Bytantaiskii National District of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The aim of the research is to study the linguistic situation of a settlement of Tiugiasirs, where the Sakha, Russian (predominantly), and Even languages all coexist. Sociolinguistic interviews were conducted, aimed at studying the linguistic biography of the informants, determining the degree of language proficiency, and assessing the linguistic situation in the study area. The survey results show that the Even language is undergoing a linguistic shift due to the assimilation of the Even language by the Sakha language.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Even folklore, represented by original epic canvases, original texts of fairy tale and non-fairy tale prose, samples of ritual song and dance art, and a variety of other genres, represents unique spiritual wealth, a component of the common cultural heritage of the Even people. Even folklore is a stable and well-established system, having an oral form that has been handed down by storytellers from generation to generation since ancient times. At present, the Even, like all indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East, are experiencing a gradual loss of folklore traditions and a narrowing of their repertoire, which is illustrated by the authors’ field material. This article deals with the circumstances of Even people concentrated in thirteen regions of Yakutia. A brief review of the history of Even epic folklore collecting from the eighteenth century to the present is provided. The modern repertoire and the degree of preservation of Even folklore genres in all regions of Even settlement in Yakutia are characterized. There is a gradual extinction of minor genres, such as riddles, proverbs, and sayings, along with the disappearance of archaic epos and fairy tales.

Under conditions of intensive development in the northern and Arctic territories, the issue of preserving the linguistic and cultural diversity of the Peoples of the North and the Arctic of Russia is becoming increasingly relevant. Within this context, this article studies linguistic ecology in light of sustainable development and wellbeing in communities of Dolgan and Evenki—small-numbered indigenous peoples living in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Russia. Linguistic ecology is associated with the study of factors affecting the functioning and development of language, as well as with the search for ways and means of preserving and enriching language. Monitoring the processes taking place in the speech practices of society makes it possible to judge some negative phenomena and trends in the language.

This article presents an anthropological analysis of the relationship between landscape, culture, and identity of Indigenous Peoples of the North of Yakutia. The topic of the study is focused on an important marker and resource of identity that encompasses the landscapes of the North, its physical, geographical, natural, and climatic features, the integrated system of northern occupations and traditional practices—the domestic reindeer. This research also considers various cultural texts and personal and collective narratives of the “imagination” and “experience” of the cold space associated with reindeer in the construction and modern representations of the ethnicity of Indigenous Peoples of the North.

This article examines various aspects of identities conveyed by urban populations, factors of transformation and development of urban spaces, and historical memory as tools for the socialization, stratification, and integration of a polyethnic society in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The empirical base of the study is a variety of material, including a questionnaire survey of the urban population of Yakutia, spontaneous polls, and in-depth expert interviews. The novelty is the research strategy itself, aimed at identifying all the listed actors through the prism of symbolic representations. The study of the symbolic value of the northern cities of Yakutia as informational and cultural spaces, understanding the heritage as a certain mediative mental-material cultural layer with symbolic codes and texts, provides key registers for considering the fundamental problems of the spatial and socio-cultural development of territories in general. The results of the study show that the political identity of the population of Yakutia has been formed according to the historical memory of the Soviet past. A trend towards positioning the region as “northern” or “arctic” has emerged in recent years, which also depends on government policy in the Arctic.

This article aims to determine the way languages are represented in the linguistic landscape of the city of Yakutsk, in particular, the representation of Sakha and ethnic (minority) languages: Even, Evenki, Yukaghir, Chukchi, and Dolgan. To meet this aim, the following objectives were completed: a systematic compilation of texts from outdoor signs available on two main streets of Yakutsk; field research on the linguistic landscape of the city; formation of a linguistic corpus of urban texts; and a comprehensive analysis of the linguistic landscape. This analysis solves two research questions: 1) What languages are represented in the linguistic landscape of Yakutsk and what is their share? 2) What are some of the characteristics of bilingual/multilingual signs?

The findings of this study relate primarily to the processes of globalization that directly affect linguistic shift and present a threat of extinction to the cultures and languages of the peoples of the world. The article is based on the results of sociolinguistic research conducted in 2021 by the authors in the Eveno-Bytantaiskii National District of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The aim of the research is to study the linguistic situation of a settlement of Tiugiasirs, where the Sakha, Russian (predominantly), and Even languages all coexist. Sociolinguistic interviews were conducted, aimed at studying the linguistic biography of the informants, determining the degree of language proficiency, and assessing the linguistic situation in the study area. The survey results show that the Even language is undergoing a linguistic shift due to the assimilation of the Even language by the Sakha language.

This article deals with current issues regarding the protection of the traditional cultural expression and traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples of the Russian Arctic in the context of intellectual property rights. The relevant problem in terms of legal regulation is the collective nature of intellectual property rights for indigenous peoples, since we are talking about a society whose composition is constantly changing as some members are born and others die. Still, rights relating to cultural heritage belong to the people as bearers of their tradition. The collective nature of the intellectual property rights of indigenous peoples requires theoretical justification as a new phenomenon and a definition of the term, as well as special legal regulations and the development of mechanisms for the implementation of the right.

Regular readers of Sibirica are surely familiar with the region of Siberia broadly construed, whether the boundaries are defined from an eco-political, geographic, or cultural perspective. Siberia covers an enormous geographic area (generally agreed to encompass the part of Russia that stretches from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east) and is home to just over 37 million people (as of 2021),¹ merely one-fifth of the overall population of Russia. Scholars of the region will also know that this sparsely populated area nevertheless boasts considerable cultural and linguistic diversity, with over three dozen distinct Indigenous language groups (Vajda 2009), each with its own distinct lifeways and traditions linked largely to stewardship of the land on which the people live.

The aim of this research is to identify and describe synonyms and antonyms in Even, aspects of the language that have been previously unexplored. This work aims to illustrate the semantic development of word synonymy in the Even language, covering individual words, morphological categories, and semantic divisions. Previously, only a few articles and superficial investigations in a number of textbooks have been dedicated to this topic. Various methodologies are used in this study, including traditional linguistic methods (language description through observation) and comparative and statistical research methods. Research into synonyms and antonyms in Even can provide valuable material for understanding the lexical-semantic and structural development of the language. Furthermore, this study can contribute to a wider investigation into the development of the stylistic resources of this language.

Even folklore, represented by original epic canvases, original texts of fairy tale and non-fairy tale prose, samples of ritual song and dance art, and a variety of other genres, represents unique spiritual wealth, a component of the common cultural heritage of the Even people. Even folklore is a stable and well-established system, having an oral form that has been handed down by storytellers from generation to generation since ancient times. At present, the Even, like all indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East, are experiencing a gradual loss of folklore traditions and a narrowing of their repertoire, which is illustrated by the authors’ field material. This article deals with the circumstances of Even people concentrated in thirteen regions of Yakutia. A brief review of the history of Even epic folklore collecting from the eighteenth century to the present is provided. The modern repertoire and the degree of preservation of Even folklore genres in all regions of Even settlement in Yakutia are characterized. There is a gradual extinction of minor genres, such as riddles, proverbs, and sayings, along with the disappearance of archaic epos and fairy tales.

Under conditions of intensive development in the northern and Arctic territories, the issue of preserving the linguistic and cultural diversity of the Peoples of the North and the Arctic of Russia is becoming increasingly relevant. Within this context, this article studies linguistic ecology in light of sustainable development and wellbeing in communities of Dolgan and Evenki—small-numbered indigenous peoples living in the Arctic zone of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Russia. Linguistic ecology is associated with the study of factors affecting the functioning and development of language, as well as with the search for ways and means of preserving and enriching language. Monitoring the processes taking place in the speech practices of society makes it possible to judge some negative phenomena and trends in the language.

This article presents an anthropological analysis of the relationship between landscape, culture, and identity of Indigenous Peoples of the North of Yakutia. The topic of the study is focused on an important marker and resource of identity that encompasses the landscapes of the North, its physical, geographical, natural, and climatic features, the integrated system of northern occupations and traditional practices—the domestic reindeer. This research also considers various cultural texts and personal and collective narratives of the “imagination” and “experience” of the cold space associated with reindeer in the construction and modern representations of the ethnicity of Indigenous Peoples of the North.

This article examines various aspects of identities conveyed by urban populations, factors of transformation and development of urban spaces, and historical memory as tools for the socialization, stratification, and integration of a polyethnic society in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The empirical base of the study is a variety of material, including a questionnaire survey of the urban population of Yakutia, spontaneous polls, and in-depth expert interviews. The novelty is the research strategy itself, aimed at identifying all the listed actors through the prism of symbolic representations. The study of the symbolic value of the northern cities of Yakutia as informational and cultural spaces, understanding the heritage as a certain mediative mental-material cultural layer with symbolic codes and texts, provides key registers for considering the fundamental problems of the spatial and socio-cultural development of territories in general. The results of the study show that the political identity of the population of Yakutia has been formed according to the historical memory of the Soviet past. A trend towards positioning the region as “northern” or “arctic” has emerged in recent years, which also depends on government policy in the Arctic.

This article aims to determine the way languages are represented in the linguistic landscape of the city of Yakutsk, in particular, the representation of Sakha and ethnic (minority) languages: Even, Evenki, Yukaghir, Chukchi, and Dolgan. To meet this aim, the following objectives were completed: a systematic compilation of texts from outdoor signs available on two main streets of Yakutsk; field research on the linguistic landscape of the city; formation of a linguistic corpus of urban texts; and a comprehensive analysis of the linguistic landscape. This analysis solves two research questions: 1) What languages are represented in the linguistic landscape of Yakutsk and what is their share? 2) What are some of the characteristics of bilingual/multilingual signs?

The findings of this study relate primarily to the processes of globalization that directly affect linguistic shift and present a threat of extinction to the cultures and languages of the peoples of the world. The article is based on the results of sociolinguistic research conducted in 2021 by the authors in the Eveno-Bytantaiskii National District of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The aim of the research is to study the linguistic situation of a settlement of Tiugiasirs, where the Sakha, Russian (predominantly), and Even languages all coexist. Sociolinguistic interviews were conducted, aimed at studying the linguistic biography of the informants, determining the degree of language proficiency, and assessing the linguistic situation in the study area. The survey results show that the Even language is undergoing a linguistic shift due to the assimilation of the Even language by the Sakha language.

This article deals with current issues regarding the protection of the traditional cultural expression and traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples of the Russian Arctic in the context of intellectual property rights. The relevant problem in terms of legal regulation is the collective nature of intellectual property rights for indigenous peoples, since we are talking about a society whose composition is constantly changing as some members are born and others die. Still, rights relating to cultural heritage belong to the people as bearers of their tradition. The collective nature of the intellectual property rights of indigenous peoples requires theoretical justification as a new phenomenon and a definition of the term, as well as special legal regulations and the development of mechanisms for the implementation of the right.

Eveny, Evenskii Iazyk, Fonetika, Grafika i Orfografiia, Morfologiia [Evens, Even language, Phonetics, Graphemes and Orthography, Morphology.] A.A. Burykin and S.I. Sharina. (Novosibirsk: Nauka, 2021), 402 pp. ISBN: 978–5–02–041468–6.

Strategies for Knowledge Elicitation: The Experience of the Russian School of Field Linguistics T. B. Agranat and L. R. Dodykhudoeva (eds.) (Springer Nature, 2021), 192 pp. ISBN: 978-3-030-79340-1.

Once again, this issue of Sibirica is diverse and disparate. We move from understanding food security as a laboratory in the northern districts of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) all the way to a brief yet trilingual Tuvan geological glossary, with stops along the way to learn about an influential yet little-known Buryat activist, as well as cultural developments in Magadan in the 1950s and 1960s. However, what unites these varied pieces is a central theme of creativity, and the effects of approaching problems with fresh eyes and new ideas even amid restrictive conditions or systems—whether political or infrastructural.

Once again, this issue of Sibirica is diverse and disparate. We move from understanding food security as a laboratory in the northern districts of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) all the way to a brief yet trilingual Tuvan geological glossary, with stops along the way to learn about an influential yet little-known Buryat activist, as well as cultural developments in Magadan in the 1950s and 1960s. However, what unites these varied pieces is a central theme of creativity, and the effects of approaching problems with fresh eyes and new ideas even amid restrictive conditions or systems—whether political or infrastructural.

This article proposes a view of the Allaikhovskii district (Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)) located in the Russian Arctic as a “laboratory” in which various actors (the state, regional authorities, local communities) have been actively working on the production of food security. Based on both field experience and published literature, I describe a multilayered process of foodscape formation in this region. The unique elements that characterize the foodscape of the district are the nonautomated modes of food production caused by territorial isolation, unsatisfactory infrastructure, the high price of food delivery, and environmental changes. All these factors create fragile foodscape; the life of local residents can be characterized as “being with risk,” which inspires certain compensatory measures implemented by different layered actors. The impossibility of creating a consistent and reliable system of subsistence thus reinforces a “laboratory” regime of permanent experiments to maintain food security. The Arctic laboratory is not located in separate place with specialists (as in the case discussed by Bruno Latour) but distributed throughout the actors and their activities connected with their lifestyles in this specific territory.

Once again, this issue of Sibirica is diverse and disparate. We move from understanding food security as a laboratory in the northern districts of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) all the way to a brief yet trilingual Tuvan geological glossary, with stops along the way to learn about an influential yet little-known Buryat activist, as well as cultural developments in Magadan in the 1950s and 1960s. However, what unites these varied pieces is a central theme of creativity, and the effects of approaching problems with fresh eyes and new ideas even amid restrictive conditions or systems—whether political or infrastructural.

This article proposes a view of the Allaikhovskii district (Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)) located in the Russian Arctic as a “laboratory” in which various actors (the state, regional authorities, local communities) have been actively working on the production of food security. Based on both field experience and published literature, I describe a multilayered process of foodscape formation in this region. The unique elements that characterize the foodscape of the district are the nonautomated modes of food production caused by territorial isolation, unsatisfactory infrastructure, the high price of food delivery, and environmental changes. All these factors create fragile foodscape; the life of local residents can be characterized as “being with risk,” which inspires certain compensatory measures implemented by different layered actors. The impossibility of creating a consistent and reliable system of subsistence thus reinforces a “laboratory” regime of permanent experiments to maintain food security. The Arctic laboratory is not located in separate place with specialists (as in the case discussed by Bruno Latour) but distributed throughout the actors and their activities connected with their lifestyles in this specific territory.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a native intelligentsia took shape among Siberia's Buryat Mongols that, combining indigenous and Russian influences, pursued cultural survival alongside social, political, and economic modernization. One of its significant, yet relatively unsung, members was Bato-Dalai Ochirov (1874 or 1875–1913). He is best known as the only Buryat ever to serve in the Russian State Duma (in the short-lived Second Duma in 1907). Yet over the course of his short life, Ochirov also was an administrator, political activist, author, philanthropist, and supporter of culture and science. This article provides an overview of Ochirov's life and seeks to elucidate his worldview, which stressed the defense of Buryat interests using the possibilities available within the existing autocratic order.

Once again, this issue of Sibirica is diverse and disparate. We move from understanding food security as a laboratory in the northern districts of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) all the way to a brief yet trilingual Tuvan geological glossary, with stops along the way to learn about an influential yet little-known Buryat activist, as well as cultural developments in Magadan in the 1950s and 1960s. However, what unites these varied pieces is a central theme of creativity, and the effects of approaching problems with fresh eyes and new ideas even amid restrictive conditions or systems—whether political or infrastructural.

This article proposes a view of the Allaikhovskii district (Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)) located in the Russian Arctic as a “laboratory” in which various actors (the state, regional authorities, local communities) have been actively working on the production of food security. Based on both field experience and published literature, I describe a multilayered process of foodscape formation in this region. The unique elements that characterize the foodscape of the district are the nonautomated modes of food production caused by territorial isolation, unsatisfactory infrastructure, the high price of food delivery, and environmental changes. All these factors create fragile foodscape; the life of local residents can be characterized as “being with risk,” which inspires certain compensatory measures implemented by different layered actors. The impossibility of creating a consistent and reliable system of subsistence thus reinforces a “laboratory” regime of permanent experiments to maintain food security. The Arctic laboratory is not located in separate place with specialists (as in the case discussed by Bruno Latour) but distributed throughout the actors and their activities connected with their lifestyles in this specific territory.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a native intelligentsia took shape among Siberia's Buryat Mongols that, combining indigenous and Russian influences, pursued cultural survival alongside social, political, and economic modernization. One of its significant, yet relatively unsung, members was Bato-Dalai Ochirov (1874 or 1875–1913). He is best known as the only Buryat ever to serve in the Russian State Duma (in the short-lived Second Duma in 1907). Yet over the course of his short life, Ochirov also was an administrator, political activist, author, philanthropist, and supporter of culture and science. This article provides an overview of Ochirov's life and seeks to elucidate his worldview, which stressed the defense of Buryat interests using the possibilities available within the existing autocratic order.

This article investigates cultural trends and promotion of cultural establishments in the northeastern USSR in the 1950s and 1960s. I examine the relationships of the government and intellectual network in the context of new sociocultural policy in the unusual conditions of the outgoing Dalstroy epoch. The Magadan Region underwent a kind of “perestroika” in this period, but it was a “perestroika” within the outlined ideological boundaries and under conditions of strict party control. The cultural policy and authorities’ activity on background changes in public-political life was directed on “de-Dalstroy” process by formation new regional identity and creation of numerous new avenues of regional self-expression in the form of institutions, creative unions, and organizations.

Once again, this issue of Sibirica is diverse and disparate. We move from understanding food security as a laboratory in the northern districts of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) all the way to a brief yet trilingual Tuvan geological glossary, with stops along the way to learn about an influential yet little-known Buryat activist, as well as cultural developments in Magadan in the 1950s and 1960s. However, what unites these varied pieces is a central theme of creativity, and the effects of approaching problems with fresh eyes and new ideas even amid restrictive conditions or systems—whether political or infrastructural.

This article proposes a view of the Allaikhovskii district (Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)) located in the Russian Arctic as a “laboratory” in which various actors (the state, regional authorities, local communities) have been actively working on the production of food security. Based on both field experience and published literature, I describe a multilayered process of foodscape formation in this region. The unique elements that characterize the foodscape of the district are the nonautomated modes of food production caused by territorial isolation, unsatisfactory infrastructure, the high price of food delivery, and environmental changes. All these factors create fragile foodscape; the life of local residents can be characterized as “being with risk,” which inspires certain compensatory measures implemented by different layered actors. The impossibility of creating a consistent and reliable system of subsistence thus reinforces a “laboratory” regime of permanent experiments to maintain food security. The Arctic laboratory is not located in separate place with specialists (as in the case discussed by Bruno Latour) but distributed throughout the actors and their activities connected with their lifestyles in this specific territory.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a native intelligentsia took shape among Siberia's Buryat Mongols that, combining indigenous and Russian influences, pursued cultural survival alongside social, political, and economic modernization. One of its significant, yet relatively unsung, members was Bato-Dalai Ochirov (1874 or 1875–1913). He is best known as the only Buryat ever to serve in the Russian State Duma (in the short-lived Second Duma in 1907). Yet over the course of his short life, Ochirov also was an administrator, political activist, author, philanthropist, and supporter of culture and science. This article provides an overview of Ochirov's life and seeks to elucidate his worldview, which stressed the defense of Buryat interests using the possibilities available within the existing autocratic order.

This article investigates cultural trends and promotion of cultural establishments in the northeastern USSR in the 1950s and 1960s. I examine the relationships of the government and intellectual network in the context of new sociocultural policy in the unusual conditions of the outgoing Dalstroy epoch. The Magadan Region underwent a kind of “perestroika” in this period, but it was a “perestroika” within the outlined ideological boundaries and under conditions of strict party control. The cultural policy and authorities’ activity on background changes in public-political life was directed on “de-Dalstroy” process by formation new regional identity and creation of numerous new avenues of regional self-expression in the form of institutions, creative unions, and organizations.

This short dictionary is the first attempt to systematize information about the Tuvan names of things and phenomena related to geology, mining, and resources obtained after processing of mineral raw materials. Here we find a very brief Russian-Tuvan geological dictionary containing 131 terms, of which 49 terms are proposed for use for the first time, including 16 terms as additional to those already available in the above dictionaries. In the brief Russian-Tuvan-English geological dictionary, terms related to chemical elements account for about 8 percent of their total amount, to metals and their alloys about 15 percent, to minerals about 15 percent, to mineral aggregates, rocks, and ores about 42 percent, and to other terms about 20 percent. The 11 chemical elements consist of ten metals and one nonmetal.

Once again, this issue of Sibirica is diverse and disparate. We move from understanding food security as a laboratory in the northern districts of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) all the way to a brief yet trilingual Tuvan geological glossary, with stops along the way to learn about an influential yet little-known Buryat activist, as well as cultural developments in Magadan in the 1950s and 1960s. However, what unites these varied pieces is a central theme of creativity, and the effects of approaching problems with fresh eyes and new ideas even amid restrictive conditions or systems—whether political or infrastructural.

This article proposes a view of the Allaikhovskii district (Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)) located in the Russian Arctic as a “laboratory” in which various actors (the state, regional authorities, local communities) have been actively working on the production of food security. Based on both field experience and published literature, I describe a multilayered process of foodscape formation in this region. The unique elements that characterize the foodscape of the district are the nonautomated modes of food production caused by territorial isolation, unsatisfactory infrastructure, the high price of food delivery, and environmental changes. All these factors create fragile foodscape; the life of local residents can be characterized as “being with risk,” which inspires certain compensatory measures implemented by different layered actors. The impossibility of creating a consistent and reliable system of subsistence thus reinforces a “laboratory” regime of permanent experiments to maintain food security. The Arctic laboratory is not located in separate place with specialists (as in the case discussed by Bruno Latour) but distributed throughout the actors and their activities connected with their lifestyles in this specific territory.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a native intelligentsia took shape among Siberia's Buryat Mongols that, combining indigenous and Russian influences, pursued cultural survival alongside social, political, and economic modernization. One of its significant, yet relatively unsung, members was Bato-Dalai Ochirov (1874 or 1875–1913). He is best known as the only Buryat ever to serve in the Russian State Duma (in the short-lived Second Duma in 1907). Yet over the course of his short life, Ochirov also was an administrator, political activist, author, philanthropist, and supporter of culture and science. This article provides an overview of Ochirov's life and seeks to elucidate his worldview, which stressed the defense of Buryat interests using the possibilities available within the existing autocratic order.

This article investigates cultural trends and promotion of cultural establishments in the northeastern USSR in the 1950s and 1960s. I examine the relationships of the government and intellectual network in the context of new sociocultural policy in the unusual conditions of the outgoing Dalstroy epoch. The Magadan Region underwent a kind of “perestroika” in this period, but it was a “perestroika” within the outlined ideological boundaries and under conditions of strict party control. The cultural policy and authorities’ activity on background changes in public-political life was directed on “de-Dalstroy” process by formation new regional identity and creation of numerous new avenues of regional self-expression in the form of institutions, creative unions, and organizations.

This short dictionary is the first attempt to systematize information about the Tuvan names of things and phenomena related to geology, mining, and resources obtained after processing of mineral raw materials. Here we find a very brief Russian-Tuvan geological dictionary containing 131 terms, of which 49 terms are proposed for use for the first time, including 16 terms as additional to those already available in the above dictionaries. In the brief Russian-Tuvan-English geological dictionary, terms related to chemical elements account for about 8 percent of their total amount, to metals and their alloys about 15 percent, to minerals about 15 percent, to mineral aggregates, rocks, and ores about 42 percent, and to other terms about 20 percent. The 11 chemical elements consist of ten metals and one nonmetal.

Once Upon the Permafrost: Knowing Culture and Climate Change in Siberia, Susan Alexandra Crate. (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2021), x + 327 pp. ISBN: 978-0-8165-4155-3.

It is often challenging to find the strands that connect articles in a given issue of a small yet heavily interdisciplinary regional studies journal. Yet I often marvel at how certain themes emerge time and time again. This issue is random at first glance; the topics are individually diverse when compared, but it is mostly their perennially significant nature within our region that makes them similar. Therefore, in this first issue of Sibirica's twenty-first volume, I found that a theme of revisiting (and rethinking) came to the fore. The four articles included here all revisit key themes in Siberian studies—from human-animal interconnectedness and bear ceremonialism to state-instituted identity categories and urbanization—from fresh perspectives.

It is often challenging to find the strands that connect articles in a given issue of a small yet heavily interdisciplinary regional studies journal. Yet I often marvel at how certain themes emerge time and time again. This issue is random at first glance; the topics are individually diverse when compared, but it is mostly their perennially significant nature within our region that makes them similar. Therefore, in this first issue of Sibirica's twenty-first volume, I found that a theme of revisiting (and rethinking) came to the fore. The four articles included here all revisit key themes in Siberian studies—from human-animal interconnectedness and bear ceremonialism to state-instituted identity categories and urbanization—from fresh perspectives.

This article studies the use of livestock dung in the social and ecological context of pastoralism in the Tyva Republic, Inner Asia. In steppe ecologies, livestock dung, depending on its (mis)management, can be a valuable resource or a threat to animals’ health and herders’ well-being. Its use is embedded in the relationships between herder-livestock communities and landscapes, which are sentient and superordinate. Utilizing dung for household needs is simultaneously a form of care for livestock and a method of balancing the relationship with sentient homelands.

It is often challenging to find the strands that connect articles in a given issue of a small yet heavily interdisciplinary regional studies journal. Yet I often marvel at how certain themes emerge time and time again. This issue is random at first glance; the topics are individually diverse when compared, but it is mostly their perennially significant nature within our region that makes them similar. Therefore, in this first issue of Sibirica's twenty-first volume, I found that a theme of revisiting (and rethinking) came to the fore. The four articles included here all revisit key themes in Siberian studies—from human-animal interconnectedness and bear ceremonialism to state-instituted identity categories and urbanization—from fresh perspectives.

This article studies the use of livestock dung in the social and ecological context of pastoralism in the Tyva Republic, Inner Asia. In steppe ecologies, livestock dung, depending on its (mis)management, can be a valuable resource or a threat to animals’ health and herders’ well-being. Its use is embedded in the relationships between herder-livestock communities and landscapes, which are sentient and superordinate. Utilizing dung for household needs is simultaneously a form of care for livestock and a method of balancing the relationship with sentient homelands.

This article draws on a large archive of original video documentation to complement ethnographic literature to provide the first description of modern Eastern Khanty bear ceremonialism and locate it in relation to the traditions of other Ob-Ugrian groups. The comparative analysis of Ob-Ugrian bear ceremonial traditions underscores fundamental differences in the function of such ceremonies, highlights foundational elements of local group identity, and suggests ways in which Ob-Ugrian groups interacted with adjacent populations.

It is often challenging to find the strands that connect articles in a given issue of a small yet heavily interdisciplinary regional studies journal. Yet I often marvel at how certain themes emerge time and time again. This issue is random at first glance; the topics are individually diverse when compared, but it is mostly their perennially significant nature within our region that makes them similar. Therefore, in this first issue of Sibirica's twenty-first volume, I found that a theme of revisiting (and rethinking) came to the fore. The four articles included here all revisit key themes in Siberian studies—from human-animal interconnectedness and bear ceremonialism to state-instituted identity categories and urbanization—from fresh perspectives.

This article studies the use of livestock dung in the social and ecological context of pastoralism in the Tyva Republic, Inner Asia. In steppe ecologies, livestock dung, depending on its (mis)management, can be a valuable resource or a threat to animals’ health and herders’ well-being. Its use is embedded in the relationships between herder-livestock communities and landscapes, which are sentient and superordinate. Utilizing dung for household needs is simultaneously a form of care for livestock and a method of balancing the relationship with sentient homelands.

This article draws on a large archive of original video documentation to complement ethnographic literature to provide the first description of modern Eastern Khanty bear ceremonialism and locate it in relation to the traditions of other Ob-Ugrian groups. The comparative analysis of Ob-Ugrian bear ceremonial traditions underscores fundamental differences in the function of such ceremonies, highlights foundational elements of local group identity, and suggests ways in which Ob-Ugrian groups interacted with adjacent populations.

During the eighteenth century, Western European travelers enjoyed unprecedented access to Siberia and many of those who visited believed themselves to have observed a clear boundary between Europe and Asia. This article examines the books of eight such travelers and explores how they categorized those living in Siberia into one of two categories, European or Asian. These travelers interpreted their observations in ways that led them to conclude that a clear binary division existed in the region, separating the European Russian settlers and government from the Asiatic indigenous peoples. Presenting their work as new information, they reproduced older categorizations, repackaged within the scientific language of the Enlightenment.

It is often challenging to find the strands that connect articles in a given issue of a small yet heavily interdisciplinary regional studies journal. Yet I often marvel at how certain themes emerge time and time again. This issue is random at first glance; the topics are individually diverse when compared, but it is mostly their perennially significant nature within our region that makes them similar. Therefore, in this first issue of Sibirica's twenty-first volume, I found that a theme of revisiting (and rethinking) came to the fore. The four articles included here all revisit key themes in Siberian studies—from human-animal interconnectedness and bear ceremonialism to state-instituted identity categories and urbanization—from fresh perspectives.

This article studies the use of livestock dung in the social and ecological context of pastoralism in the Tyva Republic, Inner Asia. In steppe ecologies, livestock dung, depending on its (mis)management, can be a valuable resource or a threat to animals’ health and herders’ well-being. Its use is embedded in the relationships between herder-livestock communities and landscapes, which are sentient and superordinate. Utilizing dung for household needs is simultaneously a form of care for livestock and a method of balancing the relationship with sentient homelands.

This article draws on a large archive of original video documentation to complement ethnographic literature to provide the first description of modern Eastern Khanty bear ceremonialism and locate it in relation to the traditions of other Ob-Ugrian groups. The comparative analysis of Ob-Ugrian bear ceremonial traditions underscores fundamental differences in the function of such ceremonies, highlights foundational elements of local group identity, and suggests ways in which Ob-Ugrian groups interacted with adjacent populations.

During the eighteenth century, Western European travelers enjoyed unprecedented access to Siberia and many of those who visited believed themselves to have observed a clear boundary between Europe and Asia. This article examines the books of eight such travelers and explores how they categorized those living in Siberia into one of two categories, European or Asian. These travelers interpreted their observations in ways that led them to conclude that a clear binary division existed in the region, separating the European Russian settlers and government from the Asiatic indigenous peoples. Presenting their work as new information, they reproduced older categorizations, repackaged within the scientific language of the Enlightenment.

The development of the Arctic was an important political and economic topic of the Soviet Union. This urbanization activity declined dramatically in the economic and political chaos of the 1990s, although some positive transformations have been seen in the new millennium. This article examines whether the colonization of the Russian Arctic will follow Soviet-era plans or the region will remain scarcely populated in the near future. The history and methods of urbanization in the Russian Arctic have been analyzed in order to better shed light on this question.

It is often challenging to find the strands that connect articles in a given issue of a small yet heavily interdisciplinary regional studies journal. Yet I often marvel at how certain themes emerge time and time again. This issue is random at first glance; the topics are individually diverse when compared, but it is mostly their perennially significant nature within our region that makes them similar. Therefore, in this first issue of Sibirica's twenty-first volume, I found that a theme of revisiting (and rethinking) came to the fore. The four articles included here all revisit key themes in Siberian studies—from human-animal interconnectedness and bear ceremonialism to state-instituted identity categories and urbanization—from fresh perspectives.

This article studies the use of livestock dung in the social and ecological context of pastoralism in the Tyva Republic, Inner Asia. In steppe ecologies, livestock dung, depending on its (mis)management, can be a valuable resource or a threat to animals’ health and herders’ well-being. Its use is embedded in the relationships between herder-livestock communities and landscapes, which are sentient and superordinate. Utilizing dung for household needs is simultaneously a form of care for livestock and a method of balancing the relationship with sentient homelands.

This article draws on a large archive of original video documentation to complement ethnographic literature to provide the first description of modern Eastern Khanty bear ceremonialism and locate it in relation to the traditions of other Ob-Ugrian groups. The comparative analysis of Ob-Ugrian bear ceremonial traditions underscores fundamental differences in the function of such ceremonies, highlights foundational elements of local group identity, and suggests ways in which Ob-Ugrian groups interacted with adjacent populations.

During the eighteenth century, Western European travelers enjoyed unprecedented access to Siberia and many of those who visited believed themselves to have observed a clear boundary between Europe and Asia. This article examines the books of eight such travelers and explores how they categorized those living in Siberia into one of two categories, European or Asian. These travelers interpreted their observations in ways that led them to conclude that a clear binary division existed in the region, separating the European Russian settlers and government from the Asiatic indigenous peoples. Presenting their work as new information, they reproduced older categorizations, repackaged within the scientific language of the Enlightenment.

The development of the Arctic was an important political and economic topic of the Soviet Union. This urbanization activity declined dramatically in the economic and political chaos of the 1990s, although some positive transformations have been seen in the new millennium. This article examines whether the colonization of the Russian Arctic will follow Soviet-era plans or the region will remain scarcely populated in the near future. The history and methods of urbanization in the Russian Arctic have been analyzed in order to better shed light on this question.

Nomadic Pastoralism among the Mongol Herders: Multispecies and Spatial Ethnography in Mongolia and Transbaikalia Charlotte Marchina Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2021, 178pp., 34 figures (incl. maps), 14 photographs (B+W). ($101.03 / €89). ISBN: 978-94-6372-142-4.

The three articles featured in this issue may not appear to be related, but within their varying contexts, I found myself teasing out several chords that resonate throughout them, and one, in particular, struck me as notable. Directly or indirectly, these articles (as well as the report) all address the notion of problem-solving in some shape or form. Whether a historical account of protest as an attempt to solve issues of discontent among fur trade workers in Russian America, approaches to discussing climate change in northeastern Siberia, coping with failing infrastructure and the negotiation of corporate versus state responsibility—or dealing with COVID lockdowns and scholarly knowledge exchange at present—the articles in this issue all explore the confrontation of problems and how they might be solved.

The three articles featured in this issue may not appear to be related, but within their varying contexts, I found myself teasing out several chords that resonate throughout them, and one, in particular, struck me as notable. Directly or indirectly, these articles (as well as the report) all address the notion of problem-solving in some shape or form. Whether a historical account of protest as an attempt to solve issues of discontent among fur trade workers in Russian America, approaches to discussing climate change in northeastern Siberia, coping with failing infrastructure and the negotiation of corporate versus state responsibility—or dealing with COVID lockdowns and scholarly knowledge exchange at present—the articles in this issue all explore the confrontation of problems and how they might be solved.

Verkhnemarkovo, a small Siberian town located on an oil field in Russia's Irkutsk region, is plagued by bad roads and limited mobility. This article explores the relationship between corporate social responsibility and the wellbeing of individuals and communities, with a focus on transport and mobility infrastructure. Some oil companies, such as Irkutsk Oil Company, are tied to the sustainability standards of international financial institutions. The article addresses the question of why people are in limbo between the state and local operating oil companies. Contemporary life in Verkhnemarkovo is characterized by so-called infrastructural violence, which results from the lack of state support—or false promises made by the state— and relates to good transport infrastructure. In their complaints, local people recall the Soviet past and expect support from the state or industry.

The three articles featured in this issue may not appear to be related, but within their varying contexts, I found myself teasing out several chords that resonate throughout them, and one, in particular, struck me as notable. Directly or indirectly, these articles (as well as the report) all address the notion of problem-solving in some shape or form. Whether a historical account of protest as an attempt to solve issues of discontent among fur trade workers in Russian America, approaches to discussing climate change in northeastern Siberia, coping with failing infrastructure and the negotiation of corporate versus state responsibility—or dealing with COVID lockdowns and scholarly knowledge exchange at present—the articles in this issue all explore the confrontation of problems and how they might be solved.

Verkhnemarkovo, a small Siberian town located on an oil field in Russia's Irkutsk region, is plagued by bad roads and limited mobility. This article explores the relationship between corporate social responsibility and the wellbeing of individuals and communities, with a focus on transport and mobility infrastructure. Some oil companies, such as Irkutsk Oil Company, are tied to the sustainability standards of international financial institutions. The article addresses the question of why people are in limbo between the state and local operating oil companies. Contemporary life in Verkhnemarkovo is characterized by so-called infrastructural violence, which results from the lack of state support—or false promises made by the state— and relates to good transport infrastructure. In their complaints, local people recall the Soviet past and expect support from the state or industry.

This article explores how a community's perceptions of a changing climate may shift over time, and the ways in which certain cultural predilections emerge in the process. Through replicating the same focus group method with Viliui Sakha in 2008 and again in 2018, the analysis reveals both continuity in cited changes as well as new emergent ones. Following this comparative exercise, the article further probes two culturally specific phenomena: how some inhabitants continue to attribute change to a long-disproven driver, de facto perpetuating a cultural myth, and how others expressed starkly contrasting perceptions of change. For both, the analysis reveals the importance of using a cultural framing founded in a people's vernacular knowledge system with a focus on historical precedence for the former case, and on sacred beliefs for the latter.

The three articles featured in this issue may not appear to be related, but within their varying contexts, I found myself teasing out several chords that resonate throughout them, and one, in particular, struck me as notable. Directly or indirectly, these articles (as well as the report) all address the notion of problem-solving in some shape or form. Whether a historical account of protest as an attempt to solve issues of discontent among fur trade workers in Russian America, approaches to discussing climate change in northeastern Siberia, coping with failing infrastructure and the negotiation of corporate versus state responsibility—or dealing with COVID lockdowns and scholarly knowledge exchange at present—the articles in this issue all explore the confrontation of problems and how they might be solved.

Verkhnemarkovo, a small Siberian town located on an oil field in Russia's Irkutsk region, is plagued by bad roads and limited mobility. This article explores the relationship between corporate social responsibility and the wellbeing of individuals and communities, with a focus on transport and mobility infrastructure. Some oil companies, such as Irkutsk Oil Company, are tied to the sustainability standards of international financial institutions. The article addresses the question of why people are in limbo between the state and local operating oil companies. Contemporary life in Verkhnemarkovo is characterized by so-called infrastructural violence, which results from the lack of state support—or false promises made by the state— and relates to good transport infrastructure. In their complaints, local people recall the Soviet past and expect support from the state or industry.

This article explores how a community's perceptions of a changing climate may shift over time, and the ways in which certain cultural predilections emerge in the process. Through replicating the same focus group method with Viliui Sakha in 2008 and again in 2018, the analysis reveals both continuity in cited changes as well as new emergent ones. Following this comparative exercise, the article further probes two culturally specific phenomena: how some inhabitants continue to attribute change to a long-disproven driver, de facto perpetuating a cultural myth, and how others expressed starkly contrasting perceptions of change. For both, the analysis reveals the importance of using a cultural framing founded in a people's vernacular knowledge system with a focus on historical precedence for the former case, and on sacred beliefs for the latter.

This article analyzes social protest in the Russian colonies in Alaska and Northern California. The main reasons for protests were the actions of the colonial administration or abuse by its representatives, along with dissatisfaction with the financial situation, rules, conditions, and remuneration for labor, as well as shortages of commodities and food for a considerable part of the population of the Russian colonies. Protest activity in Russian America was relatively insignificant, and its primary forms were complaints, minor economic sabotage, and desertion. Most protest acts took place during the 1790s–1800s, when the colonial system was formed, and exploitation of dependent natives and Russian promyshlenniki (hired hunters of fur-bearing animals) reached its peak. The representatives of the Russian-American Company who managed Alaska from 1799 on tried to block protest activity and not allow open displays of dissatisfaction, since the result could hinder trade, business, and finally, profits and its image in the eyes of the tsar's authorities.

The three articles featured in this issue may not appear to be related, but within their varying contexts, I found myself teasing out several chords that resonate throughout them, and one, in particular, struck me as notable. Directly or indirectly, these articles (as well as the report) all address the notion of problem-solving in some shape or form. Whether a historical account of protest as an attempt to solve issues of discontent among fur trade workers in Russian America, approaches to discussing climate change in northeastern Siberia, coping with failing infrastructure and the negotiation of corporate versus state responsibility—or dealing with COVID lockdowns and scholarly knowledge exchange at present—the articles in this issue all explore the confrontation of problems and how they might be solved.

Verkhnemarkovo, a small Siberian town located on an oil field in Russia's Irkutsk region, is plagued by bad roads and limited mobility. This article explores the relationship between corporate social responsibility and the wellbeing of individuals and communities, with a focus on transport and mobility infrastructure. Some oil companies, such as Irkutsk Oil Company, are tied to the sustainability standards of international financial institutions. The article addresses the question of why people are in limbo between the state and local operating oil companies. Contemporary life in Verkhnemarkovo is characterized by so-called infrastructural violence, which results from the lack of state support—or false promises made by the state— and relates to good transport infrastructure. In their complaints, local people recall the Soviet past and expect support from the state or industry.

This article explores how a community's perceptions of a changing climate may shift over time, and the ways in which certain cultural predilections emerge in the process. Through replicating the same focus group method with Viliui Sakha in 2008 and again in 2018, the analysis reveals both continuity in cited changes as well as new emergent ones. Following this comparative exercise, the article further probes two culturally specific phenomena: how some inhabitants continue to attribute change to a long-disproven driver, de facto perpetuating a cultural myth, and how others expressed starkly contrasting perceptions of change. For both, the analysis reveals the importance of using a cultural framing founded in a people's vernacular knowledge system with a focus on historical precedence for the former case, and on sacred beliefs for the latter.

This article analyzes social protest in the Russian colonies in Alaska and Northern California. The main reasons for protests were the actions of the colonial administration or abuse by its representatives, along with dissatisfaction with the financial situation, rules, conditions, and remuneration for labor, as well as shortages of commodities and food for a considerable part of the population of the Russian colonies. Protest activity in Russian America was relatively insignificant, and its primary forms were complaints, minor economic sabotage, and desertion. Most protest acts took place during the 1790s–1800s, when the colonial system was formed, and exploitation of dependent natives and Russian promyshlenniki (hired hunters of fur-bearing animals) reached its peak. The representatives of the Russian-American Company who managed Alaska from 1799 on tried to block protest activity and not allow open displays of dissatisfaction, since the result could hinder trade, business, and finally, profits and its image in the eyes of the tsar's authorities.

Beginning in the late 1920s, the central driving force responsible for the preparation of specialists for work in the Northern, Siberian, and Far Eastern regions of the Russian Federation has been the Herzen State Pedagogical University of Russia, St. Petersburg (Herzen University), primarily led by the Institute of the Peoples of the North. Here, linguists are trained in twenty-three languages of Northern indigenous minorities. Notably, several languages of these minority groups—such as Nganasan, Dolgan, Itelmen, Enets, Ul'ta—are taught only here. The university also provides training in the field of traditional cultures of indigenous peoples (methods of traditional applied arts and crafts of the peoples of the North; dance and musical folklore; museology, etc.).

However, not all experts in Northern studies are aware of the educational programs and scientific schools within the Department of Theory and History of Culture at Herzen University, under which the committee for the defense of doctoral and candidate dissertations has been working jointly with the Institute of the Peoples of the North for thirty years. The chairman of the council, doctor of arts, Professor L. M. Mosolova is the founder of the department and the head of the scientific school for the study of the culture of the regions of Russia, the countries of Northern Europe, and Eurasia. A significant amount of research completed by students—from undergraduate to postgraduate levels—is dedicated to the history and current issues of the various regions of Russia, including Siberia, the Far East, and Northern Europe.

The three articles featured in this issue may not appear to be related, but within their varying contexts, I found myself teasing out several chords that resonate throughout them, and one, in particular, struck me as notable. Directly or indirectly, these articles (as well as the report) all address the notion of problem-solving in some shape or form. Whether a historical account of protest as an attempt to solve issues of discontent among fur trade workers in Russian America, approaches to discussing climate change in northeastern Siberia, coping with failing infrastructure and the negotiation of corporate versus state responsibility—or dealing with COVID lockdowns and scholarly knowledge exchange at present—the articles in this issue all explore the confrontation of problems and how they might be solved.

Verkhnemarkovo, a small Siberian town located on an oil field in Russia's Irkutsk region, is plagued by bad roads and limited mobility. This article explores the relationship between corporate social responsibility and the wellbeing of individuals and communities, with a focus on transport and mobility infrastructure. Some oil companies, such as Irkutsk Oil Company, are tied to the sustainability standards of international financial institutions. The article addresses the question of why people are in limbo between the state and local operating oil companies. Contemporary life in Verkhnemarkovo is characterized by so-called infrastructural violence, which results from the lack of state support—or false promises made by the state— and relates to good transport infrastructure. In their complaints, local people recall the Soviet past and expect support from the state or industry.

This article explores how a community's perceptions of a changing climate may shift over time, and the ways in which certain cultural predilections emerge in the process. Through replicating the same focus group method with Viliui Sakha in 2008 and again in 2018, the analysis reveals both continuity in cited changes as well as new emergent ones. Following this comparative exercise, the article further probes two culturally specific phenomena: how some inhabitants continue to attribute change to a long-disproven driver, de facto perpetuating a cultural myth, and how others expressed starkly contrasting perceptions of change. For both, the analysis reveals the importance of using a cultural framing founded in a people's vernacular knowledge system with a focus on historical precedence for the former case, and on sacred beliefs for the latter.

This article analyzes social protest in the Russian colonies in Alaska and Northern California. The main reasons for protests were the actions of the colonial administration or abuse by its representatives, along with dissatisfaction with the financial situation, rules, conditions, and remuneration for labor, as well as shortages of commodities and food for a considerable part of the population of the Russian colonies. Protest activity in Russian America was relatively insignificant, and its primary forms were complaints, minor economic sabotage, and desertion. Most protest acts took place during the 1790s–1800s, when the colonial system was formed, and exploitation of dependent natives and Russian promyshlenniki (hired hunters of fur-bearing animals) reached its peak. The representatives of the Russian-American Company who managed Alaska from 1799 on tried to block protest activity and not allow open displays of dissatisfaction, since the result could hinder trade, business, and finally, profits and its image in the eyes of the tsar's authorities.

Beginning in the late 1920s, the central driving force responsible for the preparation of specialists for work in the Northern, Siberian, and Far Eastern regions of the Russian Federation has been the Herzen State Pedagogical University of Russia, St. Petersburg (Herzen University), primarily led by the Institute of the Peoples of the North. Here, linguists are trained in twenty-three languages of Northern indigenous minorities. Notably, several languages of these minority groups—such as Nganasan, Dolgan, Itelmen, Enets, Ul'ta—are taught only here. The university also provides training in the field of traditional cultures of indigenous peoples (methods of traditional applied arts and crafts of the peoples of the North; dance and musical folklore; museology, etc.).

However, not all experts in Northern studies are aware of the educational programs and scientific schools within the Department of Theory and History of Culture at Herzen University, under which the committee for the defense of doctoral and candidate dissertations has been working jointly with the Institute of the Peoples of the North for thirty years. The chairman of the council, doctor of arts, Professor L. M. Mosolova is the founder of the department and the head of the scientific school for the study of the culture of the regions of Russia, the countries of Northern Europe, and Eurasia. A significant amount of research completed by students—from undergraduate to postgraduate levels—is dedicated to the history and current issues of the various regions of Russia, including Siberia, the Far East, and Northern Europe.

Maria Czaplicka: Gender, Shamanism, Race: An Anthropological Biography Grażyna Kubica, translated by Ben Koschalka (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2020), Critical Studies in the History of Anthropology Series, eds. Regna Darnell and Robert Oppenheim], xix +591 pp. ISBN: 978-1-4962-2261-9.

Place and Nature: Essays in Russian Environmental History Edited by David Moon, Nicholas B. Breyfogle, and Alexandra Bekasova (Cambridgeshire, UK: White Horse Press 2021,), 343 pp. ISBN: 978-1-912186-16-7.

Mebet Alexander Grigorenko, translated by Christopher Culver (London: Glagoslav Publications, 2020), 174 pp. $23.65 (paperback). ISBN: 978-1-912894-90-1.

In going over submissions to Sibirica at the beginning of 2021, I found several articles related to culture and history in the Sakha Republic. Naturally, I thought it would be illuminating to bring them together to see how they might complement each other. Although this is not a typical special issue with a planned overarching theme, I found that these articles are not only geographically united but subtly reflective of broad underlying concerns—the revitalization and continuity of culture, and the agency of minoritized and indigenous peoples in striving for self-definition and survival. This issue is a way of “checking in” on the state of some of the diverse scholarly work happening in and on Sakha (Yakutia) in recent months and years—from the perspectives of researchers in anthropology, literary studies, history, and art history and criticism.

In going over submissions to Sibirica at the beginning of 2021, I found several articles related to culture and history in the Sakha Republic. Naturally, I thought it would be illuminating to bring them together to see how they might complement each other. Although this is not a typical special issue with a planned overarching theme, I found that these articles are not only geographically united but subtly reflective of broad underlying concerns—the revitalization and continuity of culture, and the agency of minoritized and indigenous peoples in striving for self-definition and survival. This issue is a way of “checking in” on the state of some of the diverse scholarly work happening in and on Sakha (Yakutia) in recent months and years—from the perspectives of researchers in anthropology, literary studies, history, and art history and criticism.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, much of social research on contemporary Russia focused on transformations of gender relations brought about by the closure of many state enterprises. In particular, scholars posited that men were experiencing severe insecurity about their gender identity, which they termed a “post-Soviet masculinity crisis.” However, little research has since been carried out to catch up with these findings. How have men's experiences of gender insecurity developed? How have they responded? This article addresses these questions drawing on newly active Sakha (Yakut) men's groups and shows how they are also arising and forming their consciousness in reaction to the immigration of male Muslim workers from Central Asia.

In going over submissions to Sibirica at the beginning of 2021, I found several articles related to culture and history in the Sakha Republic. Naturally, I thought it would be illuminating to bring them together to see how they might complement each other. Although this is not a typical special issue with a planned overarching theme, I found that these articles are not only geographically united but subtly reflective of broad underlying concerns—the revitalization and continuity of culture, and the agency of minoritized and indigenous peoples in striving for self-definition and survival. This issue is a way of “checking in” on the state of some of the diverse scholarly work happening in and on Sakha (Yakutia) in recent months and years—from the perspectives of researchers in anthropology, literary studies, history, and art history and criticism.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, much of social research on contemporary Russia focused on transformations of gender relations brought about by the closure of many state enterprises. In particular, scholars posited that men were experiencing severe insecurity about their gender identity, which they termed a “post-Soviet masculinity crisis.” However, little research has since been carried out to catch up with these findings. How have men's experiences of gender insecurity developed? How have they responded? This article addresses these questions drawing on newly active Sakha (Yakut) men's groups and shows how they are also arising and forming their consciousness in reaction to the immigration of male Muslim workers from Central Asia.

Focusing on the works and intellectual activity of the Sakha intelligentsia, this article examines the development of postimperial political imagination in the region of Yakutia. The formation of the Sakha intellectuals was a result of the circulation of wider imperial discourses on nationalism, anticolonialism, socialism, and regionalism during the crisis of the Russian Empire. By discussing the Sakhas’ marginal, even colonial, conditions, the Sakha national intellectuals followed self-governing aspirations inherited from political exiles and Siberian regionalists, whose ideas became frequent demands for many Siberian indigenous movements. Despite the Stalinist myth that the Soviet Union (and its social engineers) created autonomy in Yakutia for the first time in Russian history, it was the Sakha intellectuals who developed the autonomist discourse during the first two decades of the twentieth century.

In going over submissions to Sibirica at the beginning of 2021, I found several articles related to culture and history in the Sakha Republic. Naturally, I thought it would be illuminating to bring them together to see how they might complement each other. Although this is not a typical special issue with a planned overarching theme, I found that these articles are not only geographically united but subtly reflective of broad underlying concerns—the revitalization and continuity of culture, and the agency of minoritized and indigenous peoples in striving for self-definition and survival. This issue is a way of “checking in” on the state of some of the diverse scholarly work happening in and on Sakha (Yakutia) in recent months and years—from the perspectives of researchers in anthropology, literary studies, history, and art history and criticism.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, much of social research on contemporary Russia focused on transformations of gender relations brought about by the closure of many state enterprises. In particular, scholars posited that men were experiencing severe insecurity about their gender identity, which they termed a “post-Soviet masculinity crisis.” However, little research has since been carried out to catch up with these findings. How have men's experiences of gender insecurity developed? How have they responded? This article addresses these questions drawing on newly active Sakha (Yakut) men's groups and shows how they are also arising and forming their consciousness in reaction to the immigration of male Muslim workers from Central Asia.

Focusing on the works and intellectual activity of the Sakha intelligentsia, this article examines the development of postimperial political imagination in the region of Yakutia. The formation of the Sakha intellectuals was a result of the circulation of wider imperial discourses on nationalism, anticolonialism, socialism, and regionalism during the crisis of the Russian Empire. By discussing the Sakhas’ marginal, even colonial, conditions, the Sakha national intellectuals followed self-governing aspirations inherited from political exiles and Siberian regionalists, whose ideas became frequent demands for many Siberian indigenous movements. Despite the Stalinist myth that the Soviet Union (and its social engineers) created autonomy in Yakutia for the first time in Russian history, it was the Sakha intellectuals who developed the autonomist discourse during the first two decades of the twentieth century.

The article does not investigate the reason behind the recurring cases of missing children and young adults in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) and does not offer an explanation for this phenomenon. Instead, it interprets this occurrence as a symptom of the oppressive histories and realities for indigenous groups residing on the territory of this part of the Russian Federation. Although the reasons for children going missing might seem obvious—the vast uninhabited territory of the region and poor infrastructure—the article argues that these cases of missing children are the result and evidence of neglect on behalf of parents and the state. The contributive value of this article is to voice the current precarious situation in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) under the “brotherhood” of the New Russians’ oligarchy and the way that communal cultural practices of the indigenous peoples of Yakutia resist this form of oppressive practice and the possibility of going missing, or extinct.

In going over submissions to Sibirica at the beginning of 2021, I found several articles related to culture and history in the Sakha Republic. Naturally, I thought it would be illuminating to bring them together to see how they might complement each other. Although this is not a typical special issue with a planned overarching theme, I found that these articles are not only geographically united but subtly reflective of broad underlying concerns—the revitalization and continuity of culture, and the agency of minoritized and indigenous peoples in striving for self-definition and survival. This issue is a way of “checking in” on the state of some of the diverse scholarly work happening in and on Sakha (Yakutia) in recent months and years—from the perspectives of researchers in anthropology, literary studies, history, and art history and criticism.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, much of social research on contemporary Russia focused on transformations of gender relations brought about by the closure of many state enterprises. In particular, scholars posited that men were experiencing severe insecurity about their gender identity, which they termed a “post-Soviet masculinity crisis.” However, little research has since been carried out to catch up with these findings. How have men's experiences of gender insecurity developed? How have they responded? This article addresses these questions drawing on newly active Sakha (Yakut) men's groups and shows how they are also arising and forming their consciousness in reaction to the immigration of male Muslim workers from Central Asia.

Focusing on the works and intellectual activity of the Sakha intelligentsia, this article examines the development of postimperial political imagination in the region of Yakutia. The formation of the Sakha intellectuals was a result of the circulation of wider imperial discourses on nationalism, anticolonialism, socialism, and regionalism during the crisis of the Russian Empire. By discussing the Sakhas’ marginal, even colonial, conditions, the Sakha national intellectuals followed self-governing aspirations inherited from political exiles and Siberian regionalists, whose ideas became frequent demands for many Siberian indigenous movements. Despite the Stalinist myth that the Soviet Union (and its social engineers) created autonomy in Yakutia for the first time in Russian history, it was the Sakha intellectuals who developed the autonomist discourse during the first two decades of the twentieth century.

The article does not investigate the reason behind the recurring cases of missing children and young adults in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) and does not offer an explanation for this phenomenon. Instead, it interprets this occurrence as a symptom of the oppressive histories and realities for indigenous groups residing on the territory of this part of the Russian Federation. Although the reasons for children going missing might seem obvious—the vast uninhabited territory of the region and poor infrastructure—the article argues that these cases of missing children are the result and evidence of neglect on behalf of parents and the state. The contributive value of this article is to voice the current precarious situation in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) under the “brotherhood” of the New Russians’ oligarchy and the way that communal cultural practices of the indigenous peoples of Yakutia resist this form of oppressive practice and the possibility of going missing, or extinct.

Within Russia, the major centers of bone carving art are the village of Kholmogory in the Arkhangelsk region, the town of Tobolsk in the Tyumen region (which was considered the center of Siberia in the seventeenth century), Chukotka, and the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). Geographically, they are connected by their proximity to the northern seas, which explains the main materials used by carvers: walrus tusk and sperm whale tooth. The exception is Sakha (Yakutia), the ancient motherland of mammoths. This article discusses the origin and history of the development of Sakha mammoth tusk carving, the role of ethnocultural contacts at different stages of its development, and the preservation of its authenticity.

In going over submissions to Sibirica at the beginning of 2021, I found several articles related to culture and history in the Sakha Republic. Naturally, I thought it would be illuminating to bring them together to see how they might complement each other. Although this is not a typical special issue with a planned overarching theme, I found that these articles are not only geographically united but subtly reflective of broad underlying concerns—the revitalization and continuity of culture, and the agency of minoritized and indigenous peoples in striving for self-definition and survival. This issue is a way of “checking in” on the state of some of the diverse scholarly work happening in and on Sakha (Yakutia) in recent months and years—from the perspectives of researchers in anthropology, literary studies, history, and art history and criticism.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, much of social research on contemporary Russia focused on transformations of gender relations brought about by the closure of many state enterprises. In particular, scholars posited that men were experiencing severe insecurity about their gender identity, which they termed a “post-Soviet masculinity crisis.” However, little research has since been carried out to catch up with these findings. How have men's experiences of gender insecurity developed? How have they responded? This article addresses these questions drawing on newly active Sakha (Yakut) men's groups and shows how they are also arising and forming their consciousness in reaction to the immigration of male Muslim workers from Central Asia.

Focusing on the works and intellectual activity of the Sakha intelligentsia, this article examines the development of postimperial political imagination in the region of Yakutia. The formation of the Sakha intellectuals was a result of the circulation of wider imperial discourses on nationalism, anticolonialism, socialism, and regionalism during the crisis of the Russian Empire. By discussing the Sakhas’ marginal, even colonial, conditions, the Sakha national intellectuals followed self-governing aspirations inherited from political exiles and Siberian regionalists, whose ideas became frequent demands for many Siberian indigenous movements. Despite the Stalinist myth that the Soviet Union (and its social engineers) created autonomy in Yakutia for the first time in Russian history, it was the Sakha intellectuals who developed the autonomist discourse during the first two decades of the twentieth century.

The article does not investigate the reason behind the recurring cases of missing children and young adults in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) and does not offer an explanation for this phenomenon. Instead, it interprets this occurrence as a symptom of the oppressive histories and realities for indigenous groups residing on the territory of this part of the Russian Federation. Although the reasons for children going missing might seem obvious—the vast uninhabited territory of the region and poor infrastructure—the article argues that these cases of missing children are the result and evidence of neglect on behalf of parents and the state. The contributive value of this article is to voice the current precarious situation in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) under the “brotherhood” of the New Russians’ oligarchy and the way that communal cultural practices of the indigenous peoples of Yakutia resist this form of oppressive practice and the possibility of going missing, or extinct.

Within Russia, the major centers of bone carving art are the village of Kholmogory in the Arkhangelsk region, the town of Tobolsk in the Tyumen region (which was considered the center of Siberia in the seventeenth century), Chukotka, and the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). Geographically, they are connected by their proximity to the northern seas, which explains the main materials used by carvers: walrus tusk and sperm whale tooth. The exception is Sakha (Yakutia), the ancient motherland of mammoths. This article discusses the origin and history of the development of Sakha mammoth tusk carving, the role of ethnocultural contacts at different stages of its development, and the preservation of its authenticity.

Mixed Messages: Mediating Native Belonging in Asian Russia Kathryn E. Graber (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2020), 262 pp. ISBN13: 9781501750519 (paperback).

The three articles that comprise this issue of Sibirica engage with the complexities of dialogic relationships to place. What do people bring to a place? What does place catalyze for people? The authors come from diverse disciplinary backgrounds and bring disparate frameworks from human geography, cultural anthropology, and philosophy; in each article, they engage with both the immediate present and the broader arc of time and reflect on the pragmatic and practical dimensions of relationships with a place to those more spiritual and ineffable.

The three articles that comprise this issue of Sibirica engage with the complexities of dialogic relationships to place. What do people bring to a place? What does place catalyze for people? The authors come from diverse disciplinary backgrounds and bring disparate frameworks from human geography, cultural anthropology, and philosophy; in each article, they engage with both the immediate present and the broader arc of time and reflect on the pragmatic and practical dimensions of relationships with a place to those more spiritual and ineffable.

In the struggle of Russia's Indigenous northerners for greater control over their ancestral lands, the spatiolegal formations known as Territories of Traditional Nature Use (TTPs, using the Russian acronym) have become their most effective tool. TTPs have assumed diverse characteristics across Russian regions in response to the evolution of federal and sub-federal law and of center-periphery relations at national and regional scales. In the Sakha Republic (Iakutiia), TTP formation is entangled with wider territorial politics and economic trends, which have led to the precarious but powerful advancement of Indigenous rights. This article explores this evolution by comparing the creation of two neighboring TTPs, formed eight years apart under distinct political and legislative conditions. A combination of local efforts, subnational legislative and economic initiatives, and reaction to federal overstep have compelled the improvement and systematization of Indigenous rights in the republic.

The three articles that comprise this issue of Sibirica engage with the complexities of dialogic relationships to place. What do people bring to a place? What does place catalyze for people? The authors come from diverse disciplinary backgrounds and bring disparate frameworks from human geography, cultural anthropology, and philosophy; in each article, they engage with both the immediate present and the broader arc of time and reflect on the pragmatic and practical dimensions of relationships with a place to those more spiritual and ineffable.

In the struggle of Russia's Indigenous northerners for greater control over their ancestral lands, the spatiolegal formations known as Territories of Traditional Nature Use (TTPs, using the Russian acronym) have become their most effective tool. TTPs have assumed diverse characteristics across Russian regions in response to the evolution of federal and sub-federal law and of center-periphery relations at national and regional scales. In the Sakha Republic (Iakutiia), TTP formation is entangled with wider territorial politics and economic trends, which have led to the precarious but powerful advancement of Indigenous rights. This article explores this evolution by comparing the creation of two neighboring TTPs, formed eight years apart under distinct political and legislative conditions. A combination of local efforts, subnational legislative and economic initiatives, and reaction to federal overstep have compelled the improvement and systematization of Indigenous rights in the republic.

Smoothly functioning infrastructures are “unnoticeable”; they attract attention upon a breakdown. When infrastructure does not function as intended, it does not stop working altogether. Rather, it functions in unprecedented ways. This article argues that in the process of malfunctioning, infrastructure not only facilitates engagement, but also produces an affect. This ethnography shows how the “broken road” (razbitaia doroga) in rural postindustrial Eastern Siberia becomes a site around which belonging and relating unfold. The broken road functions as infrastructure acquiring a capacity to be affective precisely as it malfunctions. The affect that people experience in connection to the malfunctioning piece of infrastructure has components of anger and annoyance, a sense of unity, sociality, and camaraderie, as well as the feelings of belonging to a certain group.

The three articles that comprise this issue of Sibirica engage with the complexities of dialogic relationships to place. What do people bring to a place? What does place catalyze for people? The authors come from diverse disciplinary backgrounds and bring disparate frameworks from human geography, cultural anthropology, and philosophy; in each article, they engage with both the immediate present and the broader arc of time and reflect on the pragmatic and practical dimensions of relationships with a place to those more spiritual and ineffable.

In the struggle of Russia's Indigenous northerners for greater control over their ancestral lands, the spatiolegal formations known as Territories of Traditional Nature Use (TTPs, using the Russian acronym) have become their most effective tool. TTPs have assumed diverse characteristics across Russian regions in response to the evolution of federal and sub-federal law and of center-periphery relations at national and regional scales. In the Sakha Republic (Iakutiia), TTP formation is entangled with wider territorial politics and economic trends, which have led to the precarious but powerful advancement of Indigenous rights. This article explores this evolution by comparing the creation of two neighboring TTPs, formed eight years apart under distinct political and legislative conditions. A combination of local efforts, subnational legislative and economic initiatives, and reaction to federal overstep have compelled the improvement and systematization of Indigenous rights in the republic.

Smoothly functioning infrastructures are “unnoticeable”; they attract attention upon a breakdown. When infrastructure does not function as intended, it does not stop working altogether. Rather, it functions in unprecedented ways. This article argues that in the process of malfunctioning, infrastructure not only facilitates engagement, but also produces an affect. This ethnography shows how the “broken road” (razbitaia doroga) in rural postindustrial Eastern Siberia becomes a site around which belonging and relating unfold. The broken road functions as infrastructure acquiring a capacity to be affective precisely as it malfunctions. The affect that people experience in connection to the malfunctioning piece of infrastructure has components of anger and annoyance, a sense of unity, sociality, and camaraderie, as well as the feelings of belonging to a certain group.

Surrounded by mountains and forests, Lake Turgoyak in the Southern Urals (Russia) is a popular tourist destination. However, the many resorts and camps as well as the high number of visitors have had a negative environmental impact on the lake. Taking Lake Turgoyak as a case study, the research examines the values in the human-geosphere relationship, framed as a geoethical dilemma revisiting the concept of the noosphere. The formulation of geoethical dilemmas, as a way to explore the values that underpin the technocratic artifacts on which humans relate to the geosphere, reveals a spiritual dimension that shapes cultural identities that, in turn, unfold in eco-ideologies of resistance in hope.

The three articles that comprise this issue of Sibirica engage with the complexities of dialogic relationships to place. What do people bring to a place? What does place catalyze for people? The authors come from diverse disciplinary backgrounds and bring disparate frameworks from human geography, cultural anthropology, and philosophy; in each article, they engage with both the immediate present and the broader arc of time and reflect on the pragmatic and practical dimensions of relationships with a place to those more spiritual and ineffable.

In the struggle of Russia's Indigenous northerners for greater control over their ancestral lands, the spatiolegal formations known as Territories of Traditional Nature Use (TTPs, using the Russian acronym) have become their most effective tool. TTPs have assumed diverse characteristics across Russian regions in response to the evolution of federal and sub-federal law and of center-periphery relations at national and regional scales. In the Sakha Republic (Iakutiia), TTP formation is entangled with wider territorial politics and economic trends, which have led to the precarious but powerful advancement of Indigenous rights. This article explores this evolution by comparing the creation of two neighboring TTPs, formed eight years apart under distinct political and legislative conditions. A combination of local efforts, subnational legislative and economic initiatives, and reaction to federal overstep have compelled the improvement and systematization of Indigenous rights in the republic.

Smoothly functioning infrastructures are “unnoticeable”; they attract attention upon a breakdown. When infrastructure does not function as intended, it does not stop working altogether. Rather, it functions in unprecedented ways. This article argues that in the process of malfunctioning, infrastructure not only facilitates engagement, but also produces an affect. This ethnography shows how the “broken road” (razbitaia doroga) in rural postindustrial Eastern Siberia becomes a site around which belonging and relating unfold. The broken road functions as infrastructure acquiring a capacity to be affective precisely as it malfunctions. The affect that people experience in connection to the malfunctioning piece of infrastructure has components of anger and annoyance, a sense of unity, sociality, and camaraderie, as well as the feelings of belonging to a certain group.

Surrounded by mountains and forests, Lake Turgoyak in the Southern Urals (Russia) is a popular tourist destination. However, the many resorts and camps as well as the high number of visitors have had a negative environmental impact on the lake. Taking Lake Turgoyak as a case study, the research examines the values in the human-geosphere relationship, framed as a geoethical dilemma revisiting the concept of the noosphere. The formulation of geoethical dilemmas, as a way to explore the values that underpin the technocratic artifacts on which humans relate to the geosphere, reveals a spiritual dimension that shapes cultural identities that, in turn, unfold in eco-ideologies of resistance in hope.

Mists on the River: Folktales from Siberia Yeremei Aipin, Translated by Marina Aipin and Claude Clayton Smith (Brunswick, ME: Shanti Arts Publishing, 2020), 51 pp. ISBN 978-1-951651-40-4.

Regional'naia elita Dal'nego Vostoka v mekhanizme vneshnei politiki: Dokumental'naia istoriia voennogo konflikta na KVZHD mezhdu SSSR i Kitaem, 1929 Marina Fuchs (New York: South Eastern Publishers, 2020), 513 pp., 570 notes, with a summary in English, 54 pp.

Lifestyle in Siberia and the Russian North Joachim Otto Habeck, ed. (Cambridge, UK: Open Book, 2019), 490 pp. ISBN paperback: 978-1-78374-717-7; ISBN cloth: 978-1-78374-718-4.

Vladimir Klavdeevich Arsen'ev is one of the best-known figures of the Russian Far East, and yet the scholarly literature—particularly in English—on his historical significance is surprisingly thin. Literary scholars, drawn by Arsen'ev's famous novel Dersu Uzala, and cinema scholars, intrigued by Akira Kurosawa's masterful film adaptation of that work, have most critically engaged with the Russian polymath's work (Arsen'ev was, after all, a military officer, an explorer, an author, an ethnographer, a bureaucrat, and more). Much more rarely have scholars assessed Arsen'ev's important role as an actor in and commentator on Russian colonization in the Far East. This special collection of articles in Sibirica makes a start at that assessment, identifying several areas where a study of Arsen'ev's life and writings can illuminate important aspects of the region's early twentieth-century history.

Vladimir Klavdeevich Arsen'ev is one of the best-known figures of the Russian Far East, and yet the scholarly literature—particularly in English—on his historical significance is surprisingly thin. Literary scholars, drawn by Arsen'ev's famous novel Dersu Uzala, and cinema scholars, intrigued by Akira Kurosawa's masterful film adaptation of that work, have most critically engaged with the Russian polymath's work (Arsen'ev was, after all, a military officer, an explorer, an author, an ethnographer, a bureaucrat, and more). Much more rarely have scholars assessed Arsen'ev's important role as an actor in and commentator on Russian colonization in the Far East. This special collection of articles in Sibirica makes a start at that assessment, identifying several areas where a study of Arsen'ev's life and writings can illuminate important aspects of the region's early twentieth-century history.

The article is devoted to the famous explorer and writer Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev (1872–1930). He arrived in the Russian Far East in 1900, where he conducted numerous research expeditions and engaged in a comprehensive study of the Far East. Arsen'ev studied the lives of the region's indigenous peoples and published several books, Dersu Uzala being the most famous one. This article is based on Arsen'ev's personal archives, which are stored in Vladivostok. The article chronicles his life in the Soviet period. It also discusses the punishment of his wives and children.

Vladimir Klavdeevich Arsen'ev is one of the best-known figures of the Russian Far East, and yet the scholarly literature—particularly in English—on his historical significance is surprisingly thin. Literary scholars, drawn by Arsen'ev's famous novel Dersu Uzala, and cinema scholars, intrigued by Akira Kurosawa's masterful film adaptation of that work, have most critically engaged with the Russian polymath's work (Arsen'ev was, after all, a military officer, an explorer, an author, an ethnographer, a bureaucrat, and more). Much more rarely have scholars assessed Arsen'ev's important role as an actor in and commentator on Russian colonization in the Far East. This special collection of articles in Sibirica makes a start at that assessment, identifying several areas where a study of Arsen'ev's life and writings can illuminate important aspects of the region's early twentieth-century history.

The article is devoted to the famous explorer and writer Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev (1872–1930). He arrived in the Russian Far East in 1900, where he conducted numerous research expeditions and engaged in a comprehensive study of the Far East. Arsen'ev studied the lives of the region's indigenous peoples and published several books, Dersu Uzala being the most famous one. This article is based on Arsen'ev's personal archives, which are stored in Vladivostok. The article chronicles his life in the Soviet period. It also discusses the punishment of his wives and children.

The article describes the life and work of Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev in the context of the development of settler colonial project in the Far East. The article argues that Arsen'ev, a military officer and a self-taught geographer and ethnographer, shared in a political ecology, which combined “defense” of native peoples and the nature of the Russian Far East with racialized views of Chinese and Korean immigrants. This political ecology, in particular, led Arsen'ev to take part in military operations designed to cleanse remote parts of the Ussuri region of the Chinese and to develop administrative proposals on the governance of native peoples, which foreshadowed Soviet projects.

Vladimir Klavdeevich Arsen'ev is one of the best-known figures of the Russian Far East, and yet the scholarly literature—particularly in English—on his historical significance is surprisingly thin. Literary scholars, drawn by Arsen'ev's famous novel Dersu Uzala, and cinema scholars, intrigued by Akira Kurosawa's masterful film adaptation of that work, have most critically engaged with the Russian polymath's work (Arsen'ev was, after all, a military officer, an explorer, an author, an ethnographer, a bureaucrat, and more). Much more rarely have scholars assessed Arsen'ev's important role as an actor in and commentator on Russian colonization in the Far East. This special collection of articles in Sibirica makes a start at that assessment, identifying several areas where a study of Arsen'ev's life and writings can illuminate important aspects of the region's early twentieth-century history.

The article is devoted to the famous explorer and writer Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev (1872–1930). He arrived in the Russian Far East in 1900, where he conducted numerous research expeditions and engaged in a comprehensive study of the Far East. Arsen'ev studied the lives of the region's indigenous peoples and published several books, Dersu Uzala being the most famous one. This article is based on Arsen'ev's personal archives, which are stored in Vladivostok. The article chronicles his life in the Soviet period. It also discusses the punishment of his wives and children.

The article describes the life and work of Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev in the context of the development of settler colonial project in the Far East. The article argues that Arsen'ev, a military officer and a self-taught geographer and ethnographer, shared in a political ecology, which combined “defense” of native peoples and the nature of the Russian Far East with racialized views of Chinese and Korean immigrants. This political ecology, in particular, led Arsen'ev to take part in military operations designed to cleanse remote parts of the Ussuri region of the Chinese and to develop administrative proposals on the governance of native peoples, which foreshadowed Soviet projects.

The article explores Vladimir Arsen'ev's rationalization of the economic activities that he observed during expeditions in the Russian Far East, predominantly in the Ussuri region. It analyzes his categorization of the local population, which was derived from nonmatching taxonomies and included concepts such as nationality, religion, race, and subjecthood. Disentangling this categorization helps to outline the main contexts that influenced Arsen'ev, such as postwar political and military concerns, challenges of settler colonialism, and nationalizing empire. The article shows how Arsen'ev's intertwined life experiences as a military officer and geographer, colonization official, ethnographer, and resource-conscious naturalist outlined the limits of his imagination and provided the ground for his intellectual innovations.

Vladimir Klavdeevich Arsen'ev is one of the best-known figures of the Russian Far East, and yet the scholarly literature—particularly in English—on his historical significance is surprisingly thin. Literary scholars, drawn by Arsen'ev's famous novel Dersu Uzala, and cinema scholars, intrigued by Akira Kurosawa's masterful film adaptation of that work, have most critically engaged with the Russian polymath's work (Arsen'ev was, after all, a military officer, an explorer, an author, an ethnographer, a bureaucrat, and more). Much more rarely have scholars assessed Arsen'ev's important role as an actor in and commentator on Russian colonization in the Far East. This special collection of articles in Sibirica makes a start at that assessment, identifying several areas where a study of Arsen'ev's life and writings can illuminate important aspects of the region's early twentieth-century history.

The article is devoted to the famous explorer and writer Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev (1872–1930). He arrived in the Russian Far East in 1900, where he conducted numerous research expeditions and engaged in a comprehensive study of the Far East. Arsen'ev studied the lives of the region's indigenous peoples and published several books, Dersu Uzala being the most famous one. This article is based on Arsen'ev's personal archives, which are stored in Vladivostok. The article chronicles his life in the Soviet period. It also discusses the punishment of his wives and children.

The article describes the life and work of Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev in the context of the development of settler colonial project in the Far East. The article argues that Arsen'ev, a military officer and a self-taught geographer and ethnographer, shared in a political ecology, which combined “defense” of native peoples and the nature of the Russian Far East with racialized views of Chinese and Korean immigrants. This political ecology, in particular, led Arsen'ev to take part in military operations designed to cleanse remote parts of the Ussuri region of the Chinese and to develop administrative proposals on the governance of native peoples, which foreshadowed Soviet projects.

The article explores Vladimir Arsen'ev's rationalization of the economic activities that he observed during expeditions in the Russian Far East, predominantly in the Ussuri region. It analyzes his categorization of the local population, which was derived from nonmatching taxonomies and included concepts such as nationality, religion, race, and subjecthood. Disentangling this categorization helps to outline the main contexts that influenced Arsen'ev, such as postwar political and military concerns, challenges of settler colonialism, and nationalizing empire. The article shows how Arsen'ev's intertwined life experiences as a military officer and geographer, colonization official, ethnographer, and resource-conscious naturalist outlined the limits of his imagination and provided the ground for his intellectual innovations.

This article examines the contributions the famous Far Eastern writer Vladimir Arsen'ev made to the development of the Russian/Soviet whaling industry in the 1920s. During that time Arsen'ev worked as a “specialist for marine mammal hunting” for Dal'rybokhota. He studied the whales of the Russian Far East and helped craft the Far Eastern Republic's policy toward its subjects who wanted to start whaling. As someone with a deep knowledge of imperial-era environmental destruction and conservation, Arsen'ev helped develop measures designed to protect the region's Indigenous people and fur-bearing animals while strengthening Russian sovereignty. He also advocated the wholesale slaughter of killer whales and ultimately failed to restrain destructive commercial whaling. However, in addition to adding a new chapter to Arsen'ev's biography, his ideas about whales and whaling help us better understand the Far East's environment history and especially the way imperial-era ideas around conservation survived into the Soviet period.

Vladimir Klavdeevich Arsen'ev is one of the best-known figures of the Russian Far East, and yet the scholarly literature—particularly in English—on his historical significance is surprisingly thin. Literary scholars, drawn by Arsen'ev's famous novel Dersu Uzala, and cinema scholars, intrigued by Akira Kurosawa's masterful film adaptation of that work, have most critically engaged with the Russian polymath's work (Arsen'ev was, after all, a military officer, an explorer, an author, an ethnographer, a bureaucrat, and more). Much more rarely have scholars assessed Arsen'ev's important role as an actor in and commentator on Russian colonization in the Far East. This special collection of articles in Sibirica makes a start at that assessment, identifying several areas where a study of Arsen'ev's life and writings can illuminate important aspects of the region's early twentieth-century history.

The article is devoted to the famous explorer and writer Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev (1872–1930). He arrived in the Russian Far East in 1900, where he conducted numerous research expeditions and engaged in a comprehensive study of the Far East. Arsen'ev studied the lives of the region's indigenous peoples and published several books, Dersu Uzala being the most famous one. This article is based on Arsen'ev's personal archives, which are stored in Vladivostok. The article chronicles his life in the Soviet period. It also discusses the punishment of his wives and children.

The article describes the life and work of Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev in the context of the development of settler colonial project in the Far East. The article argues that Arsen'ev, a military officer and a self-taught geographer and ethnographer, shared in a political ecology, which combined “defense” of native peoples and the nature of the Russian Far East with racialized views of Chinese and Korean immigrants. This political ecology, in particular, led Arsen'ev to take part in military operations designed to cleanse remote parts of the Ussuri region of the Chinese and to develop administrative proposals on the governance of native peoples, which foreshadowed Soviet projects.

The article explores Vladimir Arsen'ev's rationalization of the economic activities that he observed during expeditions in the Russian Far East, predominantly in the Ussuri region. It analyzes his categorization of the local population, which was derived from nonmatching taxonomies and included concepts such as nationality, religion, race, and subjecthood. Disentangling this categorization helps to outline the main contexts that influenced Arsen'ev, such as postwar political and military concerns, challenges of settler colonialism, and nationalizing empire. The article shows how Arsen'ev's intertwined life experiences as a military officer and geographer, colonization official, ethnographer, and resource-conscious naturalist outlined the limits of his imagination and provided the ground for his intellectual innovations.

This article examines the contributions the famous Far Eastern writer Vladimir Arsen'ev made to the development of the Russian/Soviet whaling industry in the 1920s. During that time Arsen'ev worked as a “specialist for marine mammal hunting” for Dal'rybokhota. He studied the whales of the Russian Far East and helped craft the Far Eastern Republic's policy toward its subjects who wanted to start whaling. As someone with a deep knowledge of imperial-era environmental destruction and conservation, Arsen'ev helped develop measures designed to protect the region's Indigenous people and fur-bearing animals while strengthening Russian sovereignty. He also advocated the wholesale slaughter of killer whales and ultimately failed to restrain destructive commercial whaling. However, in addition to adding a new chapter to Arsen'ev's biography, his ideas about whales and whaling help us better understand the Far East's environment history and especially the way imperial-era ideas around conservation survived into the Soviet period.

In 1900, Vladimir Arsen'ev arrived in a remote corner of the Russian Empire on the cusp of significant change. Forests in the Ussuri Kray (now Primorskiy Kray, or Primorye) were wild, wildlife was abundant, and the human population was low. Twenty-one years later, after witnessing a sustained influx of settlers and a reduction of wildlife, in his introduction to Across the Ussuri Kray [Po Ussuriiskomy kraiu], a travelogue about his experiences in the region, Arsen'ev mourned the passing of this unique time and place. This article outlines Arsen'ev's contributions to our understanding of Primorye's wildlife in the early twentieth century, describes what led to the reductions in wildlife he witnessed and offers a summary of how wildlife and wilderness look in the region today.

Vladimir Klavdeevich Arsen'ev is one of the best-known figures of the Russian Far East, and yet the scholarly literature—particularly in English—on his historical significance is surprisingly thin. Literary scholars, drawn by Arsen'ev's famous novel Dersu Uzala, and cinema scholars, intrigued by Akira Kurosawa's masterful film adaptation of that work, have most critically engaged with the Russian polymath's work (Arsen'ev was, after all, a military officer, an explorer, an author, an ethnographer, a bureaucrat, and more). Much more rarely have scholars assessed Arsen'ev's important role as an actor in and commentator on Russian colonization in the Far East. This special collection of articles in Sibirica makes a start at that assessment, identifying several areas where a study of Arsen'ev's life and writings can illuminate important aspects of the region's early twentieth-century history.

The article is devoted to the famous explorer and writer Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev (1872–1930). He arrived in the Russian Far East in 1900, where he conducted numerous research expeditions and engaged in a comprehensive study of the Far East. Arsen'ev studied the lives of the region's indigenous peoples and published several books, Dersu Uzala being the most famous one. This article is based on Arsen'ev's personal archives, which are stored in Vladivostok. The article chronicles his life in the Soviet period. It also discusses the punishment of his wives and children.

The article describes the life and work of Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev in the context of the development of settler colonial project in the Far East. The article argues that Arsen'ev, a military officer and a self-taught geographer and ethnographer, shared in a political ecology, which combined “defense” of native peoples and the nature of the Russian Far East with racialized views of Chinese and Korean immigrants. This political ecology, in particular, led Arsen'ev to take part in military operations designed to cleanse remote parts of the Ussuri region of the Chinese and to develop administrative proposals on the governance of native peoples, which foreshadowed Soviet projects.

The article explores Vladimir Arsen'ev's rationalization of the economic activities that he observed during expeditions in the Russian Far East, predominantly in the Ussuri region. It analyzes his categorization of the local population, which was derived from nonmatching taxonomies and included concepts such as nationality, religion, race, and subjecthood. Disentangling this categorization helps to outline the main contexts that influenced Arsen'ev, such as postwar political and military concerns, challenges of settler colonialism, and nationalizing empire. The article shows how Arsen'ev's intertwined life experiences as a military officer and geographer, colonization official, ethnographer, and resource-conscious naturalist outlined the limits of his imagination and provided the ground for his intellectual innovations.

This article examines the contributions the famous Far Eastern writer Vladimir Arsen'ev made to the development of the Russian/Soviet whaling industry in the 1920s. During that time Arsen'ev worked as a “specialist for marine mammal hunting” for Dal'rybokhota. He studied the whales of the Russian Far East and helped craft the Far Eastern Republic's policy toward its subjects who wanted to start whaling. As someone with a deep knowledge of imperial-era environmental destruction and conservation, Arsen'ev helped develop measures designed to protect the region's Indigenous people and fur-bearing animals while strengthening Russian sovereignty. He also advocated the wholesale slaughter of killer whales and ultimately failed to restrain destructive commercial whaling. However, in addition to adding a new chapter to Arsen'ev's biography, his ideas about whales and whaling help us better understand the Far East's environment history and especially the way imperial-era ideas around conservation survived into the Soviet period.

In 1900, Vladimir Arsen'ev arrived in a remote corner of the Russian Empire on the cusp of significant change. Forests in the Ussuri Kray (now Primorskiy Kray, or Primorye) were wild, wildlife was abundant, and the human population was low. Twenty-one years later, after witnessing a sustained influx of settlers and a reduction of wildlife, in his introduction to Across the Ussuri Kray [Po Ussuriiskomy kraiu], a travelogue about his experiences in the region, Arsen'ev mourned the passing of this unique time and place. This article outlines Arsen'ev's contributions to our understanding of Primorye's wildlife in the early twentieth century, describes what led to the reductions in wildlife he witnessed and offers a summary of how wildlife and wilderness look in the region today.

The Third International and Interdisciplinary Conference about the Tungus “Social Interactions, Languages, Landscapes in Siberia and China (Evenki, Evens, Orochons and Other Groups)” was organized by the Amur Region State University (Blagoveshchensk, Russia) and other coorganizers on June 14–16, 2019. The conference was devoted to the study of Tungus peoples from different standpoints and scientific/theoretical approaches. It demonstrated the vivid interest of researchers from many countries all over the world to the discussed topics. One of the main distinctions of this particular event was the resourceful and multifaceted intercommunication between scholars, indigenous people, and local authorities.

Vladimir Klavdeevich Arsen'ev is one of the best-known figures of the Russian Far East, and yet the scholarly literature—particularly in English—on his historical significance is surprisingly thin. Literary scholars, drawn by Arsen'ev's famous novel Dersu Uzala, and cinema scholars, intrigued by Akira Kurosawa's masterful film adaptation of that work, have most critically engaged with the Russian polymath's work (Arsen'ev was, after all, a military officer, an explorer, an author, an ethnographer, a bureaucrat, and more). Much more rarely have scholars assessed Arsen'ev's important role as an actor in and commentator on Russian colonization in the Far East. This special collection of articles in Sibirica makes a start at that assessment, identifying several areas where a study of Arsen'ev's life and writings can illuminate important aspects of the region's early twentieth-century history.

The article is devoted to the famous explorer and writer Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev (1872–1930). He arrived in the Russian Far East in 1900, where he conducted numerous research expeditions and engaged in a comprehensive study of the Far East. Arsen'ev studied the lives of the region's indigenous peoples and published several books, Dersu Uzala being the most famous one. This article is based on Arsen'ev's personal archives, which are stored in Vladivostok. The article chronicles his life in the Soviet period. It also discusses the punishment of his wives and children.

The article describes the life and work of Vladimir Klavdievich Arsen'ev in the context of the development of settler colonial project in the Far East. The article argues that Arsen'ev, a military officer and a self-taught geographer and ethnographer, shared in a political ecology, which combined “defense” of native peoples and the nature of the Russian Far East with racialized views of Chinese and Korean immigrants. This political ecology, in particular, led Arsen'ev to take part in military operations designed to cleanse remote parts of the Ussuri region of the Chinese and to develop administrative proposals on the governance of native peoples, which foreshadowed Soviet projects.

The article explores Vladimir Arsen'ev's rationalization of the economic activities that he observed during expeditions in the Russian Far East, predominantly in the Ussuri region. It analyzes his categorization of the local population, which was derived from nonmatching taxonomies and included concepts such as nationality, religion, race, and subjecthood. Disentangling this categorization helps to outline the main contexts that influenced Arsen'ev, such as postwar political and military concerns, challenges of settler colonialism, and nationalizing empire. The article shows how Arsen'ev's intertwined life experiences as a military officer and geographer, colonization official, ethnographer, and resource-conscious naturalist outlined the limits of his imagination and provided the ground for his intellectual innovations.

This article examines the contributions the famous Far Eastern writer Vladimir Arsen'ev made to the development of the Russian/Soviet whaling industry in the 1920s. During that time Arsen'ev worked as a “specialist for marine mammal hunting” for Dal'rybokhota. He studied the whales of the Russian Far East and helped craft the Far Eastern Republic's policy toward its subjects who wanted to start whaling. As someone with a deep knowledge of imperial-era environmental destruction and conservation, Arsen'ev helped develop measures designed to protect the region's Indigenous people and fur-bearing animals while strengthening Russian sovereignty. He also advocated the wholesale slaughter of killer whales and ultimately failed to restrain destructive commercial whaling. However, in addition to adding a new chapter to Arsen'ev's biography, his ideas about whales and whaling help us better understand the Far East's environment history and especially the way imperial-era ideas around conservation survived into the Soviet period.

In 1900, Vladimir Arsen'ev arrived in a remote corner of the Russian Empire on the cusp of significant change. Forests in the Ussuri Kray (now Primorskiy Kray, or Primorye) were wild, wildlife was abundant, and the human population was low. Twenty-one years later, after witnessing a sustained influx of settlers and a reduction of wildlife, in his introduction to Across the Ussuri Kray [Po Ussuriiskomy kraiu], a travelogue about his experiences in the region, Arsen'ev mourned the passing of this unique time and place. This article outlines Arsen'ev's contributions to our understanding of Primorye's wildlife in the early twentieth century, describes what led to the reductions in wildlife he witnessed and offers a summary of how wildlife and wilderness look in the region today.

The Third International and Interdisciplinary Conference about the Tungus “Social Interactions, Languages, Landscapes in Siberia and China (Evenki, Evens, Orochons and Other Groups)” was organized by the Amur Region State University (Blagoveshchensk, Russia) and other coorganizers on June 14–16, 2019. The conference was devoted to the study of Tungus peoples from different standpoints and scientific/theoretical approaches. It demonstrated the vivid interest of researchers from many countries all over the world to the discussed topics. One of the main distinctions of this particular event was the resourceful and multifaceted intercommunication between scholars, indigenous people, and local authorities.

Aileen E. Friesen, Colonizing Russia's Promised Land: Orthodoxy and Community on the Siberian Steppe (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2020), xiii + 224 pp., index, illustrations (black and white), map. $48.75 (cloth). ISBN: 978-1-4426-3719-1.

Alex Oehler and Anna Varfolomeeva, eds., Multispecies Households in the Saian Mountains: Ecology at the Russia-Mongolia Border (Lanham: Lexington Books; 1 edition, 2019), 296 pages. Hardcover, $95.00. ISBN: 9781793602534.

In northwestern Siberia, rivers historically played an essential role in structuring economic, cultural, and administrative space. The rivers’ role in spatial perception is reflected in vocabulary of some local languages. With the recent development of roads and railroads, a new way has emerged to structure socioeconomic and political space. The two systems of spatial structuring contradict each other, and their relative importance for different local groups depends on their professional and ethnocultural affiliation. This leads to different perceptions of space, distances, and geographic directions by the members of these groups. Furthermore, since the administrative borders reflect the “river” system, but the administrative power is increasingly projected along the roads and railroads, the conflict between the two systems has a political dimension.

In northwestern Siberia, rivers historically played an essential role in structuring economic, cultural, and administrative space. The rivers’ role in spatial perception is reflected in vocabulary of some local languages. With the recent development of roads and railroads, a new way has emerged to structure socioeconomic and political space. The two systems of spatial structuring contradict each other, and their relative importance for different local groups depends on their professional and ethnocultural affiliation. This leads to different perceptions of space, distances, and geographic directions by the members of these groups. Furthermore, since the administrative borders reflect the “river” system, but the administrative power is increasingly projected along the roads and railroads, the conflict between the two systems has a political dimension.

This article discusses how transportation routes affect local relations with place and resources while being simultaneously shaped by the landscape. It focuses on Okinskii district (Oka) of Buriatiia in southcentral Siberia. The Mondy-Orlik road, which connected the district with the rest of Buriatiia, offered extended opportunities for the development of extractive businesses and tourism in the district. For many residents, the greater accessibility of Oka connotes a threat to local traditions and beliefs. The article examines the interconnectedness of economic, social, and cultural changes that the Mondy-Orlik road brought to Oka. The article demonstrates how the new road became entangled with the lines that previously existed in the landscape, the connections between human and nonhuman actors, and the patterns of informal jade extraction.

In northwestern Siberia, rivers historically played an essential role in structuring economic, cultural, and administrative space. The rivers’ role in spatial perception is reflected in vocabulary of some local languages. With the recent development of roads and railroads, a new way has emerged to structure socioeconomic and political space. The two systems of spatial structuring contradict each other, and their relative importance for different local groups depends on their professional and ethnocultural affiliation. This leads to different perceptions of space, distances, and geographic directions by the members of these groups. Furthermore, since the administrative borders reflect the “river” system, but the administrative power is increasingly projected along the roads and railroads, the conflict between the two systems has a political dimension.

This article discusses how transportation routes affect local relations with place and resources while being simultaneously shaped by the landscape. It focuses on Okinskii district (Oka) of Buriatiia in southcentral Siberia. The Mondy-Orlik road, which connected the district with the rest of Buriatiia, offered extended opportunities for the development of extractive businesses and tourism in the district. For many residents, the greater accessibility of Oka connotes a threat to local traditions and beliefs. The article examines the interconnectedness of economic, social, and cultural changes that the Mondy-Orlik road brought to Oka. The article demonstrates how the new road became entangled with the lines that previously existed in the landscape, the connections between human and nonhuman actors, and the patterns of informal jade extraction.

This article shows how the sensory perception of rock art guided both archeologists’ interpretations as well as indigenous worldviews in Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East. The research is based on the author's ethnographic fieldwork research among indigenous communities of the Olekma, Chara, Aldan, and Amur, and Vitim river basins in the Sakha Republic, the Amur and Zabaikalskii regions, and the Republic of Buriatiia. The article discusses Evenki herders’ and hunters’ interactions with the rock art sites and demonstrates how these sites have served as a source of ritual and cosmological inspiration. Rock art research has also been inseparable from intuitive and embodied experiences for researchers in the field who interact with rock art.

In northwestern Siberia, rivers historically played an essential role in structuring economic, cultural, and administrative space. The rivers’ role in spatial perception is reflected in vocabulary of some local languages. With the recent development of roads and railroads, a new way has emerged to structure socioeconomic and political space. The two systems of spatial structuring contradict each other, and their relative importance for different local groups depends on their professional and ethnocultural affiliation. This leads to different perceptions of space, distances, and geographic directions by the members of these groups. Furthermore, since the administrative borders reflect the “river” system, but the administrative power is increasingly projected along the roads and railroads, the conflict between the two systems has a political dimension.

This article discusses how transportation routes affect local relations with place and resources while being simultaneously shaped by the landscape. It focuses on Okinskii district (Oka) of Buriatiia in southcentral Siberia. The Mondy-Orlik road, which connected the district with the rest of Buriatiia, offered extended opportunities for the development of extractive businesses and tourism in the district. For many residents, the greater accessibility of Oka connotes a threat to local traditions and beliefs. The article examines the interconnectedness of economic, social, and cultural changes that the Mondy-Orlik road brought to Oka. The article demonstrates how the new road became entangled with the lines that previously existed in the landscape, the connections between human and nonhuman actors, and the patterns of informal jade extraction.

This article shows how the sensory perception of rock art guided both archeologists’ interpretations as well as indigenous worldviews in Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East. The research is based on the author's ethnographic fieldwork research among indigenous communities of the Olekma, Chara, Aldan, and Amur, and Vitim river basins in the Sakha Republic, the Amur and Zabaikalskii regions, and the Republic of Buriatiia. The article discusses Evenki herders’ and hunters’ interactions with the rock art sites and demonstrates how these sites have served as a source of ritual and cosmological inspiration. Rock art research has also been inseparable from intuitive and embodied experiences for researchers in the field who interact with rock art.

This article focuses on the representations of Evenkis and their culture in a local museum in Nizhneangarsk, Russia. The article uses the elements of critical discourse analysis to highlight the interplay between the real, imaginary, and ideological. The article explores how museum representations of the Evenkis and the Evenki culture create the ideological construction of the nature of the Evenkis and reproduce ethnic hierarchies in the region. The article examines the discursive strategies, rhetoric and meaning of texts, and the events presented by the museum's exhibitions. The article shows how the museum creates the nature of the Evenkis as external others, primitive folk, in contrast to the Evenkis as internal others, citizens of the contemporary Russian society, in its attempts to shape local identities.

In northwestern Siberia, rivers historically played an essential role in structuring economic, cultural, and administrative space. The rivers’ role in spatial perception is reflected in vocabulary of some local languages. With the recent development of roads and railroads, a new way has emerged to structure socioeconomic and political space. The two systems of spatial structuring contradict each other, and their relative importance for different local groups depends on their professional and ethnocultural affiliation. This leads to different perceptions of space, distances, and geographic directions by the members of these groups. Furthermore, since the administrative borders reflect the “river” system, but the administrative power is increasingly projected along the roads and railroads, the conflict between the two systems has a political dimension.

This article discusses how transportation routes affect local relations with place and resources while being simultaneously shaped by the landscape. It focuses on Okinskii district (Oka) of Buriatiia in southcentral Siberia. The Mondy-Orlik road, which connected the district with the rest of Buriatiia, offered extended opportunities for the development of extractive businesses and tourism in the district. For many residents, the greater accessibility of Oka connotes a threat to local traditions and beliefs. The article examines the interconnectedness of economic, social, and cultural changes that the Mondy-Orlik road brought to Oka. The article demonstrates how the new road became entangled with the lines that previously existed in the landscape, the connections between human and nonhuman actors, and the patterns of informal jade extraction.

This article shows how the sensory perception of rock art guided both archeologists’ interpretations as well as indigenous worldviews in Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East. The research is based on the author's ethnographic fieldwork research among indigenous communities of the Olekma, Chara, Aldan, and Amur, and Vitim river basins in the Sakha Republic, the Amur and Zabaikalskii regions, and the Republic of Buriatiia. The article discusses Evenki herders’ and hunters’ interactions with the rock art sites and demonstrates how these sites have served as a source of ritual and cosmological inspiration. Rock art research has also been inseparable from intuitive and embodied experiences for researchers in the field who interact with rock art.

This article focuses on the representations of Evenkis and their culture in a local museum in Nizhneangarsk, Russia. The article uses the elements of critical discourse analysis to highlight the interplay between the real, imaginary, and ideological. The article explores how museum representations of the Evenkis and the Evenki culture create the ideological construction of the nature of the Evenkis and reproduce ethnic hierarchies in the region. The article examines the discursive strategies, rhetoric and meaning of texts, and the events presented by the museum's exhibitions. The article shows how the museum creates the nature of the Evenkis as external others, primitive folk, in contrast to the Evenkis as internal others, citizens of the contemporary Russian society, in its attempts to shape local identities.

The article focuses on the imprisonment of elite women from the Russian metropole and women of mixed ethnic backgrounds on the Siberian frontier in the mid-eighteenth-century. Female prisoners and their monastic jailors responded to ascribed identities, positions, and circumstances dictated by imperial policies within the walls of the Dalmatov Vvedenskii Convent, which complicates our understanding of imperial interaction, gender, and empire in Siberia.

The article focuses on the imprisonment of elite women from the Russian metropole and women of mixed ethnic backgrounds on the Siberian frontier in the mid-eighteenth-century. Female prisoners and their monastic jailors responded to ascribed identities, positions, and circumstances dictated by imperial policies within the walls of the Dalmatov Vvedenskii Convent, which complicates our understanding of imperial interaction, gender, and empire in Siberia.

In the late imperial era, the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (the Kunstkamera) in St. Petersburg produced a series of guidebooks for visitors that provided an account of the changes in the gallery spaces and collections within the museum. Among the changes was a reorganization of the collection that brought about the removal of a gallery dedicated to Russian ethnography, which had housed Siberian, Central Asian, and a small number of European Russian objects. Siberian and Central Asian materials were then presented by the museum in an Asian ethnographic collection. In this new Asian collection, shamanism emerged as a category that operated to unify Russia in Asia as a culturally contiguous space located in an imperial elsewhere east of the Urals.

The article focuses on the imprisonment of elite women from the Russian metropole and women of mixed ethnic backgrounds on the Siberian frontier in the mid-eighteenth-century. Female prisoners and their monastic jailors responded to ascribed identities, positions, and circumstances dictated by imperial policies within the walls of the Dalmatov Vvedenskii Convent, which complicates our understanding of imperial interaction, gender, and empire in Siberia.

In the late imperial era, the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (the Kunstkamera) in St. Petersburg produced a series of guidebooks for visitors that provided an account of the changes in the gallery spaces and collections within the museum. Among the changes was a reorganization of the collection that brought about the removal of a gallery dedicated to Russian ethnography, which had housed Siberian, Central Asian, and a small number of European Russian objects. Siberian and Central Asian materials were then presented by the museum in an Asian ethnographic collection. In this new Asian collection, shamanism emerged as a category that operated to unify Russia in Asia as a culturally contiguous space located in an imperial elsewhere east of the Urals.

This article is focused on several themes connected with the history of photography, political exile in Imperial Russia, exploration and representations of Siberia in the late 19th–early 20th centuries. Photography became an essential tool in numerous geographic, topographic and ethnographic expeditions to Siberia in the late 19th century; well-known scientists started to master photography or were accompanied by professional photographers in their expeditions, including ones organized by the Russian Imperial Geographic Society, which resulted in the photographic records, reports, publications and exhibitions. Photography was rapidly spreading across Asian Russia and by the end of the 19th century there was a photo studio (or several ones) in almost every Siberian town. Political exiles were often among Siberian photographers, making photography their new profession, business, a way of getting a social status in the local society, and a means of surviving financially as well as intellectually and emotionally. They contributed significantly to the museum's collections by photographing indigenous people in Siberia and even traveling to Mongolia and China, displaying “types” as a part of anthropological research in Asia and presenting “views” of the Russian empire's borderlands. The visual representation of Siberia corresponded with general perceptions of an exotic East, populated by “primitive” peoples devoid of civilization, a trope reinforced by numerous photographs and depictions of Siberia as an untamed natural world, later transformed and modernized by the railroads construction.

The article focuses on the imprisonment of elite women from the Russian metropole and women of mixed ethnic backgrounds on the Siberian frontier in the mid-eighteenth-century. Female prisoners and their monastic jailors responded to ascribed identities, positions, and circumstances dictated by imperial policies within the walls of the Dalmatov Vvedenskii Convent, which complicates our understanding of imperial interaction, gender, and empire in Siberia.

In the late imperial era, the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (the Kunstkamera) in St. Petersburg produced a series of guidebooks for visitors that provided an account of the changes in the gallery spaces and collections within the museum. Among the changes was a reorganization of the collection that brought about the removal of a gallery dedicated to Russian ethnography, which had housed Siberian, Central Asian, and a small number of European Russian objects. Siberian and Central Asian materials were then presented by the museum in an Asian ethnographic collection. In this new Asian collection, shamanism emerged as a category that operated to unify Russia in Asia as a culturally contiguous space located in an imperial elsewhere east of the Urals.

This article is focused on several themes connected with the history of photography, political exile in Imperial Russia, exploration and representations of Siberia in the late 19th–early 20th centuries. Photography became an essential tool in numerous geographic, topographic and ethnographic expeditions to Siberia in the late 19th century; well-known scientists started to master photography or were accompanied by professional photographers in their expeditions, including ones organized by the Russian Imperial Geographic Society, which resulted in the photographic records, reports, publications and exhibitions. Photography was rapidly spreading across Asian Russia and by the end of the 19th century there was a photo studio (or several ones) in almost every Siberian town. Political exiles were often among Siberian photographers, making photography their new profession, business, a way of getting a social status in the local society, and a means of surviving financially as well as intellectually and emotionally. They contributed significantly to the museum's collections by photographing indigenous people in Siberia and even traveling to Mongolia and China, displaying “types” as a part of anthropological research in Asia and presenting “views” of the Russian empire's borderlands. The visual representation of Siberia corresponded with general perceptions of an exotic East, populated by “primitive” peoples devoid of civilization, a trope reinforced by numerous photographs and depictions of Siberia as an untamed natural world, later transformed and modernized by the railroads construction.

This article explores Russian political caricatures regarding the Boxer Uprising (1900) and the Russo-Japanese War (1904–5) that appeared in two of the empire's largest newspapers, Novoe vremia (The new times) and Russkoe slovo (The Russian word). The article argues that caricaturists both poked fun at international politics and crafted visual identities for their readers of Russia's European, Chinese, and Japanese neighbors. The images examined here sketch out the crowded and dangerous stage of global imperialism, while also pointing toward Russia's place within it. In the process, they articulate stylized notions of Europeanness and Asianness that had important connotations for how each periodical depicted the actors in each conflict.

The article focuses on the imprisonment of elite women from the Russian metropole and women of mixed ethnic backgrounds on the Siberian frontier in the mid-eighteenth-century. Female prisoners and their monastic jailors responded to ascribed identities, positions, and circumstances dictated by imperial policies within the walls of the Dalmatov Vvedenskii Convent, which complicates our understanding of imperial interaction, gender, and empire in Siberia.

In the late imperial era, the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (the Kunstkamera) in St. Petersburg produced a series of guidebooks for visitors that provided an account of the changes in the gallery spaces and collections within the museum. Among the changes was a reorganization of the collection that brought about the removal of a gallery dedicated to Russian ethnography, which had housed Siberian, Central Asian, and a small number of European Russian objects. Siberian and Central Asian materials were then presented by the museum in an Asian ethnographic collection. In this new Asian collection, shamanism emerged as a category that operated to unify Russia in Asia as a culturally contiguous space located in an imperial elsewhere east of the Urals.

This article is focused on several themes connected with the history of photography, political exile in Imperial Russia, exploration and representations of Siberia in the late 19th–early 20th centuries. Photography became an essential tool in numerous geographic, topographic and ethnographic expeditions to Siberia in the late 19th century; well-known scientists started to master photography or were accompanied by professional photographers in their expeditions, including ones organized by the Russian Imperial Geographic Society, which resulted in the photographic records, reports, publications and exhibitions. Photography was rapidly spreading across Asian Russia and by the end of the 19th century there was a photo studio (or several ones) in almost every Siberian town. Political exiles were often among Siberian photographers, making photography their new profession, business, a way of getting a social status in the local society, and a means of surviving financially as well as intellectually and emotionally. They contributed significantly to the museum's collections by photographing indigenous people in Siberia and even traveling to Mongolia and China, displaying “types” as a part of anthropological research in Asia and presenting “views” of the Russian empire's borderlands. The visual representation of Siberia corresponded with general perceptions of an exotic East, populated by “primitive” peoples devoid of civilization, a trope reinforced by numerous photographs and depictions of Siberia as an untamed natural world, later transformed and modernized by the railroads construction.

This article explores Russian political caricatures regarding the Boxer Uprising (1900) and the Russo-Japanese War (1904–5) that appeared in two of the empire's largest newspapers, Novoe vremia (The new times) and Russkoe slovo (The Russian word). The article argues that caricaturists both poked fun at international politics and crafted visual identities for their readers of Russia's European, Chinese, and Japanese neighbors. The images examined here sketch out the crowded and dangerous stage of global imperialism, while also pointing toward Russia's place within it. In the process, they articulate stylized notions of Europeanness and Asianness that had important connotations for how each periodical depicted the actors in each conflict.

Russia is unique on the circumpolar landscape in that indigenous communities constitute only a small percentage of its Arctic population. Whereas they represent 80 percent of Greenland's population, 50 percent of Canada's, 20 percent of Alaska's, and 15 percent of Norway's Arctic regions, they make up less than 5 percent of the population of Arctic Russia. Although indigenous peoples have a more solid demography than Russians and have therefore seen their share of the Arctic population slowly increase over the past two decades, their rights remain fragile. Moscow does not consider the Arctic to have a specific status due to the presence of indigenous peoples, and its reading of the region is still very much shaped by the imperial past, the memory of an easy conquest (osvoenie) of territories deemed “unpopulated,” and the exploitation of the region's subsoil resources.

Russia is unique on the circumpolar landscape in that indigenous communities constitute only a small percentage of its Arctic population. Whereas they represent 80 percent of Greenland's population, 50 percent of Canada's, 20 percent of Alaska's, and 15 percent of Norway's Arctic regions, they make up less than 5 percent of the population of Arctic Russia. Although indigenous peoples have a more solid demography than Russians and have therefore seen their share of the Arctic population slowly increase over the past two decades, their rights remain fragile. Moscow does not consider the Arctic to have a specific status due to the presence of indigenous peoples, and its reading of the region is still very much shaped by the imperial past, the memory of an easy conquest (osvoenie) of territories deemed “unpopulated,” and the exploitation of the region's subsoil resources.

Many cities of Russia's Far North face a massive population decline, with the exception of those based on oil and gas extraction in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. Yet, there is one more exception to that trend: the city of Yakutsk, capital of the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, whose population is booming, having grown from 186,000 in 1989 to 338,000 in 2018, This unique demographic dynamism is founded on the massive exodus of the ethnic Yakut population from rural parts of the republic to the capital city, a process that has reshaped the urban cultural landscape, making Yakutsk a genuine indigenous regional capital, the only one of its kind in the Russian Far North.

Russia is unique on the circumpolar landscape in that indigenous communities constitute only a small percentage of its Arctic population. Whereas they represent 80 percent of Greenland's population, 50 percent of Canada's, 20 percent of Alaska's, and 15 percent of Norway's Arctic regions, they make up less than 5 percent of the population of Arctic Russia. Although indigenous peoples have a more solid demography than Russians and have therefore seen their share of the Arctic population slowly increase over the past two decades, their rights remain fragile. Moscow does not consider the Arctic to have a specific status due to the presence of indigenous peoples, and its reading of the region is still very much shaped by the imperial past, the memory of an easy conquest (osvoenie) of territories deemed “unpopulated,” and the exploitation of the region's subsoil resources.

Many cities of Russia's Far North face a massive population decline, with the exception of those based on oil and gas extraction in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. Yet, there is one more exception to that trend: the city of Yakutsk, capital of the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, whose population is booming, having grown from 186,000 in 1989 to 338,000 in 2018, This unique demographic dynamism is founded on the massive exodus of the ethnic Yakut population from rural parts of the republic to the capital city, a process that has reshaped the urban cultural landscape, making Yakutsk a genuine indigenous regional capital, the only one of its kind in the Russian Far North.

This article explores the role of higher education institutions in the development of indigenous cultures in the Arctic city of Yakutsk. Although indigenous cultures have historically been related to traditional subsistence activities and a rural lifestyle, the growing urbanization of indigenous people brings new challenges and opportunities. The article draws on statistical data, as well as qualitative data from the Institute of Languages and Cultures of the Peoples of the Northeast (ILCPN) at the North-Eastern Federal University (NEFU) and the Arctic State Institute of Culture and Arts (AGIKI): annual reports, focus groups, interviews, and participant observations. The article argues that students and graduates contribute to the creation of a new image of the city as one in which indigenous cultures can find their own niche.

Russia is unique on the circumpolar landscape in that indigenous communities constitute only a small percentage of its Arctic population. Whereas they represent 80 percent of Greenland's population, 50 percent of Canada's, 20 percent of Alaska's, and 15 percent of Norway's Arctic regions, they make up less than 5 percent of the population of Arctic Russia. Although indigenous peoples have a more solid demography than Russians and have therefore seen their share of the Arctic population slowly increase over the past two decades, their rights remain fragile. Moscow does not consider the Arctic to have a specific status due to the presence of indigenous peoples, and its reading of the region is still very much shaped by the imperial past, the memory of an easy conquest (osvoenie) of territories deemed “unpopulated,” and the exploitation of the region's subsoil resources.

Many cities of Russia's Far North face a massive population decline, with the exception of those based on oil and gas extraction in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. Yet, there is one more exception to that trend: the city of Yakutsk, capital of the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, whose population is booming, having grown from 186,000 in 1989 to 338,000 in 2018, This unique demographic dynamism is founded on the massive exodus of the ethnic Yakut population from rural parts of the republic to the capital city, a process that has reshaped the urban cultural landscape, making Yakutsk a genuine indigenous regional capital, the only one of its kind in the Russian Far North.

This article explores the role of higher education institutions in the development of indigenous cultures in the Arctic city of Yakutsk. Although indigenous cultures have historically been related to traditional subsistence activities and a rural lifestyle, the growing urbanization of indigenous people brings new challenges and opportunities. The article draws on statistical data, as well as qualitative data from the Institute of Languages and Cultures of the Peoples of the Northeast (ILCPN) at the North-Eastern Federal University (NEFU) and the Arctic State Institute of Culture and Arts (AGIKI): annual reports, focus groups, interviews, and participant observations. The article argues that students and graduates contribute to the creation of a new image of the city as one in which indigenous cultures can find their own niche.

This article presents the social, economic, and political factors that contribute to the ongoing urbanization of the Nenets indigenous communities (“communities-in-transition”) in the Nenets Autonomous Region. Focusing on the preconditions for “indigenous flight” from traditional rural settlements to urban areas, the article analyzes key indicators—demographics, language proficiency, education level, and occupational sector, as well as social cohesion, interethnic relations, and political inclusion in the larger urban context—to describe the adaptation and integration processes of these new city dwellers. Based on the fieldwork in the region, the article also presents individual life strategies and career choices of indigenous youth and describes the role of gender in indigenous urbanization.

Russia is unique on the circumpolar landscape in that indigenous communities constitute only a small percentage of its Arctic population. Whereas they represent 80 percent of Greenland's population, 50 percent of Canada's, 20 percent of Alaska's, and 15 percent of Norway's Arctic regions, they make up less than 5 percent of the population of Arctic Russia. Although indigenous peoples have a more solid demography than Russians and have therefore seen their share of the Arctic population slowly increase over the past two decades, their rights remain fragile. Moscow does not consider the Arctic to have a specific status due to the presence of indigenous peoples, and its reading of the region is still very much shaped by the imperial past, the memory of an easy conquest (osvoenie) of territories deemed “unpopulated,” and the exploitation of the region's subsoil resources.

Many cities of Russia's Far North face a massive population decline, with the exception of those based on oil and gas extraction in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. Yet, there is one more exception to that trend: the city of Yakutsk, capital of the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, whose population is booming, having grown from 186,000 in 1989 to 338,000 in 2018, This unique demographic dynamism is founded on the massive exodus of the ethnic Yakut population from rural parts of the republic to the capital city, a process that has reshaped the urban cultural landscape, making Yakutsk a genuine indigenous regional capital, the only one of its kind in the Russian Far North.

This article explores the role of higher education institutions in the development of indigenous cultures in the Arctic city of Yakutsk. Although indigenous cultures have historically been related to traditional subsistence activities and a rural lifestyle, the growing urbanization of indigenous people brings new challenges and opportunities. The article draws on statistical data, as well as qualitative data from the Institute of Languages and Cultures of the Peoples of the Northeast (ILCPN) at the North-Eastern Federal University (NEFU) and the Arctic State Institute of Culture and Arts (AGIKI): annual reports, focus groups, interviews, and participant observations. The article argues that students and graduates contribute to the creation of a new image of the city as one in which indigenous cultures can find their own niche.

This article presents the social, economic, and political factors that contribute to the ongoing urbanization of the Nenets indigenous communities (“communities-in-transition”) in the Nenets Autonomous Region. Focusing on the preconditions for “indigenous flight” from traditional rural settlements to urban areas, the article analyzes key indicators—demographics, language proficiency, education level, and occupational sector, as well as social cohesion, interethnic relations, and political inclusion in the larger urban context—to describe the adaptation and integration processes of these new city dwellers. Based on the fieldwork in the region, the article also presents individual life strategies and career choices of indigenous youth and describes the role of gender in indigenous urbanization.

The Arctic is one of Russia's treasures. However, Arctic economic development means that business is invading lands that are sacred to indigenous peoples. As a rule, regional authorities are interested in tax revenues from subsoil users, prompting them to decide the culture-or-mining dilemma in favor of the latter. But this does not mean that the price of this encroachment on indigenous lands remains uncalculated. Since its establishment in 2010, Yakutia's Ethnological Expertise Committee has developed a tool for assessing the damage caused to indigenous communities by subsoil users. The problem of getting businesses to compensate indigenous communities has yet to be solved. This article seeks answers to the problem of fair compensation methods and explores modes of partnership and cooperation on traditional lands.

Russia is unique on the circumpolar landscape in that indigenous communities constitute only a small percentage of its Arctic population. Whereas they represent 80 percent of Greenland's population, 50 percent of Canada's, 20 percent of Alaska's, and 15 percent of Norway's Arctic regions, they make up less than 5 percent of the population of Arctic Russia. Although indigenous peoples have a more solid demography than Russians and have therefore seen their share of the Arctic population slowly increase over the past two decades, their rights remain fragile. Moscow does not consider the Arctic to have a specific status due to the presence of indigenous peoples, and its reading of the region is still very much shaped by the imperial past, the memory of an easy conquest (osvoenie) of territories deemed “unpopulated,” and the exploitation of the region's subsoil resources.

Many cities of Russia's Far North face a massive population decline, with the exception of those based on oil and gas extraction in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. Yet, there is one more exception to that trend: the city of Yakutsk, capital of the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, whose population is booming, having grown from 186,000 in 1989 to 338,000 in 2018, This unique demographic dynamism is founded on the massive exodus of the ethnic Yakut population from rural parts of the republic to the capital city, a process that has reshaped the urban cultural landscape, making Yakutsk a genuine indigenous regional capital, the only one of its kind in the Russian Far North.

This article explores the role of higher education institutions in the development of indigenous cultures in the Arctic city of Yakutsk. Although indigenous cultures have historically been related to traditional subsistence activities and a rural lifestyle, the growing urbanization of indigenous people brings new challenges and opportunities. The article draws on statistical data, as well as qualitative data from the Institute of Languages and Cultures of the Peoples of the Northeast (ILCPN) at the North-Eastern Federal University (NEFU) and the Arctic State Institute of Culture and Arts (AGIKI): annual reports, focus groups, interviews, and participant observations. The article argues that students and graduates contribute to the creation of a new image of the city as one in which indigenous cultures can find their own niche.

This article presents the social, economic, and political factors that contribute to the ongoing urbanization of the Nenets indigenous communities (“communities-in-transition”) in the Nenets Autonomous Region. Focusing on the preconditions for “indigenous flight” from traditional rural settlements to urban areas, the article analyzes key indicators—demographics, language proficiency, education level, and occupational sector, as well as social cohesion, interethnic relations, and political inclusion in the larger urban context—to describe the adaptation and integration processes of these new city dwellers. Based on the fieldwork in the region, the article also presents individual life strategies and career choices of indigenous youth and describes the role of gender in indigenous urbanization.

The Arctic is one of Russia's treasures. However, Arctic economic development means that business is invading lands that are sacred to indigenous peoples. As a rule, regional authorities are interested in tax revenues from subsoil users, prompting them to decide the culture-or-mining dilemma in favor of the latter. But this does not mean that the price of this encroachment on indigenous lands remains uncalculated. Since its establishment in 2010, Yakutia's Ethnological Expertise Committee has developed a tool for assessing the damage caused to indigenous communities by subsoil users. The problem of getting businesses to compensate indigenous communities has yet to be solved. This article seeks answers to the problem of fair compensation methods and explores modes of partnership and cooperation on traditional lands.

Through the example of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug–Yugra, which has become one of the country's main energy hubs (accounting for 62 percent of Russian oil production) and a pioneer in matters of native rights, this article sheds light on what is at stake in the Siberian taiga of the early twenty-first century between two worlds that, over the years, have variously clashed, assisted each other, and ignored each other. Based primarily on fieldwork carried out between 2013 and 2018, as well as on interviews with local cultural and economic actors, the article outlines a local aspect of a history in movement that is still to be written.

Russia is unique on the circumpolar landscape in that indigenous communities constitute only a small percentage of its Arctic population. Whereas they represent 80 percent of Greenland's population, 50 percent of Canada's, 20 percent of Alaska's, and 15 percent of Norway's Arctic regions, they make up less than 5 percent of the population of Arctic Russia. Although indigenous peoples have a more solid demography than Russians and have therefore seen their share of the Arctic population slowly increase over the past two decades, their rights remain fragile. Moscow does not consider the Arctic to have a specific status due to the presence of indigenous peoples, and its reading of the region is still very much shaped by the imperial past, the memory of an easy conquest (osvoenie) of territories deemed “unpopulated,” and the exploitation of the region's subsoil resources.

Many cities of Russia's Far North face a massive population decline, with the exception of those based on oil and gas extraction in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. Yet, there is one more exception to that trend: the city of Yakutsk, capital of the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, whose population is booming, having grown from 186,000 in 1989 to 338,000 in 2018, This unique demographic dynamism is founded on the massive exodus of the ethnic Yakut population from rural parts of the republic to the capital city, a process that has reshaped the urban cultural landscape, making Yakutsk a genuine indigenous regional capital, the only one of its kind in the Russian Far North.

This article explores the role of higher education institutions in the development of indigenous cultures in the Arctic city of Yakutsk. Although indigenous cultures have historically been related to traditional subsistence activities and a rural lifestyle, the growing urbanization of indigenous people brings new challenges and opportunities. The article draws on statistical data, as well as qualitative data from the Institute of Languages and Cultures of the Peoples of the Northeast (ILCPN) at the North-Eastern Federal University (NEFU) and the Arctic State Institute of Culture and Arts (AGIKI): annual reports, focus groups, interviews, and participant observations. The article argues that students and graduates contribute to the creation of a new image of the city as one in which indigenous cultures can find their own niche.

This article presents the social, economic, and political factors that contribute to the ongoing urbanization of the Nenets indigenous communities (“communities-in-transition”) in the Nenets Autonomous Region. Focusing on the preconditions for “indigenous flight” from traditional rural settlements to urban areas, the article analyzes key indicators—demographics, language proficiency, education level, and occupational sector, as well as social cohesion, interethnic relations, and political inclusion in the larger urban context—to describe the adaptation and integration processes of these new city dwellers. Based on the fieldwork in the region, the article also presents individual life strategies and career choices of indigenous youth and describes the role of gender in indigenous urbanization.

The Arctic is one of Russia's treasures. However, Arctic economic development means that business is invading lands that are sacred to indigenous peoples. As a rule, regional authorities are interested in tax revenues from subsoil users, prompting them to decide the culture-or-mining dilemma in favor of the latter. But this does not mean that the price of this encroachment on indigenous lands remains uncalculated. Since its establishment in 2010, Yakutia's Ethnological Expertise Committee has developed a tool for assessing the damage caused to indigenous communities by subsoil users. The problem of getting businesses to compensate indigenous communities has yet to be solved. This article seeks answers to the problem of fair compensation methods and explores modes of partnership and cooperation on traditional lands.

Through the example of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug–Yugra, which has become one of the country's main energy hubs (accounting for 62 percent of Russian oil production) and a pioneer in matters of native rights, this article sheds light on what is at stake in the Siberian taiga of the early twenty-first century between two worlds that, over the years, have variously clashed, assisted each other, and ignored each other. Based primarily on fieldwork carried out between 2013 and 2018, as well as on interviews with local cultural and economic actors, the article outlines a local aspect of a history in movement that is still to be written.

Smoking under the Tsars: A History of Tobacco in Imperial Russia Tricia Starks (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2018), xiii +320 pp. ISBN 978-1-5017-2205-9.

White Fox and Icy Seas in the Western Arctic: The Fur Trade, Transportation and Change in the Early Twentieth Century John R. Bockstoce (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2018), 327 pp., index, illustrations, maps, $40.00 (hardback). ISBN 978-0-300-22179-4.

Delo—Tabak: Polveka fabriki “Iava” glazami ee rukovoditelia Leonid Sinel'nikov (Moscow: Delo, 2017), 511 pp., ISBN: 978-5-7749-1260-5.

Life Histories of Etnos Theory in Russia and Beyond David G. Anderson, Dmitry V. Arzyutov and Sergei S. Alymov, eds. (Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2019), 425 pp., https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0150, ISBN 9781783745449.

Russian imperialism continues to leave a strong imprint on indigenous cultures across Siberia, and throughout the Russian Federation and the post-Soviet republics. Imperialism is invasive and persistent, and it might be impossible to escape its consequences. In 1986, African novelist and postcolonial theorist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o published his influential essay collection, Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. One of his arguments is that no postcolonial subject could be free from the constraints of imperialism until she or he succeeded in freeing the mind from the trap of an imposed (and foreign) language. Ngũgĩ’s experience was based on his own life growing up in Kenya, but his lesson is as applicable to Siberia as it is for East Africa. For indigenous Siberians, language and education are at the forefront of the ongoing postcolonial struggle to maintain their cultural identities in modern Russia.

Russian imperialism continues to leave a strong imprint on indigenous cultures across Siberia, and throughout the Russian Federation and the post-Soviet republics. Imperialism is invasive and persistent, and it might be impossible to escape its consequences. In 1986, African novelist and postcolonial theorist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o published his influential essay collection, Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. One of his arguments is that no postcolonial subject could be free from the constraints of imperialism until she or he succeeded in freeing the mind from the trap of an imposed (and foreign) language. Ngũgĩ’s experience was based on his own life growing up in Kenya, but his lesson is as applicable to Siberia as it is for East Africa. For indigenous Siberians, language and education are at the forefront of the ongoing postcolonial struggle to maintain their cultural identities in modern Russia.

This article explores the ethnographic, philosophical, and political background of the image of the northern peoples as “silent,” by analyzing the diachronic perspective descriptions of the Finno-Ugric peoples of the north who inhabit Western Siberia and the Russian North from the eighteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth. Early modern ethnographies treated the Siberian peoples as aggressive, although from the end of the eighteenth century this image was reassessed and a different view of the silent character of the indigenous people was introduced in scholarly literature. Silent conduct was assessed as an archaic quality of the Finno-Ugric temperament, or as the result of the colonial encounter. This manifestation of silence was the most distinctive marker of the modern transformations of power and knowledge in the arena of Siberian studies.

Russian imperialism continues to leave a strong imprint on indigenous cultures across Siberia, and throughout the Russian Federation and the post-Soviet republics. Imperialism is invasive and persistent, and it might be impossible to escape its consequences. In 1986, African novelist and postcolonial theorist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o published his influential essay collection, Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. One of his arguments is that no postcolonial subject could be free from the constraints of imperialism until she or he succeeded in freeing the mind from the trap of an imposed (and foreign) language. Ngũgĩ’s experience was based on his own life growing up in Kenya, but his lesson is as applicable to Siberia as it is for East Africa. For indigenous Siberians, language and education are at the forefront of the ongoing postcolonial struggle to maintain their cultural identities in modern Russia.

This article explores the ethnographic, philosophical, and political background of the image of the northern peoples as “silent,” by analyzing the diachronic perspective descriptions of the Finno-Ugric peoples of the north who inhabit Western Siberia and the Russian North from the eighteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth. Early modern ethnographies treated the Siberian peoples as aggressive, although from the end of the eighteenth century this image was reassessed and a different view of the silent character of the indigenous people was introduced in scholarly literature. Silent conduct was assessed as an archaic quality of the Finno-Ugric temperament, or as the result of the colonial encounter. This manifestation of silence was the most distinctive marker of the modern transformations of power and knowledge in the arena of Siberian studies.

This article explores the language attitudes of young residents of the Republic of Buriatiia toward two official languages in the region, Buriat and Russian. The article also contributes to the research methodology on language attitudes and use, notably by employing a verbal guise technique in a psychosociolinguistic experiment. In the experiment, both phonetically authentic (native, accent-free) and inauthentic (non-native, phonetically nonstandard) Buriat and Russian voices are evaluated by representatives of both nationalities based on two distinct lines: achievement and character traits. The experiment revealed positive attitudes toward native speaking and perception of non-native speaking as a deviation from the norm that are indicative of the unconscious “one ethnicity—one language” idea in the mass consciousness of the youth in Buriatiia along with the strategies of tolerance and ethnocentrism.

Russian imperialism continues to leave a strong imprint on indigenous cultures across Siberia, and throughout the Russian Federation and the post-Soviet republics. Imperialism is invasive and persistent, and it might be impossible to escape its consequences. In 1986, African novelist and postcolonial theorist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o published his influential essay collection, Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. One of his arguments is that no postcolonial subject could be free from the constraints of imperialism until she or he succeeded in freeing the mind from the trap of an imposed (and foreign) language. Ngũgĩ’s experience was based on his own life growing up in Kenya, but his lesson is as applicable to Siberia as it is for East Africa. For indigenous Siberians, language and education are at the forefront of the ongoing postcolonial struggle to maintain their cultural identities in modern Russia.

This article explores the ethnographic, philosophical, and political background of the image of the northern peoples as “silent,” by analyzing the diachronic perspective descriptions of the Finno-Ugric peoples of the north who inhabit Western Siberia and the Russian North from the eighteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth. Early modern ethnographies treated the Siberian peoples as aggressive, although from the end of the eighteenth century this image was reassessed and a different view of the silent character of the indigenous people was introduced in scholarly literature. Silent conduct was assessed as an archaic quality of the Finno-Ugric temperament, or as the result of the colonial encounter. This manifestation of silence was the most distinctive marker of the modern transformations of power and knowledge in the arena of Siberian studies.

This article explores the language attitudes of young residents of the Republic of Buriatiia toward two official languages in the region, Buriat and Russian. The article also contributes to the research methodology on language attitudes and use, notably by employing a verbal guise technique in a psychosociolinguistic experiment. In the experiment, both phonetically authentic (native, accent-free) and inauthentic (non-native, phonetically nonstandard) Buriat and Russian voices are evaluated by representatives of both nationalities based on two distinct lines: achievement and character traits. The experiment revealed positive attitudes toward native speaking and perception of non-native speaking as a deviation from the norm that are indicative of the unconscious “one ethnicity—one language” idea in the mass consciousness of the youth in Buriatiia along with the strategies of tolerance and ethnocentrism.

This article covers the process of identity construction in children; this process defines the focus of Russian educational policy, which also provides a venue for alternative ways to implement it. The article presents research on designing a system to form national, regional, and ethnocultural identity in children of the indigenous people of the North via the curriculum and teaching aids. The article examines regions of Russia inhabited by indigenous small-numbered peoples, as well as their distinctive features, which have a significant impact on the process of identity construction in children of the North. This has revealed the specific character of the large formation of positive types of identity within the educational system.

Russian imperialism continues to leave a strong imprint on indigenous cultures across Siberia, and throughout the Russian Federation and the post-Soviet republics. Imperialism is invasive and persistent, and it might be impossible to escape its consequences. In 1986, African novelist and postcolonial theorist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o published his influential essay collection, Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. One of his arguments is that no postcolonial subject could be free from the constraints of imperialism until she or he succeeded in freeing the mind from the trap of an imposed (and foreign) language. Ngũgĩ’s experience was based on his own life growing up in Kenya, but his lesson is as applicable to Siberia as it is for East Africa. For indigenous Siberians, language and education are at the forefront of the ongoing postcolonial struggle to maintain their cultural identities in modern Russia.

This article explores the ethnographic, philosophical, and political background of the image of the northern peoples as “silent,” by analyzing the diachronic perspective descriptions of the Finno-Ugric peoples of the north who inhabit Western Siberia and the Russian North from the eighteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth. Early modern ethnographies treated the Siberian peoples as aggressive, although from the end of the eighteenth century this image was reassessed and a different view of the silent character of the indigenous people was introduced in scholarly literature. Silent conduct was assessed as an archaic quality of the Finno-Ugric temperament, or as the result of the colonial encounter. This manifestation of silence was the most distinctive marker of the modern transformations of power and knowledge in the arena of Siberian studies.

This article explores the language attitudes of young residents of the Republic of Buriatiia toward two official languages in the region, Buriat and Russian. The article also contributes to the research methodology on language attitudes and use, notably by employing a verbal guise technique in a psychosociolinguistic experiment. In the experiment, both phonetically authentic (native, accent-free) and inauthentic (non-native, phonetically nonstandard) Buriat and Russian voices are evaluated by representatives of both nationalities based on two distinct lines: achievement and character traits. The experiment revealed positive attitudes toward native speaking and perception of non-native speaking as a deviation from the norm that are indicative of the unconscious “one ethnicity—one language” idea in the mass consciousness of the youth in Buriatiia along with the strategies of tolerance and ethnocentrism.

This article covers the process of identity construction in children; this process defines the focus of Russian educational policy, which also provides a venue for alternative ways to implement it. The article presents research on designing a system to form national, regional, and ethnocultural identity in children of the indigenous people of the North via the curriculum and teaching aids. The article examines regions of Russia inhabited by indigenous small-numbered peoples, as well as their distinctive features, which have a significant impact on the process of identity construction in children of the North. This has revealed the specific character of the large formation of positive types of identity within the educational system.

The Chukchi-speaking population is distributed within three regions of the Russian Federation—Chukotka, Kamchatka, and Yakutia. Because of the lack of regular transportation between these regions and different attitudes toward the Chukchi from the local authorities, Chukchi-speaking communities in these regions have become isolated from one another and have been developing independently. This article observes the dynamics of language shift in all Chukchi-speaking areas through the analysis of the data of the Russian Censuses (1897–2015), literature sources, and personal observations. The figures in this article illustrate the distribution of Chukchi-speaking communities within their historical and modern homeland, Chukchi vernacular zones, the participation in traditional economic activities, and contacts with other languages.

Russian imperialism continues to leave a strong imprint on indigenous cultures across Siberia, and throughout the Russian Federation and the post-Soviet republics. Imperialism is invasive and persistent, and it might be impossible to escape its consequences. In 1986, African novelist and postcolonial theorist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o published his influential essay collection, Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. One of his arguments is that no postcolonial subject could be free from the constraints of imperialism until she or he succeeded in freeing the mind from the trap of an imposed (and foreign) language. Ngũgĩ’s experience was based on his own life growing up in Kenya, but his lesson is as applicable to Siberia as it is for East Africa. For indigenous Siberians, language and education are at the forefront of the ongoing postcolonial struggle to maintain their cultural identities in modern Russia.

This article explores the ethnographic, philosophical, and political background of the image of the northern peoples as “silent,” by analyzing the diachronic perspective descriptions of the Finno-Ugric peoples of the north who inhabit Western Siberia and the Russian North from the eighteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth. Early modern ethnographies treated the Siberian peoples as aggressive, although from the end of the eighteenth century this image was reassessed and a different view of the silent character of the indigenous people was introduced in scholarly literature. Silent conduct was assessed as an archaic quality of the Finno-Ugric temperament, or as the result of the colonial encounter. This manifestation of silence was the most distinctive marker of the modern transformations of power and knowledge in the arena of Siberian studies.

This article explores the language attitudes of young residents of the Republic of Buriatiia toward two official languages in the region, Buriat and Russian. The article also contributes to the research methodology on language attitudes and use, notably by employing a verbal guise technique in a psychosociolinguistic experiment. In the experiment, both phonetically authentic (native, accent-free) and inauthentic (non-native, phonetically nonstandard) Buriat and Russian voices are evaluated by representatives of both nationalities based on two distinct lines: achievement and character traits. The experiment revealed positive attitudes toward native speaking and perception of non-native speaking as a deviation from the norm that are indicative of the unconscious “one ethnicity—one language” idea in the mass consciousness of the youth in Buriatiia along with the strategies of tolerance and ethnocentrism.

This article covers the process of identity construction in children; this process defines the focus of Russian educational policy, which also provides a venue for alternative ways to implement it. The article presents research on designing a system to form national, regional, and ethnocultural identity in children of the indigenous people of the North via the curriculum and teaching aids. The article examines regions of Russia inhabited by indigenous small-numbered peoples, as well as their distinctive features, which have a significant impact on the process of identity construction in children of the North. This has revealed the specific character of the large formation of positive types of identity within the educational system.

The Chukchi-speaking population is distributed within three regions of the Russian Federation—Chukotka, Kamchatka, and Yakutia. Because of the lack of regular transportation between these regions and different attitudes toward the Chukchi from the local authorities, Chukchi-speaking communities in these regions have become isolated from one another and have been developing independently. This article observes the dynamics of language shift in all Chukchi-speaking areas through the analysis of the data of the Russian Censuses (1897–2015), literature sources, and personal observations. The figures in this article illustrate the distribution of Chukchi-speaking communities within their historical and modern homeland, Chukchi vernacular zones, the participation in traditional economic activities, and contacts with other languages.

A World of Empires: The Russian Voyage of the Frigate Pallada Edyta M. Bojanowska (Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 2018), viii +373 pp., illus., maps. ISBN 978-0-674976405. $35.00

Thomas, Lucy & Alatau: The Atkinsons’ Adventures in Siberia and the Kazakh Steppe John Massey Stewart (London: Unicorn, 2018), 344 pages. ISBN 978-1-911604-30-3. Hardback, £25.00.

Our new volume begins with a departure. Tatiana Argounova-Low, following a long term as an associate editor, has left the journal to focus on other projects. We owe her a great debt of thanks for all her work for the journal, which included numerous translations over the years. Most recently, she and Jenanne Ferguson translated the entirety of our last issue on “Indigenous Methodology in the Study of the Native Peoples of Siberia.” The project was an enormous undertaking. We know that Tatiana's contributions will continue to be valuable for the field and for Sibirica and wish her the best with her future endeavors.

Our new volume begins with a departure. Tatiana Argounova-Low, following a long term as an associate editor, has left the journal to focus on other projects. We owe her a great debt of thanks for all her work for the journal, which included numerous translations over the years. Most recently, she and Jenanne Ferguson translated the entirety of our last issue on “Indigenous Methodology in the Study of the Native Peoples of Siberia.” The project was an enormous undertaking. We know that Tatiana's contributions will continue to be valuable for the field and for Sibirica and wish her the best with her future endeavors.

This article evaluates the relationship among the railroad staff of the Far East during the most dramatic events in the political life of the country at that time—repressions. As a rule, Russian academic literature indicates that few workers perceived the Soviet state's mechanisms of pressure negatively. This article demonstrates that the railroad staff's position was far more diverse than traditionally argued, which is a result of the broad variety of social groups working for the railroad in the Far East. The article demonstrates this diversity of opinions by focusing on those events that affected a significant number of railroad workers.

Our new volume begins with a departure. Tatiana Argounova-Low, following a long term as an associate editor, has left the journal to focus on other projects. We owe her a great debt of thanks for all her work for the journal, which included numerous translations over the years. Most recently, she and Jenanne Ferguson translated the entirety of our last issue on “Indigenous Methodology in the Study of the Native Peoples of Siberia.” The project was an enormous undertaking. We know that Tatiana's contributions will continue to be valuable for the field and for Sibirica and wish her the best with her future endeavors.

This article evaluates the relationship among the railroad staff of the Far East during the most dramatic events in the political life of the country at that time—repressions. As a rule, Russian academic literature indicates that few workers perceived the Soviet state's mechanisms of pressure negatively. This article demonstrates that the railroad staff's position was far more diverse than traditionally argued, which is a result of the broad variety of social groups working for the railroad in the Far East. The article demonstrates this diversity of opinions by focusing on those events that affected a significant number of railroad workers.

The Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM), a railroad in East Siberia and the Russian Far East, became the last large Soviet industrial project. Its construction in the 1970s and 1980s attracted migrants from across the USSR, who formed the bamovtsy, or group of BAM builders. They share a history of working and living along the BAM and constitute the majority population in the region. The article argues that emotionally charged social memory of the BAM construction plays the central role in reproducing and reinforcing the bamovtsy identity in the post-Soviet period. Drawing on in-depth interviews and focus groups, the article examines the dynamics of both individual and collective remembering of the socialist BAM. It forms a vibrant discursive and emotional field, in which memories and identities are reconstructed, relived, and contested. Commemorative ceremonies such as the fortieth anniversary of the BAM serve as forums of public remembering and arenas for the politics of emotions.

Our new volume begins with a departure. Tatiana Argounova-Low, following a long term as an associate editor, has left the journal to focus on other projects. We owe her a great debt of thanks for all her work for the journal, which included numerous translations over the years. Most recently, she and Jenanne Ferguson translated the entirety of our last issue on “Indigenous Methodology in the Study of the Native Peoples of Siberia.” The project was an enormous undertaking. We know that Tatiana's contributions will continue to be valuable for the field and for Sibirica and wish her the best with her future endeavors.

This article evaluates the relationship among the railroad staff of the Far East during the most dramatic events in the political life of the country at that time—repressions. As a rule, Russian academic literature indicates that few workers perceived the Soviet state's mechanisms of pressure negatively. This article demonstrates that the railroad staff's position was far more diverse than traditionally argued, which is a result of the broad variety of social groups working for the railroad in the Far East. The article demonstrates this diversity of opinions by focusing on those events that affected a significant number of railroad workers.

The Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM), a railroad in East Siberia and the Russian Far East, became the last large Soviet industrial project. Its construction in the 1970s and 1980s attracted migrants from across the USSR, who formed the bamovtsy, or group of BAM builders. They share a history of working and living along the BAM and constitute the majority population in the region. The article argues that emotionally charged social memory of the BAM construction plays the central role in reproducing and reinforcing the bamovtsy identity in the post-Soviet period. Drawing on in-depth interviews and focus groups, the article examines the dynamics of both individual and collective remembering of the socialist BAM. It forms a vibrant discursive and emotional field, in which memories and identities are reconstructed, relived, and contested. Commemorative ceremonies such as the fortieth anniversary of the BAM serve as forums of public remembering and arenas for the politics of emotions.

This article describes current matrimonial strategies and residence patterns in two communities in the Sakha Republic. In Tolon, a rural settlement in central Sakha, community exogamy is predominant and patrilocality is detectable in postnuptial residence patterns. In the sub-Arctic town of Khonuu no gendered residence patterns are observed. Khonuu has an airport and serves as a regional capital. In Khonuu matrimonial decisions follow the immigration of men and couples rather than traditional strategies connected with horse- and cattle-based subsistence. This article discusses the possible biological, historical, and cultural reasons that explain the observance or lack of observance of traditional marriage in the contemporary Sakha Republic.

Our new volume begins with a departure. Tatiana Argounova-Low, following a long term as an associate editor, has left the journal to focus on other projects. We owe her a great debt of thanks for all her work for the journal, which included numerous translations over the years. Most recently, she and Jenanne Ferguson translated the entirety of our last issue on “Indigenous Methodology in the Study of the Native Peoples of Siberia.” The project was an enormous undertaking. We know that Tatiana's contributions will continue to be valuable for the field and for Sibirica and wish her the best with her future endeavors.

This article evaluates the relationship among the railroad staff of the Far East during the most dramatic events in the political life of the country at that time—repressions. As a rule, Russian academic literature indicates that few workers perceived the Soviet state's mechanisms of pressure negatively. This article demonstrates that the railroad staff's position was far more diverse than traditionally argued, which is a result of the broad variety of social groups working for the railroad in the Far East. The article demonstrates this diversity of opinions by focusing on those events that affected a significant number of railroad workers.

The Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM), a railroad in East Siberia and the Russian Far East, became the last large Soviet industrial project. Its construction in the 1970s and 1980s attracted migrants from across the USSR, who formed the bamovtsy, or group of BAM builders. They share a history of working and living along the BAM and constitute the majority population in the region. The article argues that emotionally charged social memory of the BAM construction plays the central role in reproducing and reinforcing the bamovtsy identity in the post-Soviet period. Drawing on in-depth interviews and focus groups, the article examines the dynamics of both individual and collective remembering of the socialist BAM. It forms a vibrant discursive and emotional field, in which memories and identities are reconstructed, relived, and contested. Commemorative ceremonies such as the fortieth anniversary of the BAM serve as forums of public remembering and arenas for the politics of emotions.

This article describes current matrimonial strategies and residence patterns in two communities in the Sakha Republic. In Tolon, a rural settlement in central Sakha, community exogamy is predominant and patrilocality is detectable in postnuptial residence patterns. In the sub-Arctic town of Khonuu no gendered residence patterns are observed. Khonuu has an airport and serves as a regional capital. In Khonuu matrimonial decisions follow the immigration of men and couples rather than traditional strategies connected with horse- and cattle-based subsistence. This article discusses the possible biological, historical, and cultural reasons that explain the observance or lack of observance of traditional marriage in the contemporary Sakha Republic.

This article analyzes the concept of an Arctic circumpolar civilization and focuses on contradictions inherent within the concept. Some of these antinomies are the nomadic character of the traditional Arctic civilization and the traditional academic approach that takes a sedentarist perspective; the rich worldview of the Arctic residents and its inadequate reflection in the rational paradigm of cognition; and issues surrounding sustainable development and the global crisis of humanity, which leads to instability worldwide, including in the Arctic. The article proposes method of dialectical synthesis for resolving such antinomies.

Translated by Tatiana Argounova-Low

Our new volume begins with a departure. Tatiana Argounova-Low, following a long term as an associate editor, has left the journal to focus on other projects. We owe her a great debt of thanks for all her work for the journal, which included numerous translations over the years. Most recently, she and Jenanne Ferguson translated the entirety of our last issue on “Indigenous Methodology in the Study of the Native Peoples of Siberia.” The project was an enormous undertaking. We know that Tatiana's contributions will continue to be valuable for the field and for Sibirica and wish her the best with her future endeavors.

This article evaluates the relationship among the railroad staff of the Far East during the most dramatic events in the political life of the country at that time—repressions. As a rule, Russian academic literature indicates that few workers perceived the Soviet state's mechanisms of pressure negatively. This article demonstrates that the railroad staff's position was far more diverse than traditionally argued, which is a result of the broad variety of social groups working for the railroad in the Far East. The article demonstrates this diversity of opinions by focusing on those events that affected a significant number of railroad workers.

The Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM), a railroad in East Siberia and the Russian Far East, became the last large Soviet industrial project. Its construction in the 1970s and 1980s attracted migrants from across the USSR, who formed the bamovtsy, or group of BAM builders. They share a history of working and living along the BAM and constitute the majority population in the region. The article argues that emotionally charged social memory of the BAM construction plays the central role in reproducing and reinforcing the bamovtsy identity in the post-Soviet period. Drawing on in-depth interviews and focus groups, the article examines the dynamics of both individual and collective remembering of the socialist BAM. It forms a vibrant discursive and emotional field, in which memories and identities are reconstructed, relived, and contested. Commemorative ceremonies such as the fortieth anniversary of the BAM serve as forums of public remembering and arenas for the politics of emotions.

This article describes current matrimonial strategies and residence patterns in two communities in the Sakha Republic. In Tolon, a rural settlement in central Sakha, community exogamy is predominant and patrilocality is detectable in postnuptial residence patterns. In the sub-Arctic town of Khonuu no gendered residence patterns are observed. Khonuu has an airport and serves as a regional capital. In Khonuu matrimonial decisions follow the immigration of men and couples rather than traditional strategies connected with horse- and cattle-based subsistence. This article discusses the possible biological, historical, and cultural reasons that explain the observance or lack of observance of traditional marriage in the contemporary Sakha Republic.

This article analyzes the concept of an Arctic circumpolar civilization and focuses on contradictions inherent within the concept. Some of these antinomies are the nomadic character of the traditional Arctic civilization and the traditional academic approach that takes a sedentarist perspective; the rich worldview of the Arctic residents and its inadequate reflection in the rational paradigm of cognition; and issues surrounding sustainable development and the global crisis of humanity, which leads to instability worldwide, including in the Arctic. The article proposes method of dialectical synthesis for resolving such antinomies.

Translated by Tatiana Argounova-Low

A World Trimmed with Fur: Wild Things and the Natural Fringes of Qing Rule Jonathan Schlesinger (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2017), 288 pp. ISBN: 9780804799966.

Ethnic and Religious Minorities in Stalin's Soviet Union: New Dimensions of Research Andrej Kotljarchuk and Olle Sundström, eds. (Stockholm: Elanders, 2017), 283 pp., paperback $27.00. ISBN: 978-91-7601-777-7.

Kosmologiia i praktika sibirskogo shamanizma Elena V. Nam (Tomsk: Tomskii gosudarstvennyi universitet, 2017), 296 pp. ISBN: 978-5-7511-2521-9.

Kul'tura i resursy. Opyt etnologicheskogo obsledovaniia sovremennogo polozheniia narodov Severnogo Sakhalina Dmitrii Funk, ed. (Moscow: “Demos,” 2015), 272 pp. ISBN 978-5-9904710-6-1.

Maritime Hunting Culture of Chukotka: Traditions and Modern Practices Igor Krupnik and Rachel Mason, eds. (Anchorage, AK: National Park Service, Shared Beringian Heritage Program, 2016), 343 pp. ISBN: 9780990725251.

Litsom k moriu: Pamiati Liudmily Bogoslovskoi Igor Krupnik, ed.(Moscow: Moskva, 2016), 647 pp. ISBN 9785600013650.

T-Bone Whacks and Caviar Snacks: Cooking with Two Texans in Siberia and the Russian Far East Sharon Hudgins(Denton: University of North Texas Press, 2018), 448 pp. ISBN: 9781574417142.

Bij de Joekagieren. Het oudste toendravolk van Noord-Oost Siberië / Life with the Yukaghir: Northeast Siberia's Oldest Tundra People Cecilia Odé (Lias, Uitgeverij: Verschijningsjass, 2018), 240 pp., €29.95 (paperback). ISBN: 978-90-8803-099-4.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

This article examines the book culture of the Buryat Buddhists of the Southern Siberia. Based on social archaeographic studies, the article posits a link between local book culture and the stable identity of Buryat Buddhist. Defining Buryat Buddhist identity based on an analysis of different aspects of their worldview, cultural life, and historical past, this article reveals how Buddhist book culture and home life are the most important aspects in the formation of local identity. The analysis confirms that a radical change in the mechanism of the transfer of tradition, social changes, and the economic crisis led to the transformation of the vector of development in the traditional book culture of the Buryats, highlighting that the main priority is not the religious but the ethnic component.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

This article examines the book culture of the Buryat Buddhists of the Southern Siberia. Based on social archaeographic studies, the article posits a link between local book culture and the stable identity of Buryat Buddhist. Defining Buryat Buddhist identity based on an analysis of different aspects of their worldview, cultural life, and historical past, this article reveals how Buddhist book culture and home life are the most important aspects in the formation of local identity. The analysis confirms that a radical change in the mechanism of the transfer of tradition, social changes, and the economic crisis led to the transformation of the vector of development in the traditional book culture of the Buryats, highlighting that the main priority is not the religious but the ethnic component.

Ethnic cultures experience great transformations that affect their sustainability and holistic nature. However, the traditions related to life and death are, remarkably, persisting. This articles focuses on funerary customs and burial rituals that are significant for the Khakass people. In this research of the Khakass burial rituals we bring together archaeological, ethnographic, and folklore material that reveals unique data about funerary customs. The article reviews the burial rituals in historical perspective and focuses on changes the rituals have undergone. It concludes with the summary of transformations in contemporary burial practices.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

This article examines the book culture of the Buryat Buddhists of the Southern Siberia. Based on social archaeographic studies, the article posits a link between local book culture and the stable identity of Buryat Buddhist. Defining Buryat Buddhist identity based on an analysis of different aspects of their worldview, cultural life, and historical past, this article reveals how Buddhist book culture and home life are the most important aspects in the formation of local identity. The analysis confirms that a radical change in the mechanism of the transfer of tradition, social changes, and the economic crisis led to the transformation of the vector of development in the traditional book culture of the Buryats, highlighting that the main priority is not the religious but the ethnic component.

Ethnic cultures experience great transformations that affect their sustainability and holistic nature. However, the traditions related to life and death are, remarkably, persisting. This articles focuses on funerary customs and burial rituals that are significant for the Khakass people. In this research of the Khakass burial rituals we bring together archaeological, ethnographic, and folklore material that reveals unique data about funerary customs. The article reviews the burial rituals in historical perspective and focuses on changes the rituals have undergone. It concludes with the summary of transformations in contemporary burial practices.

This article discusses the normative and legal foundations, laws, principles, approaches, means and methods of organizing the educational process and analyzing the content of the authors’ ethnopedagogical program—Olonkho pedagogy. The article relies on the aspiration of ethnic groups to preserve their own distinctiveness and maintain their ethnic and cultural identity despite the current circumstances of globalization. By basing its approach on the Sakha heroic epic tradition—the Olonkho—the article describes how this tradition can introduce children to ethnocultural traditions, customs, and ceremonial rituals. The article examines manifestations of civic and ethnic identity among students, as well as their values and attitudes toward their native language and the cultural and historical heritage of their ethnic group.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

This article examines the book culture of the Buryat Buddhists of the Southern Siberia. Based on social archaeographic studies, the article posits a link between local book culture and the stable identity of Buryat Buddhist. Defining Buryat Buddhist identity based on an analysis of different aspects of their worldview, cultural life, and historical past, this article reveals how Buddhist book culture and home life are the most important aspects in the formation of local identity. The analysis confirms that a radical change in the mechanism of the transfer of tradition, social changes, and the economic crisis led to the transformation of the vector of development in the traditional book culture of the Buryats, highlighting that the main priority is not the religious but the ethnic component.

Ethnic cultures experience great transformations that affect their sustainability and holistic nature. However, the traditions related to life and death are, remarkably, persisting. This articles focuses on funerary customs and burial rituals that are significant for the Khakass people. In this research of the Khakass burial rituals we bring together archaeological, ethnographic, and folklore material that reveals unique data about funerary customs. The article reviews the burial rituals in historical perspective and focuses on changes the rituals have undergone. It concludes with the summary of transformations in contemporary burial practices.

This article discusses the normative and legal foundations, laws, principles, approaches, means and methods of organizing the educational process and analyzing the content of the authors’ ethnopedagogical program—Olonkho pedagogy. The article relies on the aspiration of ethnic groups to preserve their own distinctiveness and maintain their ethnic and cultural identity despite the current circumstances of globalization. By basing its approach on the Sakha heroic epic tradition—the Olonkho—the article describes how this tradition can introduce children to ethnocultural traditions, customs, and ceremonial rituals. The article examines manifestations of civic and ethnic identity among students, as well as their values and attitudes toward their native language and the cultural and historical heritage of their ethnic group.

A circle dance, a fundamental element of many traditional cultures, exists in many parts of the world. Scholars have been fascinated by historical and contemporary, mythical and cultural, ritual and semantic aspects of circle dances. The article discusses the Yakut circle dance, osuokhai, influenced by ancient practices and religious ideas of Eurasian nomads. The article reflects on the historical transformations and on the semantics of the osuokhai.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

This article examines the book culture of the Buryat Buddhists of the Southern Siberia. Based on social archaeographic studies, the article posits a link between local book culture and the stable identity of Buryat Buddhist. Defining Buryat Buddhist identity based on an analysis of different aspects of their worldview, cultural life, and historical past, this article reveals how Buddhist book culture and home life are the most important aspects in the formation of local identity. The analysis confirms that a radical change in the mechanism of the transfer of tradition, social changes, and the economic crisis led to the transformation of the vector of development in the traditional book culture of the Buryats, highlighting that the main priority is not the religious but the ethnic component.

Ethnic cultures experience great transformations that affect their sustainability and holistic nature. However, the traditions related to life and death are, remarkably, persisting. This articles focuses on funerary customs and burial rituals that are significant for the Khakass people. In this research of the Khakass burial rituals we bring together archaeological, ethnographic, and folklore material that reveals unique data about funerary customs. The article reviews the burial rituals in historical perspective and focuses on changes the rituals have undergone. It concludes with the summary of transformations in contemporary burial practices.

This article discusses the normative and legal foundations, laws, principles, approaches, means and methods of organizing the educational process and analyzing the content of the authors’ ethnopedagogical program—Olonkho pedagogy. The article relies on the aspiration of ethnic groups to preserve their own distinctiveness and maintain their ethnic and cultural identity despite the current circumstances of globalization. By basing its approach on the Sakha heroic epic tradition—the Olonkho—the article describes how this tradition can introduce children to ethnocultural traditions, customs, and ceremonial rituals. The article examines manifestations of civic and ethnic identity among students, as well as their values and attitudes toward their native language and the cultural and historical heritage of their ethnic group.

A circle dance, a fundamental element of many traditional cultures, exists in many parts of the world. Scholars have been fascinated by historical and contemporary, mythical and cultural, ritual and semantic aspects of circle dances. The article discusses the Yakut circle dance, osuokhai, influenced by ancient practices and religious ideas of Eurasian nomads. The article reflects on the historical transformations and on the semantics of the osuokhai.

This article discusses indigenous methodology in the context of Tuvan studies. Tuvan studies have a rich history, with significant contributions by local Tuvan researchers as well as Russian and foreign scholars. This article presents an overview of this research before, during, and after the Soviet period. The paper examines possible strengths and weaknesses of both “insider” (indigenous) and “outsider” research, with the consideration that these opposing categories are not so easily delineated. Through case studies describing the work and insights of the renowned Tuvan researcher Valentina Suzukei and the cultural “thesaurus” approach of Lukov and Lukov (2008), the article assesses the potential of indigenous methodology in the field of Tuvan studies.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

This article examines the book culture of the Buryat Buddhists of the Southern Siberia. Based on social archaeographic studies, the article posits a link between local book culture and the stable identity of Buryat Buddhist. Defining Buryat Buddhist identity based on an analysis of different aspects of their worldview, cultural life, and historical past, this article reveals how Buddhist book culture and home life are the most important aspects in the formation of local identity. The analysis confirms that a radical change in the mechanism of the transfer of tradition, social changes, and the economic crisis led to the transformation of the vector of development in the traditional book culture of the Buryats, highlighting that the main priority is not the religious but the ethnic component.

Ethnic cultures experience great transformations that affect their sustainability and holistic nature. However, the traditions related to life and death are, remarkably, persisting. This articles focuses on funerary customs and burial rituals that are significant for the Khakass people. In this research of the Khakass burial rituals we bring together archaeological, ethnographic, and folklore material that reveals unique data about funerary customs. The article reviews the burial rituals in historical perspective and focuses on changes the rituals have undergone. It concludes with the summary of transformations in contemporary burial practices.

This article discusses the normative and legal foundations, laws, principles, approaches, means and methods of organizing the educational process and analyzing the content of the authors’ ethnopedagogical program—Olonkho pedagogy. The article relies on the aspiration of ethnic groups to preserve their own distinctiveness and maintain their ethnic and cultural identity despite the current circumstances of globalization. By basing its approach on the Sakha heroic epic tradition—the Olonkho—the article describes how this tradition can introduce children to ethnocultural traditions, customs, and ceremonial rituals. The article examines manifestations of civic and ethnic identity among students, as well as their values and attitudes toward their native language and the cultural and historical heritage of their ethnic group.

A circle dance, a fundamental element of many traditional cultures, exists in many parts of the world. Scholars have been fascinated by historical and contemporary, mythical and cultural, ritual and semantic aspects of circle dances. The article discusses the Yakut circle dance, osuokhai, influenced by ancient practices and religious ideas of Eurasian nomads. The article reflects on the historical transformations and on the semantics of the osuokhai.

This article discusses indigenous methodology in the context of Tuvan studies. Tuvan studies have a rich history, with significant contributions by local Tuvan researchers as well as Russian and foreign scholars. This article presents an overview of this research before, during, and after the Soviet period. The paper examines possible strengths and weaknesses of both “insider” (indigenous) and “outsider” research, with the consideration that these opposing categories are not so easily delineated. Through case studies describing the work and insights of the renowned Tuvan researcher Valentina Suzukei and the cultural “thesaurus” approach of Lukov and Lukov (2008), the article assesses the potential of indigenous methodology in the field of Tuvan studies.

The article provides an overview of recent initiatives spearheaded by indigenous peoples in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) that seek to improve the existing language policy put forth by the state government. Although there has been some research conducted on the activities of public organizations and associations of indigenous peoples in the region, more must be done to better understand activities specifically related to language policy. The article presents a history of indigenous and minority organizing in the republic since the end of the Soviet era, with special attention paid to the campaigns regarding the status of native language and its presence within the educational sphere. It then analyzes the results of a 2011 sociological study regarding people’s beliefs about responsibility for native language maintenance and revitalization.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

This article examines the book culture of the Buryat Buddhists of the Southern Siberia. Based on social archaeographic studies, the article posits a link between local book culture and the stable identity of Buryat Buddhist. Defining Buryat Buddhist identity based on an analysis of different aspects of their worldview, cultural life, and historical past, this article reveals how Buddhist book culture and home life are the most important aspects in the formation of local identity. The analysis confirms that a radical change in the mechanism of the transfer of tradition, social changes, and the economic crisis led to the transformation of the vector of development in the traditional book culture of the Buryats, highlighting that the main priority is not the religious but the ethnic component.

Ethnic cultures experience great transformations that affect their sustainability and holistic nature. However, the traditions related to life and death are, remarkably, persisting. This articles focuses on funerary customs and burial rituals that are significant for the Khakass people. In this research of the Khakass burial rituals we bring together archaeological, ethnographic, and folklore material that reveals unique data about funerary customs. The article reviews the burial rituals in historical perspective and focuses on changes the rituals have undergone. It concludes with the summary of transformations in contemporary burial practices.

This article discusses the normative and legal foundations, laws, principles, approaches, means and methods of organizing the educational process and analyzing the content of the authors’ ethnopedagogical program—Olonkho pedagogy. The article relies on the aspiration of ethnic groups to preserve their own distinctiveness and maintain their ethnic and cultural identity despite the current circumstances of globalization. By basing its approach on the Sakha heroic epic tradition—the Olonkho—the article describes how this tradition can introduce children to ethnocultural traditions, customs, and ceremonial rituals. The article examines manifestations of civic and ethnic identity among students, as well as their values and attitudes toward their native language and the cultural and historical heritage of their ethnic group.

A circle dance, a fundamental element of many traditional cultures, exists in many parts of the world. Scholars have been fascinated by historical and contemporary, mythical and cultural, ritual and semantic aspects of circle dances. The article discusses the Yakut circle dance, osuokhai, influenced by ancient practices and religious ideas of Eurasian nomads. The article reflects on the historical transformations and on the semantics of the osuokhai.

This article discusses indigenous methodology in the context of Tuvan studies. Tuvan studies have a rich history, with significant contributions by local Tuvan researchers as well as Russian and foreign scholars. This article presents an overview of this research before, during, and after the Soviet period. The paper examines possible strengths and weaknesses of both “insider” (indigenous) and “outsider” research, with the consideration that these opposing categories are not so easily delineated. Through case studies describing the work and insights of the renowned Tuvan researcher Valentina Suzukei and the cultural “thesaurus” approach of Lukov and Lukov (2008), the article assesses the potential of indigenous methodology in the field of Tuvan studies.

The article provides an overview of recent initiatives spearheaded by indigenous peoples in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) that seek to improve the existing language policy put forth by the state government. Although there has been some research conducted on the activities of public organizations and associations of indigenous peoples in the region, more must be done to better understand activities specifically related to language policy. The article presents a history of indigenous and minority organizing in the republic since the end of the Soviet era, with special attention paid to the campaigns regarding the status of native language and its presence within the educational sphere. It then analyzes the results of a 2011 sociological study regarding people’s beliefs about responsibility for native language maintenance and revitalization.

The article discusses professional teaching training for tutoring and primary education at a small-scale rural school, where there are prolific opportunities for individualizing the educational process and creating conditions that foster personal development of primary schoolchildren. Educational quality is indicated by the formation of ethnocultural identity and ethnic self-knowledge; this is the basis for the development of harmonious interethnic relations in multicultural societies. The article presents a model for the development of ethnopedagogical competence in the primary school teacher, the ethnopedagogy of the educational process, and the formation of the pan-Russian civic identity as a condition for the successful implementation of the new primary school standards.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.

This article examines the book culture of the Buryat Buddhists of the Southern Siberia. Based on social archaeographic studies, the article posits a link between local book culture and the stable identity of Buryat Buddhist. Defining Buryat Buddhist identity based on an analysis of different aspects of their worldview, cultural life, and historical past, this article reveals how Buddhist book culture and home life are the most important aspects in the formation of local identity. The analysis confirms that a radical change in the mechanism of the transfer of tradition, social changes, and the economic crisis led to the transformation of the vector of development in the traditional book culture of the Buryats, highlighting that the main priority is not the religious but the ethnic component.

Ethnic cultures experience great transformations that affect their sustainability and holistic nature. However, the traditions related to life and death are, remarkably, persisting. This articles focuses on funerary customs and burial rituals that are significant for the Khakass people. In this research of the Khakass burial rituals we bring together archaeological, ethnographic, and folklore material that reveals unique data about funerary customs. The article reviews the burial rituals in historical perspective and focuses on changes the rituals have undergone. It concludes with the summary of transformations in contemporary burial practices.

This article discusses the normative and legal foundations, laws, principles, approaches, means and methods of organizing the educational process and analyzing the content of the authors’ ethnopedagogical program—Olonkho pedagogy. The article relies on the aspiration of ethnic groups to preserve their own distinctiveness and maintain their ethnic and cultural identity despite the current circumstances of globalization. By basing its approach on the Sakha heroic epic tradition—the Olonkho—the article describes how this tradition can introduce children to ethnocultural traditions, customs, and ceremonial rituals. The article examines manifestations of civic and ethnic identity among students, as well as their values and attitudes toward their native language and the cultural and historical heritage of their ethnic group.

A circle dance, a fundamental element of many traditional cultures, exists in many parts of the world. Scholars have been fascinated by historical and contemporary, mythical and cultural, ritual and semantic aspects of circle dances. The article discusses the Yakut circle dance, osuokhai, influenced by ancient practices and religious ideas of Eurasian nomads. The article reflects on the historical transformations and on the semantics of the osuokhai.

This article discusses indigenous methodology in the context of Tuvan studies. Tuvan studies have a rich history, with significant contributions by local Tuvan researchers as well as Russian and foreign scholars. This article presents an overview of this research before, during, and after the Soviet period. The paper examines possible strengths and weaknesses of both “insider” (indigenous) and “outsider” research, with the consideration that these opposing categories are not so easily delineated. Through case studies describing the work and insights of the renowned Tuvan researcher Valentina Suzukei and the cultural “thesaurus” approach of Lukov and Lukov (2008), the article assesses the potential of indigenous methodology in the field of Tuvan studies.

The article provides an overview of recent initiatives spearheaded by indigenous peoples in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) that seek to improve the existing language policy put forth by the state government. Although there has been some research conducted on the activities of public organizations and associations of indigenous peoples in the region, more must be done to better understand activities specifically related to language policy. The article presents a history of indigenous and minority organizing in the republic since the end of the Soviet era, with special attention paid to the campaigns regarding the status of native language and its presence within the educational sphere. It then analyzes the results of a 2011 sociological study regarding people’s beliefs about responsibility for native language maintenance and revitalization.

The article discusses professional teaching training for tutoring and primary education at a small-scale rural school, where there are prolific opportunities for individualizing the educational process and creating conditions that foster personal development of primary schoolchildren. Educational quality is indicated by the formation of ethnocultural identity and ethnic self-knowledge; this is the basis for the development of harmonious interethnic relations in multicultural societies. The article presents a model for the development of ethnopedagogical competence in the primary school teacher, the ethnopedagogy of the educational process, and the formation of the pan-Russian civic identity as a condition for the successful implementation of the new primary school standards.

The Nenets people have various forms of worshipping spirits in their sacred landscapes. The article examines the history, definitions, and classifications of forms of worship of the Nenets sacred places (khebidia ia). Cult structures (khekhe) include objects of nature as well as effigies of various deities installed at sacred sites or residential areas. Images of a master spirit carved in stone or wood (siadei) mark tribal or general significant sites of worship. The main activities carried out on these sacred sites relate to seasonal rituals of the life cycle and to subsistence practices such as fishing and hunting. The most important of them were sacrificial rituals.

Abstract: The article provides a review of various strategies the peoples of Siberia undertake to reestablish their identity, their cultural identity, and rights to their land. The article aims to analyze the modern challenges that the indigenous peoples of Siberia face and their responses to such challenges. The article presents five models of survival strategies used by the peoples of Siberia.