Khanty, People of the Taiga: Surviving the 20th Century
Khanty, People of the Taiga: Surviving the 20th Century
by Andrew Wiget and Olga Balalaeva
University of Alaska Press, 2011 Paper: 978-1-60223-124-5 | eISBN: 978-1-60223-125-2 Library of Congress Classification DK759.K3W54 2011 Dewey Decimal Classification 305.89451
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
ABOUT THIS BOOK
Drawing on nearly twenty years of fieldwork, as well as ethnohistory, politics, and economics, this volume takes a close look at changes in the lives of the indigenous Siberian Khanty people and draws crucial connections between those changes and the social, cultural, and political transformation that swept Russia during the transition to democracy. Delving deeply into the history of the Khanty—who were almost completely isolated prior to the Russian revolution—the authors show how the customs, traditions, and knowledge of indigenous people interact with and are threatened by events in the larger world.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Andrew Wiget is professor of English and director of the New Mexico Heritage Center at New Mexico State University. Olga Balalaeva is a folklorist and specialist in Finno-Ugric studies who has been working in Siberia since 1988.
REVIEWS
"Meticulously researched, authoritatively written, and enlivened with a magnificence of ethnographic, ecological, and linguistic detail, this unique study offers a portrait of immense scholarly value that could easily serve as a model for similar social analyses of other native peoples of Siberia. . . . Essential.”
— Choice, Outstanding Academic Title, 2011
"Well-written, readable, and accessible to a wide audience. The authors balance a broad range of sources in a way that creates a tightly woven, dense, and compelling narrative. . . . [A]n excellent example of how profoundly satisfying deep ethnography can be."
— Brian Donahoe, Sibirica
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Figures
Notes on Spelling, Pronunciation, and Usage
Preface
1. Iugra Before the Russians
Vlast’ and Volost’: Russian Power from 1600 to 1917
The Soviet Era 2. Iakh and Sir Kinship and Residency, History and Territoriality
Soul, Conception, and Rebirth
Adulthood and Social Identity
Courtship and Marriage
Alcoholism, Accidents, and Violence
Being Elderly
Death and Transformation
Tradition, Modernity, and “Being Khanty” 3. Traditions The Khanty World
Ordinary Competence, Religious Practice, and the Family Sphere
Spirits, Land, and Kin
Pori and Yir: Ritual Communion
Communal Rituals
Other Communal Rituals 4. Transformations Cultural Specialists and Cultural Change
Russian Orthodoxy
When the Insider Becomes the Outsider
Khanty Traditions
The Politics of Cultural Survival 5. Kurlomkin: Taiga Hunter Land Use in the Iugan Basin
The Kurlomkins of Bolshoi Iugan
Beyond the Settlement: The Family Hunting Territory
The Domestic Economy
Difficult Futures 6. Kanterov: Muskeg Reindeer Herder Historic Land Use on the Pim River
Kirill Kanterov and His Brothers
The Kanterov Family Territory
The Domestic Economy
Conclusions 7. Black Snow Post-Soviet Administration
Defacing the Land
Marginalization and the Press of Oil
Making Way for Oil
Reimagining Land and Community
Emergent Types 8. Land, Leadership, and Community Oil, Ethnicity, and Perestroika
The Obshchina Movement
The Fight to Save the Iugan 9. Accommodation, Resistance, and Resilience Vectors of Change
Revitalization, Resistance, and Revival
Strategies of Cultural Persistence
A Resilient People
Bibliography
Index
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