Category
Topic
Year
Contested wars and ongoing colonization in the Nenets tundra
Keywords: Nenets; colonialism; armed resistance; memory practices; Russia–Ukraine war; reindeer herders
This article examines how long-term colonial domination shapes attitudes toward war, violence, and the state among Nenets reindeer herders in the European tundra and the Polar Urals. Drawing on historical sources, contemporary media, open-source data on wartime casualties and mobilization, and long-term ethnographic fieldwork among private reindeer-herding families (2000–2017), I trace changes in relations between Nenets and lutsa – a term referring to Russians and, more broadly, to settlement-dwelling, reindeerless others. Adopting a longue durée perspective, the article follows shifts from early fur-tribute extraction and violent encounters, through Orthodox missionization…
This article examines how long-term colonial domination shapes attitudes toward war, violence, and the state among Nenets reindeer herders in the European tundra and the Polar Urals. Drawing on historical sources, contemporary media, open-source data on wartime casualties and mobilization, and long-term ethnographic fieldwork among private reindeer-herding families (2000–2017), I trace changes in relations between Nenets and lutsa – a term referring to Russians and, more broadly, to settlement-dwelling, reindeerless others. Adopting a longue durée perspective, the article follows shifts from early fur-tribute extraction and violent encounters, through Orthodox missionization…
Albert Razin’s protest self-immolation in Russophone media coverage
Keywords:activism, epistemic injustice, Indigenous peoples, power of knowledge, ethnicity, languages.
On 10 September 2019, Albert Razin, an Udmurt humanities scholar and activist, set himself on fire in protest against the Russification of educational policies. Russian federal media and experts framed his act in highly peculiar ways. First, Razin’s actions were extensively medicalized, with fabricated claims about his age, private life, and alleged physical and mental health conditions. Second, public commentators invoked the so-called custom of tipshar, a purported tradition of ritual suicide, to explain his actions. According to this narrative, drawn from the colonial discourse, ethnically non-Russian peoples of the Volga-Ural…
On 10 September 2019, Albert Razin, an Udmurt humanities scholar and activist, set himself on fire in protest against the Russification of educational policies. Russian federal media and experts framed his act in highly peculiar ways. First, Razin’s actions were extensively medicalized, with fabricated claims about his age, private life, and alleged physical and mental health conditions. Second, public commentators invoked the so-called custom of tipshar, a purported tradition of ritual suicide, to explain his actions. According to this narrative, drawn from the colonial discourse, ethnically non-Russian peoples of the Volga-Ural…
Udmurts and Russians
Keywords: Udmurts, colonization, Russian rule, Christianization, korenizatsiia, repression
This article reflects on the history of the Udmurts and their relations with Russians from the late Middle Ages to the mid-20th century: how contacts with Russians developed before the incorporation of the Kazan khanate into Muscovy and what it meant for the smaller peoples who became part of the emerging Russian Empire. Special attention is paid to the process of Evangelization and its consequences, including the migration of many villagers to regions less exposed to Russian interference. I trace how Russian eastward migration led to a problematic, although not yet conflictual coexistence.…
This article reflects on the history of the Udmurts and their relations with Russians from the late Middle Ages to the mid-20th century: how contacts with Russians developed before the incorporation of the Kazan khanate into Muscovy and what it meant for the smaller peoples who became part of the emerging Russian Empire. Special attention is paid to the process of Evangelization and its consequences, including the migration of many villagers to regions less exposed to Russian interference. I trace how Russian eastward migration led to a problematic, although not yet conflictual coexistence.…
Yamal Nenets Film Series
Keywords: ethnography, ethnographic film, Finno-Ugric peoples
This article analyzes the Yamal Nenets Film Series (2024–2025), a nine-hour sequence of observational event-films edited from video footage recorded among Nenets reindeer herders on the Yamal Peninsula in 1999. In a context where pandemics and Russia’s war in Ukraine have rendered classical long-term fieldwork in Yamal politically and ethically untenable, the article asks how such historical audiovisual material can function simultaneously as an ethnographic source, a representational form, and a method of “returning” to a now-inaccessible field.
The article conceptualizes filming as a mode of embodied participant observation, in which handheld camera work, long takes,…
This article analyzes the Yamal Nenets Film Series (2024–2025), a nine-hour sequence of observational event-films edited from video footage recorded among Nenets reindeer herders on the Yamal Peninsula in 1999. In a context where pandemics and Russia’s war in Ukraine have rendered classical long-term fieldwork in Yamal politically and ethically untenable, the article asks how such historical audiovisual material can function simultaneously as an ethnographic source, a representational form, and a method of “returning” to a now-inaccessible field.
The article conceptualizes filming as a mode of embodied participant observation, in which handheld camera work, long takes,…
Films about the Vepsians and Vepsian cultural self-representation through film
Keywords: assimilation, documentary film, ethnic minorities, national identity, repression, feature film
This article examines films made about the Vepsians. From the second half of the 20th century onwards, the Vepsians have been filmed primarily for documentary purposes by (Soviet) Russian, Estonian and Finnish researchers, journalists and other interested parties. These productions include both documentary films and journalistic television formats. Since the 21st century, the Vepsians themselves have also begun to produce films addressing their ethnography and history. The visual representation of one’s own culture constitutes a form of ethnic self-reflection. Films made by Vepsians encompass both recollections and reconstructions of a…
This article examines films made about the Vepsians. From the second half of the 20th century onwards, the Vepsians have been filmed primarily for documentary purposes by (Soviet) Russian, Estonian and Finnish researchers, journalists and other interested parties. These productions include both documentary films and journalistic television formats. Since the 21st century, the Vepsians themselves have also begun to produce films addressing their ethnography and history. The visual representation of one’s own culture constitutes a form of ethnic self-reflection. Films made by Vepsians encompass both recollections and reconstructions of a…
First knowledge is lost
Keywords: Komi, hunter, forest, wayfinding, weather, ethnography
This article reflects on the first ethnographic field data collected by the author in 1996 among Komi hunters. The topics covered during the first encounter between the author and his field partners involved discussions on the practices of wayfinding. These conversations also encompassed weather conditions and broader questions concerning how Komi hunters see the world around them. The article combines a discussion of ethnographic field observations with data from scholarly literature and an autoethnographic analysis of the author’s own forest experience and the construction of ethnological knowledge.
As people deeply accustomed to the forest environment,…
This article reflects on the first ethnographic field data collected by the author in 1996 among Komi hunters. The topics covered during the first encounter between the author and his field partners involved discussions on the practices of wayfinding. These conversations also encompassed weather conditions and broader questions concerning how Komi hunters see the world around them. The article combines a discussion of ethnographic field observations with data from scholarly literature and an autoethnographic analysis of the author’s own forest experience and the construction of ethnological knowledge.
As people deeply accustomed to the forest environment,…
Finno-Ugric religious life through the eyes of Estonian ethnographers
Keywords: history of ethnology, Estonian National Museum, Finno-Ugric peoples, fieldwork diaries, religion
From the 1960s to the 1990s, the Estonian National Museum organized numerous field expeditions to other Finno-Ugric peoples within the Soviet Union. The primary aim of these trips was to collect objects of material heritage. During the expeditions, ethnographers produced photographs, drawings, and occasionally video recordings, as well as written ethnographic descriptions and field diaries. These materials provide valuable insights into the lives of Finno-Ugric peoples during this period. They also enable us to better understand Estonian ethnographers’ perspectives on their smaller kindred peoples, including their motivations for collecting, as well as…
From the 1960s to the 1990s, the Estonian National Museum organized numerous field expeditions to other Finno-Ugric peoples within the Soviet Union. The primary aim of these trips was to collect objects of material heritage. During the expeditions, ethnographers produced photographs, drawings, and occasionally video recordings, as well as written ethnographic descriptions and field diaries. These materials provide valuable insights into the lives of Finno-Ugric peoples during this period. They also enable us to better understand Estonian ethnographers’ perspectives on their smaller kindred peoples, including their motivations for collecting, as well as…
In the shadow of Greater Finland
Keywords: Finno-Ugric ethnography, close reading, tacit knowledge, field, community of experience, community of memory, evaluation
The objective of this article is to examine Ilmari Manninen’s position within Finnish ethnology on the basis of archival sources. The material consists mainly of Manninen’s correspondence, and the methodological approach is a close re-reading of his scholarly work. Manninen spent six years in Estonia, where he adapted well to the university and museum life in Tartu. The opening of the Estonian National Museum was a milestone and a testament to the success of the working team. Manninen’s return to Finnish ethnology was not self-evident. Although…
The objective of this article is to examine Ilmari Manninen’s position within Finnish ethnology on the basis of archival sources. The material consists mainly of Manninen’s correspondence, and the methodological approach is a close re-reading of his scholarly work. Manninen spent six years in Estonia, where he adapted well to the university and museum life in Tartu. The opening of the Estonian National Museum was a milestone and a testament to the success of the working team. Manninen’s return to Finnish ethnology was not self-evident. Although…
obadus and plinder
Keywords: Estonian vocabulary, etymology, loanwords
Quite a blow
According to Julius Mägiste, obadus ’metal loop’ is a Russian loanword; cf. Russian óбод ’hoop, ring; arched fastening’ and dialectal обóдь ’ring, hook, clasp, bow’. The article notes that the meaning ’blow, hit’ developed in the semantic field of obadus within the Estonian linguistic context, where many fastening devices have acquired a secondary sense ’blow, hit’. Examples include haak ’hook, part of a latch or fastening’ ⇒ ’a boxing hook delivered from below or the side with a bent arm’; kiil ’iron or wooden wedge used for joining or sealing objects or their parts’ ⇒ ’blow,…
Quite a blow
According to Julius Mägiste, obadus ’metal loop’ is a Russian loanword; cf. Russian óбод ’hoop, ring; arched fastening’ and dialectal обóдь ’ring, hook, clasp, bow’. The article notes that the meaning ’blow, hit’ developed in the semantic field of obadus within the Estonian linguistic context, where many fastening devices have acquired a secondary sense ’blow, hit’. Examples include haak ’hook, part of a latch or fastening’ ⇒ ’a boxing hook delivered from below or the side with a bent arm’; kiil ’iron or wooden wedge used for joining or sealing objects or their parts’ ⇒ ’blow,…
Pizarro in Estonia
Keywords: August von Kotzebue, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Baltic German, English, reception, provenance
Around 1800, the German dramatist August von Kotzebue was immensely popular in the Anglophone world. Since his fame as a playwright began in Tallinn and he was married to three noblewomen from Estonia, this article examines whether any of the numerous English adaptations of his works reached Estonia. Based on the collections of Estonian research libraries, it appears that only a few such texts have survived: Kotzebue’s memoirs describing his deportation to Siberia in 1800, and two adaptations of his play Die Spanier in Peru, one by Richard Brinsley…
Around 1800, the German dramatist August von Kotzebue was immensely popular in the Anglophone world. Since his fame as a playwright began in Tallinn and he was married to three noblewomen from Estonia, this article examines whether any of the numerous English adaptations of his works reached Estonia. Based on the collections of Estonian research libraries, it appears that only a few such texts have survived: Kotzebue’s memoirs describing his deportation to Siberia in 1800, and two adaptations of his play Die Spanier in Peru, one by Richard Brinsley…
Orthography as a stylistic device in modern Estonian poetry
Keywords: stylistics, poetics, spelling, deviation, language norms
This article examines instances of nonstandard orthography in poetry books published in Estonia between 2000 and 2023. The aim is to identify the types of orthographic deviation that appear in contemporary Estonian poetry and the stylistic functions that they serve. The theoretical section provides an overview of the concept of stylistic deviation, international research on orthographic deviation, and earlier studies on this topic in Estonia. The analysis proposes five functions of orthographic deviation: marking belonging, constructing authorial style, referencing linguistic varieties, guiding the reading process, and language play. These functional categories are then examined…
This article examines instances of nonstandard orthography in poetry books published in Estonia between 2000 and 2023. The aim is to identify the types of orthographic deviation that appear in contemporary Estonian poetry and the stylistic functions that they serve. The theoretical section provides an overview of the concept of stylistic deviation, international research on orthographic deviation, and earlier studies on this topic in Estonia. The analysis proposes five functions of orthographic deviation: marking belonging, constructing authorial style, referencing linguistic varieties, guiding the reading process, and language play. These functional categories are then examined…