Project description - The Other Russia. Cultural Multiplicity in the Making

Project leader: Academy Professor Anna-Leena Siikala, Helsinki University, Institute for Cultural Research, Folkloristics, tel. +358 (0)9 19122631, fax. +358 (0)9 4122402, Anna-Leena.Siikala(at)Helsinki.Fi

1. De-centralising the Cultural Empire

It is customary to examine Russia from the perspective of Moscow and St. Petersburg, centres of the hierarchical state, and as a monolithic cultural empire. Ethnographic fieldwork in different republics of Russia has demonstrated the need to approach the socio-cultural situation in Post-Soviet Russia from a new perspective. The dichotomy between hegemonic state culture and minority "folk" cultures has to be deconstructed. If the perspective is turned upside down, from the margins to the centres, the great changes caused by the collapse of the Soviet Union and the new forms of globalisation, which resulted in an unstable society with simultaneous tendencies for rapid modernisation and neotraditionalism, the revival of traditions, can be seen even more clearly. The minorities of multicultural Northern Russia, such as Finno-Ugrian groups, should not be seen as islands isolated from one another but in relation to one another and to the main culture.

2.1.  Many Faces of Social and Economic Change

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union there have been noticeable economic and political changes in all the areas inhabited by Uralic peoples. The Western Siberian North, in particular, is changing rapidly and fundamentally: oil and gas field exploration, the pouring in of foreign capital investments, and the strengthening of international contacts are hallmarks of the era of globalisation.

In the early 1990s, the infrastructure, transport, public health care and education built by the Soviet authorities collapsed or suffered severe financial difficulties. State farms were transformed into co-operative enterprises. The process of transformation has been painful and has not yet ended. On the contrary, in the 2000s marketing problems are forcing co-operative plants to close or find new means of selling their products. At the same time the financial benefits of oil and gas are pouring in. The towns and regional centres are more prosperous than ever, while the nearby population centres lack the means of subsistence and the remote villages are losing inhabitants. The results of these changes can be seen at social and cultural level. The simultaneous presence of different cultural elements and practices, both new and traditional, has resulted in economically stratified communities. The socio-economic processes of such European Russian minorities as the Udmurts and Komis are more subtle. Typical problems in the local rural communities are unemployment, falling population, a high mortality rate, and an ageing population. On the other hand, churches, schools and cultural centres are being rebuilt. The local language, culture and religious activities give substance to life and help people to cope with everyday problems. Hence, the pace and direction of development vary from one area to another. This does not lead to easily comprehensible cultural entities, but to cultural domains in which different cultural elements are simultaneously present, to connections between phenomena that were formerly considered disparate and far removed from one another. This is a typical feature of globalising culture.

The introduction of new economic and social systems has led to an unstable society with a market economy of growing importance in which people are turning to a traditional subsistence economy, barter and reciprocal networks of relatives and neighbours. The meaning and practice of "tradition" varies greatly from one area to another depending on the economic and societal development. Tradition as a word might be connected to everyday life: people are turning to the customary livelihoods and healing for economic reasons. "Tradition" is also a tool for cultural policies today. The counter-reaction to the international economy and information flow typical of globalisation is the striving to strengthen the local and marginal. During the process of change, ethnic groups are seeking to establish their self-awareness and self-respect, consciously constructing it by the bricoleur technique, exploiting and recreating their past and traditions.  Neotraditionalism in Russia represents a global trend. It is typical not only of the minorities of the huge state, but also of the majority: Russian nationalists, especially in the periphery, have aimed to revive their religious and imperial traditions. In the republics of the former Soviet Union the nature of neotraditionalism depends on the historical, political and economic experiences of the people.

2.2. The Aims and Principal Ideas of the Project

The project "Other Russia" examines the making of Post-Soviet cultural multiplicity in local communities. Special attention is being paid to the recreation of indigenousness. "Ethnic" in this connection does not refer to a homogenous entity of a primordial nature. On the contrary, the cultural multiplicity of North Russian communities is a consequence of not only the multi-ethnicity of neighbourhoods, but the fact that ethnic groups are internally divided by many factors such as economic opportunities, politics, values, religion, dialect, everyday habits and the relocation of populations.   

The aims and principal ideas of the work are as follows:

1. To identify the diverse mechanisms of social and economic change in different Northern Russian areas and their relationship to the transformation of cultural practices.
2. To examine the making of the cultural multiplicity of the Post-Soviet era. 
3. To trace oral and literal discourses, events and cultural processes expressing ethnic diversities in micro-level local communities and to examine them from the perspective of area, state and global cultural policies, and in the light of historical and socio-economic developments.
4. To see the pursuit of new socio-cultural agency by minorities as interaction in a multicultural situation instead of the minority-majority dichotomy. 
5. To trace the different "voices" of minorities in culture-making processes, e.g., seeing recreations of tradition as a topic for negotiation and even conflict among ethnic groups, not as cultural forms based on common consent. 
6. To pay special attention to the gendered nature of these processes and the role of women in the making of the symbols of ethnicity. 
7. To define the forms and items of culture (rituals, myths, local history and poetry, dress, food, etc.) which bear symbolic value in presenting ethnicity and the arenas and ways in which these symbolic representations are manifest.  
8. To examine the role of politicians, intellectuals and the media in circulating different interpretations of recreated traditions. 
9. To trace the political and economic implications of different manifestations of neotraditionalism.     
   Even research mainly deals with cultural changes of the Northern Russia, the economic mechanisms regional policies and changing values of societies have to be taken in consideration, also. 

2.3. Nationalism, Ethnonationalism and Ethnic Self-awareness

Research interested in the ethnic awakening of minority groups has to take a stand on the concepts of "nationality", "nationalism", "ethnicity" and "identity". The limits of the concept of nationalism became visible when, in the 1980s and 1990s, the crisis of European nation states led to debate on nationalism and the invention of traditions in the construction of national identities. In this debate, as Aira Kemiläinen has stated, the concept of nationalism seems to have become blurred, mixing national attitudes, the cultural and social programmes of the European nation state processes which contributed to, for example, the establishment of education and health care systems, the political programmes of these processes, and the aggressive expansion politics of chauvinistic nationalism with its destructive results in the Second World War.

David G. Anderson has observed the special usage of the term "nationality" and "nationalism" in Russian studies. He states that in analyses of Russia, "nationalism" tends to apply to peoples whom the Soviet state had classified as nations (titular nations) while other social movements are described as "ethnonationalism"- "ethnic mobilisation", or even subgroupism. Because the dynamics of social life depends on the scale and organisation of society, the concepts of "nationality" and  "nationalism" lead to problems in the study of minority groups and indigenous people. For this reason many ethnographers choose to use the concepts of ethnicity. 

Ethnonationalism - like nationalism - has been given different values depending on whose ideology it represents. I use the concept of ethnonationalism reluctantly, because - if the self-awareness of minority groups is regarded as falsely based on irrational primordialism and threatening separationism - it might provide an excuse for state terrorism. The ideological fields of ethnonationalism and nationalism should be examined in their concrete international and socio-economic contexts, in their relationships with the partner groups and nations that constitute the field of mutual action, not forgetting the historical past of these relationships or economic interests of partners often disguised in ideological rhetoric. 

Among the Uralic peoples, the cultural awakening has been peaceful and not given to separatist action. Some of the Uralic groups belong to the those small nationalities of Russia whose cultures are seen as being in need of special safeguarding. Biculturalism is a visible feature of the life of these people and the saliency of multiple levels of identity is seen in, for instance, the term "Rossiiany", meaning multiethnic citizens of Russia.  
 It is customary to use the concept of identity in studies of ethnic self-awareness and self-construction. But the concept of identity is not alone a sufficient conceptual tool for analysing the practices and meanings of ethnic and social relationships in face-to-face communities. I prefer conceptual idea of belonging, which leaves room for an understanding of the multiplicity of factors in the self-definition of people. In referring to the interrelationship and reciprocity of face-to-face communities, the concept "belonging" is anchored on the concrete practices in everyday life.

Whereas Western research into society and culture has seen the invention of traditions as an instrument in the nation-building processes, the Marxist ideology formulated by Vladimir Il'ich Lenin saw national consciousness as a means used by the bourgeois state to improve its capitalistic competitiveness. Ethnonationalism within Russia, the "ocean of peoples", and later in the Soviet Union, was seen as a by-product of bourgeois socio-economic imperatives which should fade away once the economic basis for class distinction has been removed. For this reason, Lenin's policy on ethnic groups was liberal during the first years of the new state. The Bolsheviks reorganised the territorial division along ethnic principles: the series of republics bearing the names of ethnic groups was a result of Lenin's will to safeguard other nationalities from the domination of Russians. During the Stalinist regime of the 1930s, the nationality policy changed, leading to suppression, the forced resettling of whole ethnic groups to other parts of the vast country and to the extinction of intellectuals speaking languages other than Russian. Collectivisation, the crisis caused by famine in the 1930s and the liquidation of villages "without perspective" destroyed the social structures at micro-level. The Stalinist language policy, in turn, limited the possibility of speaking minority languages.  In the 1960s, Russian was propagated as the native language of minorities, which weakened the position of the small languages. 

According to Henry R. Huttenbach, these historical experiences of ethnic groups form the roots of the present-day ethnic movements, which also contributed to the failure of the greatest social experiment in the world. In the 1990s, people realised the multiplicity of histories instead of the canonised Soviet understanding of the past in which they could not locate their personal or communal histories. The decade can be characterised as the decade of memorising and reinterpreting history. Remembering the traumatic past of many ethnic groups helps to understand the emotional loadedness of ethnically relevant traditions and the striving for self-determination of minorities in the former Soviet territory.

2.4. State, Intellectuals and Construction of Heritage

Since 1985 and the days of Perestroika, national identity has raised a good deal of discussion in Finno-Ugrian intellectual circles. Because of the suppression of the Stalinist regime and the ensuing absence of the written culture of many Finno-Ugrian groups, orally preserved traditions and ethnic religions seem to provide the foundation for a national culture. Similar trends have been visible in Siberia, where drama, literature, fine arts and local culture construction have drawn inspiration from the traditional modes of shamanism.  These tendencies are not only typical of Siberian minorities or Finno-Ugrian peoples; they are a global sign of the times.

In referring to folklore and ethnic religion as a source for constructing nationally relevant cultural capital, the above mentioned intellectuals follow the models already being used in the nation state projects of 19th century Europe. Interest in folklore in the cultures lacking written history was based on the Romantic ideas presented by Johan Gottfried Herder at the end of 18th century.  The example par excellence is the creation of Finnishness and its symbol, the Kalevala. Traditions may be constructions, selections or inventions, but they are not just any constructions. In everyday life the feeling of belonging is born of common practices and important social relationships. The building of the self-awareness of an ethnic group needs symbols greater than that. National symbols are sought in sources that have the authority and uniting power of the past. We should ask what kinds of "traditions" are selected for the construction of a nationally important heritage. And by whom and how are these traditions selected?

In the Nordic countries study of the politics of heritage has shown how organised work in the collection, preservation and publication of oral traditions modified the picture of nationally representative tradition. Analogous heritage-building processes can be found in Russia and the Soviet Union, despite their different ideological backgrounds. The role of Russian and Soviet ethnography, which depicted cultural forms of minorities, has been crucial in the self-understanding of these groups. Cultural portraits created by researchers were transmitted to local people through museums, folklore publications and exhibitions. The museum institution, for example, has been acting at different levels of the cultural administration of the republics from big towns to tiny villages. 
 The great influence of the state in the creation of locally visible representations of ethnicity is also evident in the central position of the "folklore collectives" in rural villages. During the 1930s, when the Soviet state wanted to promote the cultural development of the rural population, leading Russian folklorists recommended folklore as a basis for socialist folk art. In the 1940s centrally planned socialist folklorism acquired a strong organisational basis, including a network of cultural houses and clubs in all the socialist countries. Soviet/Russian folklore collectives received their instructions from the representatives of the ministries of culture in the republics. Nowadays they form a tradition in themselves and are visible participants in all the cultural festivals.

Soviet culture workers fixed their gaze upon the present day in order to develop cultural expressions of rural populations, to create new socialist forms of folk art. Today the intellectuals of the minority groups are more clearly aiming at the construction of ethnic awareness. In their heritage-building processes they are seeking traditions bearing the authority of the past. It seems that different groups pick out different yet characteristic elements from the pool of past traditions. The main traditions symbolising cultural unity of, say, the Khanty and Mansi are bear ceremonialism and shamanism. The Volga Finns and Udmurts value their holy groves and sacrificial rituals, whereas the symbolic capital of the Russian Karelians is Kalevala poetry, which seems to bear the voice of the past in its mythic themes and images. An interesting topic for study is the relationship of the traditions chosen as ethnic symbols and the self-understanding of the people they are supposed to characterise.

2.5. Revitalising Mythic World View

The recontextualisation of mythic heritage in the present day is a typical feature of ethnic movements. The mythic traditions of the Komi, for example, have been transformed into literature and drama. The Komi Folklore Theatre has specialised in plays based on ethnic tradition and myths.  But myths do not live only in texts produced by poets and writers. One of the most visible forms of the recontextualisation of mythic traditions is to be found in art.  Ethnofuturism has revived mythic images in its search for Finno-Ugrian roots. Ancient mythic tradition is connected to the need to live in harmony with nature.

The role of myth research in the creation of these "long term prisons" in our self-awareness, pictures of our mythic heritage, is of course crucial and as such an important object for study. On the other hand, the interest in mythology among Finno-Ugrian artists and intellectuals is a phenomenon of the modern globalising world and a mark of ethnic revival. We have to remember that the studies of relics of the past and the creation of contemporary ideologies and movements are not separated by a gulf but engage in a complex dialogue with one another. Today myths give substance to local, ethnic, social and gender groups in creating metaphors and symbols for their self-awareness and identity.

The new uses of myth traditions open up possibilities for analysing the processes of reconstruction, recontextualisation and constant variation characteristic of mythic-historical discourse. The continuing negotiative process concerning the mythic-historical tradition leaves room for the creative imagination, which uses doubt and deviation as well as stereotypic reproduction, borrowed elements and their assimilation and adaptation to produce unique performances and new forms of art relevant to the present day. The study of the recontextualisation of heritage in these processes will be as important in the future as the examination of the character of myth or the past phases of myth traditions. However, the knowledge of mythic traditions is crucial for the study of its present day usage. The "Encyclopaedia of the Uralic Mythologies" -volumes produce this kind knowledge.

2.6. Competing Religions

When Mikhail Gorbachev opened the way to the freedom of religion, a renaissance of religions was the result. Atheism could not answer the needs of people and soon after the collapse of the state, the empty place left by it began to be filled with different religious alternatives. Although the Russian Orthodox Church has been and is a powerful and deep-rooted home of spiritual life for Russians, other churches began their missionary work in both towns and rural areas.

In the field of competing religions, ethnic religions occupy a special position as bearers of world view important for the self-awareness of the minorities. The Khanty and Mansi, and the Finnic peoples near the Volga and Kama rivers, specially the Udmurts and Mari, preserved their ethnic cults to a far greater extent than had been imagined. We can even talk about the revitalisation of holy groves and their cults. To intellectuals, the "nature religion" of these minorities represents an ethnically-based philosophical idea of living harmoniously with nature. For participants representing the grass-root level of society, tradition and the values of ancestors are manifested in rituals. Rituals not only join social groups, they recreate and establish them.  One noticeable feature of the rituals is the large number of women among the participants, though men act as ritual priests as before. The gender division of the feasts changed in the course of the 20th century. A parallel phenomenon is the active role of women in keeping up the Orthodox Christian traditions during the Soviet era.

It is interesting to note that people with a higher education who have distanced themselves from village life take part in the reconstruction of groves and their rituals. In bi-religious situation people select suitable practices according to the present-day demands. The revitalisation of religious tradition does not go uncontested. It must be remembered that ethnic processes are not without their internal contradictions, entailing different interpretations and alternative practices. Conflicting interests, intentions and ideologies in communities determine the meanings and significance of ethnic cults and their sites. The past is revitalised in a way that corresponds to the demands of the present political situation. We may ask whose interests the recreations of ethnic cults serve and how different participant groups interpret them today.
 
2.7. Performing Belongingness: Gendered Symbols of Ethnicity

If the authority of the past is sought by intellectuals, researchers and artists in using ancient mythic traditions in their creative work, ordinary people establish symbols for "self" and "us" in their practical everyday lives. "Identity" is a rigid concept which does not illuminate the ways of placing oneself into the multiple frames of practical relationships in the grass-root social world. People belong to their families, to their network of relatives and neighbours, to their village or co-operative farm, to an ethnic group or nation, to an area, republic and state. 

All the relationships of belongingness have different emotional and cognitive values depending on the situation. In everyday life, the belongingness is experienced through reciprocity and mutual help, but also through rivalry and hostilities. The male world of honour and violence is one of the arenas of belongingness. The understanding of the great social problems of the North Russia, the excessive consumption of alcohol and high mortality rates, needs thorough knowledge of traditional models of male behaviour. Special acts, performances and arenas heighten the feeling of belongingness. So does taking part in discourse handling the common past and experiences. Folklore and its public performance are powerful instruments in creating the emotional experience of belongingness. 

The folklore collectives serving the Soviet and Post-Soviet cultural policy depended only partly on these policies. The reasons for the activity of folklore groups have to be sought elsewhere. First, it must be stated that these groups differ greatly as regards their participants and performances. Besides groups aiming at standardised stage performances there are groups of enthusiasts relying on local traditions and performing only in intimate events in their home villages. During the Soviet era, men took part in these activities, but nowadays the collectives are mostly in the hands of women. The negotiations of performances and interpretations of songs reflect the understanding of values and peoples' own history. 

The annual festivals organised by ethnic groups have recently been a characteristic feature of cultural life in rural areas. The festival creates an arena in which both ordinary local people and the constitutive institutions of society are represented. Festivals underline the peaceful co-existence of different ethnic groups.  The message of the folk festivals is belonging: to a group of relatives and village, but also to a nation. Performing "our" rituals and games, singing together "our" songs loaded with emotion and memories heighten the sense of belonging to a strong emotion. Belonging is also expressed in dress and handicrafts representing local fashions.

Although the cultural elements of festivals and their interpretations represent and revive different ethnic cultures, the background ideology and structuring of events are shared by all, following the Soviet models of folk festivals. The festivals present the differences, the distinguishing cultural traits, according to the common trans-cultural patterns. The state is represented by the district authorities, and the songs and dances are composed by local masters of tradition. The appearance of the tiny Finno-Ugrian populations in the arena of cultural display is not a coincidence. New forms of globalisation have enabled the margins to present their cultural difference. Since women organise village feasts and take part in the national folk festivals more actively than men, the ethnic symbols are defined more and more from the point of view of the women's world. Now the role of women is visible even in such male-dominated societies as that of the Khanty. Not only are women's efforts to define their own identity undermining the conventional gender systems. They are also producing alternative expressions of ethnicity.

2.8. Political and Economic Implications of Neotraditionalism

The neotraditionalism of the Northern Russian minorities follows general trends in the globalising world of today. However, it is rooted in local cultural practice and reflects the changing Russian society. The ways of performing the heritage are more and more various. The active role of women in these processes reflects not only the special development of Russian society but also international trends. The intellectuals, journalists, researchers, artists and international audiences at which the performance of heritage is directed are important mediators in these processes. Due to them, the heritage is not negotiated only in local communities but also in the media.

In giving visibility to minority groups, neotraditionalism answers the challenges of political - and economic - aspirations. Arctic minorities have presented the best-known forms of ethnonationalistic demands in Northern Russia and Siberia. In order to maintain the traditional lifestyle and gain their share of the new prosperity produced by the oil and gas industry, they have developed relations with the International Circumpolar Community. Tradition movements have always had political functions. The political and economic implications have to be taken into account in examining the neotraditionalism of Russian minorities. The meanings of administrative and political action in these processes should be traced at local, areal and national level. The cultural ministries of the republics already occupied an important role in the Soviet era in formulating the concept and representations of heritage. Today, discussions among representatives of the international community, such as in UNESCO, aim at supporting and preserving local tradition. The aims and forms of tradition revival cannot be reduced to a single level of the administrative hierarchy or cultural life. On the contrary, the goals and means of heritage politics are negotiated and deformulated at all levels of socio-cultural integration: from the practices of everyday life to the conscious politics of administrative institutions.  

3.  Practical Organisation of the Work

3.1.  Field Work and Concrete Research Tasks

This research is based on field work conducted in Russia since 1991. The target areas are Yamalo-Nenetsiya (the Khanty, Nentsy, Komi and Russians), the Upper Vychegda region in the Komi Republic (the Komi and Russians), and the Alnash area of the Udmurt Republic (the Russians, Udmurts, Mari and Tatars). These areas differ in their history, society, economy and culture. The concrete research tasks in field work and co-operation with local researchers therefore vary according to the target area. They include e.g. following themes: sacred landscapes; recreating ethnic histories; hidden and public rituals; visible symbols for ethnicity: reconstruction of holy grows; folklore collectives: creating beauty and "soul" in everyday life (singing "for yourself and for your soul"); festivals and women's role in the performance of belongingness; the ideas and practice of the male world of honour and violence; the revival of magic and ethno-medicine.

3.2. The  Research Group
 
The Research Group: A funding from the Academy of Finland is received for the following research group: Anna-Leena Siikala, project leader, Karina Suominen, MA, Oleg Ulyashev, C.Sc. (Senior Researcher at the Komi Scientific Centre, scholarship), Prof. Vladimir Napolskikh (Professor at the Udmurt State University, scholarship), C.Sc. Irina Il'ina (Komi Scientific Centre, scholarship), and project secretary/translator Marja-Leea Hattuniemi, MA.  
 Network of Researchers:  The research group is closely connected to an international network of more than 20 researchers writing the "Encyclopaedia of Uralic Mythologies" published by Akadémia Kiádo (Budapest) and the Finnish Literature Society (Helsinki). The leading scholars are Acad. Prof. Anna-Leena Siikala, Prof. Vladimir V. Napolskikh and Prof. Mihály Hoppál, Director of the Institute of Ethnography at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.

3.3. Meetings and Post-Graduate Teaching

The planned seminars and postgraduate courses are:

1. A joint Finnish-Russian seminar organised with Academician Viktor M. Gatsak  (IMLI, Moscow);on the problems of Folklore and Multiethnicity in the Context of Russian Studies.
2. An international seminar The Other Russia in Helsinki on the problems presented here.  
3. An international research training course Folklore Fellows- Summer School: Cultural   Multiplicity in the Making. 

3.4. International Co-operation

"The Encyclopaedia of the Uralic Mythologies" project has developed close and good working contacts with several research institutes interested in Finno-Ugrian and Uralic studies. In Siberian studies the most important colleagues are Dr Izmail N. Gemuev and Dr Arkadii V. Baulo from the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Novosibirsk). Other Russian colleagues include Academician Viktor M. Gatsak from the Institute of World Literature (IMLI), Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow). In Estonia Dr Mare Kõiva, Director of the Folklore Department of Kirjandusmuuseum, Tartu and Mr Ergo-Hart Västrik, Director of the Estonian Folklore Archives are responsible for producing of the Estonian Mythology.

The consultant on the Encyclopaedia of Uralic Mythologies in the United States is Professor Marjorie Mandelstam Balzer (Georgetown), who is known for her research into the Khanty.

3.5. Dissemination of the Results

Planned publications of the research group:

1. Anna-Leena Siikala and Oleg Ulyashev: A monograph The Other Russia. Cultural Multiplicity in the Making 2007.
2. Anna-Leena Siikala (ed.): a collection of arcticles Performing Belongingness. Neotraditionalism in Russia 2006.
3. Arno Survo: A monograph Religious Images as a Cultural Dialect 2007.
4. Karina Suominen: doctoral dissertation on The Politics of History and Tradition among the   Nenets in the 20th Century 2007.
5. Natalya Tuchkova et al.: Selkup Mythology 2005. 
6.  Vladimir Napolskikh et al.: Udmurt Mythology 2005.

The results of the project will be published not only in the works mentioned above but also in articles in scientific journals. The languages of publication are English and/or Russian and/or Finnish depending on the character of the work.

The results will add to the knowledge on the ongoing socio-cultural processes of Northern Russia and contribute to the understanding of the local manifestations and counter-currencies of globalisation.

The project aims at developing theoretical and methodological tools for handling the questions presented above and increasing knowledge important for the scientific community. At the same time it pays attention to the needs of social policies and local audiences. The films and other materials produced during the research process are donated to the local research centres and museums.