First of all, happy new year to all our readers, followers, and a big thank you to all those who contribute to making this blog a success. This is my first ever new years trip to the Russian Arctic. Flying from Finland to Yamal, one of the first visible impressions is the extensive use of …
Tag: Yamal
Rain on snow – how do people and reindeer learn to survive?
This winter and spring we hear again disastrous news from sudden temperature rises and falls, leading to thick ice-crusts on reindeer pastures that block reindeer's access to their pastures. While the most famous of these events happened in 2014 in the Centre of the Yamal Peninsula, West Siberia, the phenomenon is known probably to reindeer …
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Sudden loss of a great research facilitator
This is dedicated to a long term and very good friend, Konstantin Ochepkov, who passed away in Siberia way too early yesterday, just a little over 50 years old. His body was not able to retain victory over covid-19. I have known Kostya (how most of us called him) since I first came to Yamal …
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Language, silence and climate in Yamal
In spring we were proud to host the world's first anthropological PhD defence in english by a Nenets colleague, Roza Laptander. Now we are happy that she got her first postdoc employment in the big EU Charter project that looks at biodiversity changes, reindeer herding and the climate. We continue working with Roza in work …
Permafrost thaw responsible for Norilsk oil spill, impacting indigenous fishing?
Talking to a friend in Se Yakha, at the shore of the Ob Bay close to the Kara Sea, I realised how far the consequences of the recent Norilsk oil spill could go: the recent New York Times article about the oil spill cite environmentalists and even a Russian minister saying that the consequences of …
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Nenets mothers’ education: another PhD defense
After recently having celebrated the world's first Nenets PhD defense, now we can witness another one, in three days time, 14 May 11.15 Norwegian time! Zoya Vylka Ravna shall defend her thesis with the very technical name "The Inter-Generational Transmission of Indigenous Knowledge By Nenets Women: Viewed in the context of the state educational system …
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Sacred Site worshipping for good health in Corona times
Yamal has a legally protected sacred sites inventory: here, Angalskiy Mys Today in the morning I was just about to brew my breakfast coffee, when my friend Mikhail Okotetto called and told me "we need to go and feed the sacred site here, come along, right now". I had 5 minutes to grab my stuff …
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Successful doctoral Dissertation Defense: When we got reindeer, we moved to live to the tundra – The spoken and Silenced History of the Yamal Nenets
Roza Laptander's public dissertation defense took place online on the 29th of April 2020 at 10 a.m. Finnish time. "In Christianity, at the beginning was the word - in Nenets, at the beginning was silence" (Andrey Golovnev during Roza's defense). How beautifully put by Andrey Golovnev! The director of the Kunstkamera acted as opponent in …
Arctic Security and Anthropology
Our colleagues Gunhild Hoogensen Gjorv with Marc Lanteigne launched the Routledge Handbook of Arctic Security, of which they are the main editors, and where there are some chapters relevant for (and co-authored by) us. Gunhild said that the starting point for their approach to security is much broader than just hard dominant state approaches to …
1st December: “World Aids Day” Всемирный день борьбы со СПИДом – ВИЧ и коренные народы Севера в России HIV and indigenous peoples in Russia
(English version see bеlow, after the end of the Russian text) В связи с этой датой хотелось бы обратить внимание на один аспект эпидемии ВИЧ-инфекции в России, который еще недостаточно изучен и мало известен широкой общественности. Я и сам относительно недавно узнал о нем. Как показывают исследования у коренного населения Севера риск заразиться ВИЧ выше, …
Arctic Anthropology 