"Eating Hay": The Ecology, Economy and Culture of Viliui Sakha Smallholders of Northeastern Siberia

• Main Author: Susan A Crate
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Sakha; Subarctic; Siberia
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.1089.6495; http://mason.gmu.edu/%7Escrate1/Crate_Human_Ecology_08.pdf

Abstract Contemporary rural Viliui Sakha of northeastern Siberia, Russia, are a Turkicspeaking people practicing horse and cattle breeding in the subarctic. This article details their story of survival in the north as one not only of adapting a southern subsistence to an extreme climate but also to the effects of Russian colonization, Soviet collectivization, and post-Soviet decentralization. In the post-Soviet period a majority of rural Viliu Sakha adapted to the loss of a centralized agro-industrial state farm system by developing a smallholder food production system relying on cattle husbandry supplemented with other subsistence sources including fish, game, forage, other domesticates, and garden products. In the twenty-first century, this "cows-and-kin" system represents a resilient smallholder adaptation based on reviving pre-Soviet production knowledge, recalling ecological knowledge, and relying on kin. The article concludes with a discussion of the future of cows-and-kin by exploring issues of alienated youth, accessing land and the overwhelming concern of inhabitants about the local effects of global climate change.