NAUCZYĆ SIĘ SIEDZIEĆ: OSIEDLANIE LUDÓW KOCZOWNICZYCH DALEKIEJ PÓŁNOCY ZSRR JAKO OGRADZANIE PRZESTRZENNE I POZNAWCZE

• Main Author: Joachim OTTO HABECK
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English; Polish
• Published: Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology Polish Academy of Sciences 2016
• Subjects: ruch ciała; koczownicze ludy; osiadły tryb życia; percepcja przestrzeni; postawa ciała; Ethnology. Social and cultural anthropology; GN301-674; Evenki; taiga; Siberia
• Online Access: https://doaj.org/article/f59971143cbb4f1fbe4c7e35d6a629b2

Nomadism was widely perceived as a developmental problem by state administrators in the XX century, in capitalist as well as socialist countries. This article examines the strategies and effects of sedentarization policies in the forest (taiga) zone of the Soviet Union in the 1940s and 1950s. The different aspects of the state’s sedentarization campaign – administrative restructuring, collectivization, and the development of new industrial branches – are illuminated through examples of official documents and responses by Evenki reindeer nomads who were affected by this policy. Responses include reindeer nomads’ comments on how their spatial practices were subject to state-instigated change. Building on Gail Fondahl’s concept of “socialist enclosure”, the author develops the concept of “cognitive enclosure” to broach the very palpable consequences of sedentarisation on people’s perception of space and skills of moving. Examples are: learning to live in a house, unlearning certain modes of travelling, and navigating new environments. Sources used for this article comprise archival material from Central Siberia, ethnographies by scholars who have worked in this and adjacent areas, and the author’s own field observations from different regions. J