Speaking about oneself in order to change the world.

• Main Authors: Toulouze, Eva, Niglas, Liivo
• Other Authors: Centre de recherches Europes-Eurasie (CREE EA 4513), Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (Inalco), University of Tartu (UT), Department of Ethnology
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: French
• Published: HAL CCSD 2006
• Subjects: élevage des rennes; pouvoir de la parole; clan; personhood; hisphilso; hist; Soi; Vella; nenets; taiga; Siberia
• Online Access: https://hal-inalco.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01278254/file/parler%20de%20soi%20pour%20changer%20le%20monde.pdf; https://hal-inalco.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01278254

International audience Yuri Vella is a Forest Nenets reindeer herder, writer and fighter for his people's rights. In his private life, he enjoys silence, as it is a rule in his culture. But the public man, who is graduated from the Literature Institute in Moscow, is aware of the power of speech, and knows how to use it for his goals, to support his vision. He had to realise that the native peoples in Western Siberia have lost much of their skills and acquired none during the Soviet period, in which they were compelled to integrate in the society and to attend Soviet institutions as school or the army. This process has been intensified in the latest fifty years, with the invasion of their traditional territories by oil industry. But Yuri Vella expects the oil reserves to finish one day, and then the aborigines will lack the goods bestowed upon them by " Western " society and will have to survive with the help of the traditional skills. He tries to promote his vision of the natives able to live in both worlds and able to recover their dignity. This article analyses his public speech in this behalf and the way Yuri Vella speaks about himself, enlarging his " ego " both to his clan and the native peoples in general and connecting it very directly with the space around him. The main sources are Eva Toulouze's fieldwork at yuri Vella's taiga camp, living with the family five months, and the film Liivo Niglas has shot about him in 2003. Jurij Vella est un écrivain, éleveur de rennes et militant nénetse des forêts. Dans sa vie privée, il est volontiers silencieux, comme il est de règle dans sa culture. Mais l'homme public, diplômé de l'Institut de littérature de Moscou, est conscient du pouvoir de la parole et sait comment s'en servir pour atteindre ses objectifs, pour soutenir sa vision. IL a dû prendre conscience que les autpchtones de Sibérie Occidentale ont perdu bien de leurs savoir-faire pour vivre dans la forêt pendant la période soviétique, où ils ont dû être intégrés dans des institutions comme l'école ou ...