A Tribute to Elizaveta Ubryatova: Scholarly Life and Personal Destiny

• Published in: Quaestio Rossica
• Main Author: Shirobokova, Natalya
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: Russian
• Published: Ural Federal University 2015
• Subjects: the Yakut language; the Dolgan language; syntax of simple and complex sentences; the ancient Turkic language; the ancient Uighur language; substrate; Patience; Dolgan language; Yakut; Yakuts
• Online Access: https://journals.urfu.ru/index.php/QR/article/view/136; https://doi.org/10.15826/qr.2015.4.136

In Russia, the name of prominent turkologist Elizaveta Ivanovna Ubryatova, at present is known mostly to specialists who study the languages spoken by the Northern peoples of the country. However, the essence of scientific research of a linguist of such a calibre includes naturally attentive and concerned attitude to the fate of the peoples residing in the North of Russia, which was especially important in the conditions of the Soviet era. Survival of the Northern peoples and their languages became for Ubryatova not only a scientific problem but also a mission of vital importance.Ubryatova’s scientific interests were not restricted to linguistic problems, she also purposefully studied the important monuments of folk literature and ethnography of indigenous peoples. This was due to her scientific breadth, social responsibility, and commitment to a supreme mastery of the research object. That is why she became the founder of the original linguistic and cultural school in the study of the history and structures of languages spoken by peoples living in the North of Russia.The scale of her bright personality, combined with her intelligence, patience, and feminine care about colleagues and students, made her a center of attraction for researchers in this field. She launched an extensive project of publishing works devoted to folklore of the peoples who inhabited the Northern territories of Russia, and whose traditional culture became a part of the world culture as a result.The languages of the Dolgans and Yakuts became the main topics of her research. In this article, we outline the major ideas proposed by Ubryatova in her works, viz., those concerning the origin of the Turkic languages, Dolgan and Yakut in particular, and principles of the organization of the Yakut syntax.In her works, devoted to syntactic problems, Ubryatova determined the fundamental characteristic features of systemic organization of Turkic languages, Yakut in particular, as the ability of these languages to link language units of different levels ...