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@article{JEF, author = {Konrad Vanja and Elisabeth Tietmeyer}, title = { The Museum of European Cultures of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin as a Platform of Intercultural Dialogue}, journal = {Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics}, volume = {3}, number = {1}, year = {2011}, keywords = {museums; exhibitions; cultural contacts}, abstract = {Presentation at the Centenary of the Estonian National Museum, Tartu, 13 April 2009.}, issn = {2228-0987}, pages = {129–133}, url = {https://jef.ee/index.php/journal/article/view/25} }

@article{JEF, author = {Taive Särg}, title = { Context-Related Melodies in Oral Culture: An Attempt to Describe Words-and-Music Relationships in Local Singing Tradition}, journal = {Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics}, volume = {3}, number = {1}, year = {2011}, keywords = {ethnomusicology; regilaul; formula melody; folk song improvisation; folk singer}, abstract = {In oral folk song traditions we often find many lyrics, but not nearly as many melodies. The terms “polyfunctionalism”, “group melodies” or “general melodies” have been used by Estonian researches to indicate the phenomenon that many lyrics were sung to only one, or a small handful, of tunes. The scarcity of melodies is supposed to be one of several related phenomena characteristic to an oral, text-centred singing culture.In this article the Estonian folk song tradition will be analysed against a quantity of melodies and their usage in the following aspects: word-and-melody relationships and context-and-melody relationships in Karksi parish (south Estonia); a singer; and native musical terms and the process of singing and (re)creation.}, issn = {2228-0987}, pages = {35–56}, url = {https://jef.ee/index.php/journal/article/view/20} }

@article{JEF, author = {Katriina Siivonen}, title = { Local Culture as a Resource in Regional Development in the Southwest-Finland Archipelago}, journal = {Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics}, volume = {3}, number = {2}, year = {2011}, keywords = {cultural sustainability; regional development; Southwest-Finland Archipelago; everyday culture; production of cultural heritage}, abstract = {In cultural and regional politics in the European Union, and in practice for instance in the Southwest-Finland Archipelago, local culture and cultural heritage are considered resources. Global boundlessness, heterogeneity and change are basic qualities of culture. However, in regional development, culture is seen and used as a number of different local cultures with their own essential cultural heritage. The culture of local everyday life is opposite to, and in tension with, the construct of cultures used in regional development. Accordingly, culture should primarily be safeguarded as a heterogenic, dynamic and interactive process of everyday life. This process is the most important resource of local culture. In addition, culture should be safeguarded as value-based cultural constructions, such as brands or common identities of certain cultures, with for instance cultural heritage as a part of it. In the latter case, a common, transparent definition of these brands, identities and cultural heritages with their different values, is needed.}, issn = {2228-0987}, pages = {47–64}, url = {https://jef.ee/index.php/journal/article/view/12} }

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0010 The Yupik language has a word to signify ‘work’ derived from the stem qepgha(gh)- (qepghaq ‘work’ [noun], qepghaghtuq ‘he works’, qepghaghta ‘worker’, etc.) The scope of the meaning of this word changed drastically after the Russians came to Chukotka to stay in the 1930s. While in the pre-(intensive) contact times the word mainly meant ‘house work’ or ‘processing the carcass of a killed animal’, in mid-20th century it acquired new meanings, borrowing them from Russian. The usage of the word also became a replica of Russian usage: the concept acquired new dependent words, like evaluative adverbs and adjectives, or inanimate agents. This change of meaning reflected social changes that took place in the Yupik world as a result of the modernisation process of the 1950s and 1960s, and is an indicator of the deep transformation the society underwent under Russian (Soviet) influence. The paper analyses this process using two sources from two different epochs: Yupik texts recorded by Yekaterina Rubtsova in the 1940s, that is, in the pre-(intensive) contact period, and a modern Russian-Yupik dictionary compiled by Natalia Rodionova, a teacher of Yupik Eskimo at the Anadyr college, and published 70 years later, in 2014. 

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The following article explores the meaning of roads and the practices of movement for a small group of forest inhabitants in the Western Siberian lowlands on the middle Ob. The indigenous people known as the Khanty live as reindeer herders, fishermen and hunters in the midst of oil fields in the Surgut Rayon. The article examines their emic point of view opposed to the evaluation of the state administration. Anthropological research can access the mobility of people in two ways. At first researchers map movement in physical and metaphysical time and space, they observe and record the practice of movement. The second important source for anthropological insight is what people say about their practices of movement and how they evaluate them and the spaces in which they move. The following article tries to show that these perspectives remain incomplete without a synthesis of both. The first perspective allows only for a functionalist classification and the second allows the researcher to be taken in by the black and white pictures of moral evaluations that render the complexity of everyday life invisible. Only a synthesis of both, a careful interpretation of indigenous narratives before the background of social and political circumstances let us understand the practices of movement we can observe in the everyday life of people. Khanty reindeer herders try to build up a distance from the world of intruders and try to defend their autonomy in the forest. By accessing everyday practices and motivations instead of ready-made explanations it is revealed that the Khanty are not doomed to adapt to new situations, but they try to negotiate and manipulate them in their favour. The article tries to prove that one has to skip the objectifying approach to a hermeneutic one to grasp their abilities to do so.

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Overview of the Arctic Workshop at the University of Tartu in Estonia May 31 – June 1, 2013.

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Based on the ethnographic study of Estonian spiritual Internet forum The Nest of Angels, the article observes the process of sharing virtual social support and creating-confirming spiritual meanings. The forum, explicitly opposing the consumeristic side of new spirituality, has become popular and demonstrates the nature and various roles of contemporary spiritual angels. The study identifies two main modes in which the Nest and the presence of angels might be useful for users. Firstly, emotional support is shared, either by fellow users directly or by confirmations that angels will definitely help. Secondly, the Nest allows people to acquire knowledge both on spiritual and practical issues. As the Nest is dialogical, users can pose questions and find confirmations for their otherwise deviant experiences. Discussions in the Nest encourage everybody to interpret some situations and objects (like feathers) as signs from angels. This interpreting process might change people’s perceptions of the world by adding a layer of positive emotions. The study demonstrates how the angelic presence (or at least endeavour towards the presence) helps to establish and keep the tonality of benevolence which functions as the cornerstone of this virtual space. The Nest supports a specific epistemological stance manifested in the angelic, traditional ‘feminine’ values of empathy, softness, and caring. Angels and the idea of angelic presence is the main factor helping to keep the ‘high-vibrational’ and benevolent atmosphere of the forum and empowering the users inside the traditional understanding of ‘feminine softness’.

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Ethnography of religious ceremonies by theBashkortostan Udmurt. A short introduction based on fieldwork.

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This article discusses contemporary vernacular theory about the elusive energies that emanate from the ground. These energies are reported to be the ultimate reason for different remarkable occurrences, both natural and supernatural. The hypothesis of special energies is expressed in local tourism, in ecological debates and healing practises, driving the curiosity of amateur science. In these expressions knowledge as a form of engagement with the supernatural plays an integrating role between the individual and the forces beyond. Dowsing reveals the ‘energetic’ nature of reality, which will be discussed using three examples. Tuhala Nõiakaev (the Witch’s Well) as a peculiar natural sight in the north of Estonia has drawn together many reports of energy columns that are linked to underground rivers and cultic stones. Another place under discussion is also famous for healing energy points: Kirna Manor works as a centre for spreading knowledge of the interdependence of physical health and the search for a spiritual path with the help of energies that the next example, the Society of Dowsers, attempts to discover using scientific methods. In these examples ‘energy’ designates the position of the individual, in which the participative relationship with the environment works as a form of folk epistemology within the limits of cultural understanding.

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Under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs license, the author(s) and users are free to share (copy, distribute and transmit the contribution) under the following conditions: 1. they must attribute the contribution in the manner specified by the author or licensor, 2. they may not use this contribution for commercial purposes, 3. they may not alter, transform, or build upon this work.

Authors retain the following rights:

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3. Vol 6 No 2 (2012) /
4. Articles

Based on the ethnographic study of Estonian spiritual Internet forum The Nest of Angels, the article observes the process of sharing virtual social support and creating-confirming spiritual meanings. The forum, explicitly opposing the consumeristic side of new spirituality, has become popular and demonstrates the nature and various roles of contemporary spiritual angels. The study identifies two main modes in which the Nest and the presence of angels might be useful for users. Firstly, emotional support is shared, either by fellow users directly or by confirmations that angels will definitely help. Secondly, the Nest allows people to acquire knowledge both on spiritual and practical issues. As the Nest is dialogical, users can pose questions and find confirmations for their otherwise deviant experiences. Discussions in the Nest encourage everybody to interpret some situations and objects (like feathers) as signs from angels. This interpreting process might change people’s perceptions of the world by adding a layer of positive emotions. The study demonstrates how the angelic presence (or at least endeavour towards the presence) helps to establish and keep the tonality of benevolence which functions as the cornerstone of this virtual space. The Nest supports a specific epistemological stance manifested in the angelic, traditional ‘feminine’ values of empathy, softness, and caring. Angels and the idea of angelic presence is the main factor helping to keep the ‘high-vibrational’ and benevolent atmosphere of the forum and empowering the users inside the traditional understanding of ‘feminine softness’.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs license, the author(s) and users are free to share (copy, distribute and transmit the contribution) under the following conditions: 1. they must attribute the contribution in the manner specified by the author or licensor, 2. they may not use this contribution for commercial purposes, 3. they may not alter, transform, or build upon this work.

Authors retain the following rights:

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