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This article analyses Estonian fairy tales with regard to perceiving supernatural lapses of time, focusing on the tale type cluster A Mortal Visits the Other World, which includes tale types ATU 470, 470A, 471, and 471A. In these tales the mortal finding himself in the world of the dead, heaven or fairyland experiences the accelerated passage of time. Returning to the mundane temporal reality and learning the truth the hero generally dies. The difference in time perception has been caused by the hero’s movement in space and between spaces. Three vertical spheres can be detected: 1) the upper world (heaven, paradise); 2) the human world; 3) the netherworld (the world of the dead, hell). Usually, the events of a particular tale take place only in the human world, and either in the upper or the netherworld. The relativity of the passing of time on earth and in the other world makes the tales ‘behave’ in a peculiar manner as regards genre, bringing to prominence features of representation of time typical of legends or religious tales. Although the tales contain several features that make them close to legends (a concrete place and personal names, the topic of death, dystopic endings, characters belonging to the reality of legends, etc.), based on Estonian material they can be regarded as part of fairy tales.

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This article is based on the results of recent fieldwork among the Evenk reindeer herders in the northern Baikal region. It argues that reindeer domestication should be approached as a never-ending process that happens in the context of animal and human movement and can be described as domestication-in-practice and domestication-on-the-move. An important signal of the fact that animals became closer to people is their constant return to a camp. This article presents the ethnography of how people try to facilitate these returns by feeding reindeer with salt, producing smoke and binding calves to stakes and poles. On the one hand, animals periodically come back to a camp. On the other hand, reindeer herders know the places to which the animals return outside the camp and this helps them to find reindeer in certain places. Reindeer herding in the northern Baikal region is based on constant relocation of the herd from place to place, implying daily short-term movement in order to bring animals to the camp and meaning a continuous monitoring of reindeer and predator movements.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0018 Book review of Riturile de trecere în actualitate – The Rites of Passage Time after Time, edited by Adina Hulubaş and Ioana Repciuc (Iaşi: Editura Universităţii „Alexandru Ioan Cuza“, 2016. 394 p.).

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0012 The article focuses on the dynamics of contemporary beliefs related to involuntary childlessness. Firstly, the methodological issues of collecting source material on delicate matters and the advantages of anonymous and narrative presentation modes in certain contexts will be discussed. Secondly, conclusions drawn from the collected material, i.e. the temporary and changeable nature of those beliefs, their relations with the mass media, the social and the individual aspects and the motifs of guilt and supernatural punishment in the context of identity issues will be presented, concluding that such belief-based models of explanation and help-seeking eventually function as a mental self-defence mechanism.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0017 Interview with Professor Simon J. Bronner (Penn State University).

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@article{JEF, author = {Zulfadli Aziz and Yunisrina Yusuf and Burhansyah Burhansyah and Meutia Muzammil}, title = { To Say or Not To Say? Construing Contextual Taboo Words Used by Acehnese Speakers in Indonesia}, journal = {Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics}, volume = {14}, number = {2}, year = {2020}, keywords = {}, abstract = {This study describes the types of taboo words used by the Acehnese people in Aceh, Indonesia. Ten language informants in the district were interviewed for this qualitative study. The interviews were recorded and then transcribed prior to analysis. The data were then analysed by the procedures of condensation, display, and conclusion drawing. The findings of the research reveal that the most common taboo types used by Acehnese speakers are taboos of vulgarity or obscenity, epithet, and the taboo of disease. This implies that calling people bad names, talking about sex, mentioning incurable or ‘repulsive’ diseases are among the most taboo discussions in Acehnese society. Taboo words related to religion are found the least in the data, which could imply that these words are small in number because the Acehnese people embrace their religion strongly and thus minimise verbal abuse related to it.}, issn = {2228-0987}, pages = {83–98}, url = {https://jef.ee/index.php/journal/article/view/351} }

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0009 The article addresses a conflicting encounter of two ideologies of kinship, ‘natural’ and ‘religious’, among the newly established Evangelical communities of Nenets in the Polar Ural and Yamal tundra. An ideology of Christian kinship, as an outcome of ‘spiritual re-birth’, was introduced through Nenets religious conversion. The article argues that although the born-again experience often turned against ancestral traditions and Nenets traditional kinship ties, the Nenets kinship system became a platform upon which the conversion mechanism was furthered and determined in the Nenets tundra.The article examines missionary initiatives and Nenets religiosity as kin-based activities, the outcome of which was twofold. On one side, it was the realignment of Nenets traditional kinship networks. On other side, it was the indigenisation of the Christian concept of kinship according to native internal cultural logic. Evangelical communities in the tundra were plunged into the traditional practices of Nenets kinship networks, economic exchanges, and marriage alliances. Through negotiation of traditional Nenets kinship and Christian kinship, converted Nenets developed new imaginaries, new forms of exchanges, and even new forms of mobility.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0001 This special issue of the Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics is composed on the basis of papers presented at the Ethnography of Contemporary Ritual Landscapes panel organised at the Conference of the Finnish Anthropological Society at the University of Helsinki, October 21–22, 2015.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0014 This paper aims to investigate the relevance of metaphor and metonymy to ancient dream interpretation in Islamic-Iranian culture. To this end, a most-referenced book of dream interpretation is analysed according to the conceptual metaphor theory. The results show that metaphor and metonymy play an important role in this ancient discourse. The metaphorical dream is based either on a resemblance between the dream as the source domain and its interpretation as the target domain, or on some symbolic metaphors arising from cultural conventions. The metonymic dream is formed by a contiguous relationship between the dream as the vehicle entity and its interpretation as the target entity. Concerning metaphorical dream interpretation, it can be argued that the overt content of the dream is mapped onto the latent content by resemblance or cultural convention. As regards metonymic dream interpretation, it can be said that the overt content of the dream is mapped onto the latent content by a conceptual metonymy based on socio-physical context. In addition, there are two other procedures of dream interpretation based on realistic representation and the technique of reversion. These cases do not apply figurative devices like metaphor and metonymy. Also, the dreamer’s personal knowledge of his or her life does not play a significant role in the discourse of dream interpretation in Islamic-Iranian culture.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0015 The paper considers common youth leisure activities in traditional Karelian culture, from the point of view both of the culturally prescribed norms and the actual behaviour. Special attention is paid to official and social adolescent development frameworks and to reflection of these age-related stages in folk vocabulary. The paper uses a large number of recently published and unpublished ethnographic and folkloristic sources. The authors come to the conclusion that in Karelian culture there is a specific age-group framework for adolescence, as well as gender-related differences between male and female behavioural patterns. The paper shows that girls had to undertake more varied tasks than boys as, on the one hand, they were to play socially prescribed roles and follow moral obligations, remaining modest and, on the other hand, had to be active in order to get married and give birth to children.

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