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Sensing Athletes: Sensory Dimensions of Recreational Endurance Sports | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2017-0011 Sport has become increasingly popular with recreational athletes over the last couple of decades. This has only gained minimal attention so far from scholars interested in the relations between recreational sports and everyday culture. With this paper, we seek to contribute to this field by scrutinising the sensory dimensions of recreational sport. Rather than probing into or highlighting isolated senses, we look at sensory dimensions understood as a combination of different, non-separable sensory experiences featured in recreational endurance sports. We are interested in how senses play a role for recreational endurance athletes in running, triathlon and cycling both in training and competition. We start by examining how cultural and social dimensions are inextricably linked to doing sports. Secondly, we show how different configurations of the senses and their communicative mediation are contingent on sport disciplines, specific settings, technology, development and change as sensory careers over time. Thirdly, we discuss the kinaesthetic dimensions of doing sports in relation to the senses and the role of atmospheres. We conclude by arguing that highlighting specific senses by athletes is a cultural practice that calls for a holistic analysis of senses in sport, and outline some methodological implications for research on the senses.

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Making a Home in the Taiga: Movements, Paths and Signs among Orochen-Evenki Hunters and Herders of Zabaikal Krai (South East Siberia) | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

In this article, I will explore interrelations between place making, movement, use of paths and signs among the Orochen of Zabaikal Krai (Province). Although under the Russian Tsars Orochen-Evenki hunters and herders were referred to negatively as wanderers; today my ethnography demonstrates how movements of animals and humans are crucial for the success of their subsistence, place making and worldview. Hence, walking in the taiga is an important skill that is essential to hunting and herding activities when humans strive to identify animals’ ‘living places’ (Orochen bikit) by reading their tracks and movements. Humans also leave their own tracks and paths as well as signs communicating with each other while subsisting in remote areas, in this way creating their own living places. Thereby, I show how movements and the use of paths is an important dimension of Orochen-Evenki wellbeing as well as their moral code. 88x31-8913862

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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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– the right to use the substance of the article in future own works, including lectures and books,

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The Evenki Memorial Tree and Trail: Negotiating with a Memorial Regime in the North Baikal, Siberia | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

Based upon the ethnography gathered among Evenkis living in Kholodnoye village in the northern coastal area of Lake Baikal in Siberia this article discusses relationships between local memorial practices and official memorial regimes. Although negotiation between authoritative and alternative memories and histories is typically portrayed in terms of resistance, in North Baikal it should be approached differently. Thus Evenkis in alliance with the Taiga creatively engage with official memorial regime in a way local practices of remembering serve positively for the local community. Remembering becomes a ‘language’ to interact with state powers and external audiences. 88x31-9513131

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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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Reconnecting Alaska: Mexican Movements and the Last Frontier | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

This paper discusses the initial findings of on-going research with Mexican migrants and immigrants to Alaska. The paper outlines the historical and on-going connections between Alaska and Mexico and explores how and why those connections have been obscured or ignored. Powerful imaginaries are associated with places: Alaska, and ‘the north’ more generally, and Latin America, and Mexico specifically. My research shows how interesting things happen when they are brought together through movement. People from Acuitzio del Canje, Michoacán began travelling to Alaska (Anchorage, and elsewhere) to work in the 1950s, and movement between Mexico and Alaska has continued across generations since then. Today, many Acuitzences who live in Anchorage maintain a close relationship with friends and family members in Acuitzio, and travel back and forth regularly. However, this movement is obscured by ideological work that makes Alaska seem separate, isolated, wild, and a place where Mexicans are not imagined to be. Mexican movements into Alaska over time disrupt this vision, showing how Alaska is connected to multiple other geographies, and making the US-Mexico border a salient reference point in everyday life in Anchorage. When the South moves into the North, it can make us think about both ‘Alaska’ and ‘Mexico’ in different ways. When the US-Mexico border is relocated to Anchorage, if only for a moment, it can elicit a reaction of humour or surprise. Why is that? And what does this have to do with how people actually live in an interconnected place? 88x31-7885013

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Authors retain the following rights:

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Contemporary Jokes about Students: The Body of Texts and Their Genetic Relations | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

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In spite of the fact that so many papers in folklore scholarship have been dedicated to the question of the genesis of the joke as a genre (mainly speculating on its origin from the fairy tale) almost none of them attempts to reach beyond theoretical discussion on the problem. The aim of this article is to broaden the scope of existing research by analysing the genetic relations of contemporary jokes in a sample of Russian-language jokes about students collected from different sources (written, oral, Internet). Jokes about students are compared to jokes from other cycles and other genres with the help of statistical investigation. The types of genetic (and typological) relations between them are elucidated as well as the possible aspects of the origin of jokes. 88x31-1570047

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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– the right to use the substance of the article in future own works, including lectures and books,

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The Izhma Komi and the Pomor: Two Models of Cultural Transformation | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

The article analyses Pomor and Izhma Komi identities. The Pomor and Izhma Komi, who live in the European north of Russia, practically lost their identity during the 20th century and are currently undergoing a process of re-identification. The authors delve into the reasons and circumstances stimulating this process of re-identification, analyse which social groups are the initiators of this process and what is the content of Pomorian and Izhma identity today. 88x31-2321770

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@article{JEF, author = {Alexandru-Laurenţiu Cohal}, title = { Book Review: The Rites of Passage Time after Time}, journal = {Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics}, volume = {11}, number = {2}, year = {2017}, keywords = {book review}, abstract = {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.).}, issn = {2228-0987}, pages = {144–147}, doi = {10.1515/jef-2017-0018}, url = {/index.php/journal/article/view/271} }

“I'm Not Like Most of You Here, I'm Just an Alcoholic”: A Russian Baptist Theory of Addiction | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2016-0008 In my paper I discuss alcoholics in the Russian Baptist rehabilitation ministry by comparing them to drug addicts. In the outside world, as well as in the early stages of the rehabilitation program, alcoholics and illicit drug abusers are perceived as different cultural groups. However, during the program, rehabilitants learn Russian Baptist dogma and theology, and soon afterwards the distinction becomes obsolete for them. I address narratives of distinction and the Russian Baptist response to them. Then I reconstruct the Russian Baptist theory of addiction to demonstrate why alcoholism and substance dependence are not regarded as a problem, but rather as consequences of the real problem, which is a life in sin. 88x31-5943436

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Authors retain the following rights:

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MD Voldemar Sumberg and the Folk Medicine Collection of the Estonian Museum of Hygiene from the 1920s and 1930s | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

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Based on the documents preserved in several museums and archives in Tartu and Tallinn (the Estonian Health Care Museum, the Estonian State Archives, the Estonian Historical Archives, the Estonian Folklore Archives and the Estonian National Museum), the article will give an overview of the views of the director of the Estonian Museum of Hygiene, Voldemar Sumberg, on the relationship between folk medicine and modern medicine; the data on folk medicine collecting campaigns with Sumberg’s involvement in the 1920s; and the fate of the folk medicine records and items collected by the Museum of Hygiene during the 1920s and 1930s, according to the documentation and archival material found so far. 88x31-5312291

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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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Contemporary Jokes about Students: The Body of Texts and Their Genetic Relations | Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics

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  3. Vol 6 No 2 (2012) /
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In spite of the fact that so many papers in folklore scholarship have been dedicated to the question of the genesis of the joke as a genre (mainly speculating on its origin from the fairy tale) almost none of them attempts to reach beyond theoretical discussion on the problem. The aim of this article is to broaden the scope of existing research by analysing the genetic relations of contemporary jokes in a sample of Russian-language jokes about students collected from different sources (written, oral, Internet). Jokes about students are compared to jokes from other cycles and other genres with the help of statistical investigation. The types of genetic (and typological) relations between them are elucidated as well as the possible aspects of the origin of jokes. 88x31-6078687

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:

– copyright, and other proprietary rights relating to the article, such as patent rights,

– the right to use the substance of the article in future own works, including lectures and books,

– the right to reproduce the article for own purposes, provided the copies are not offered for sale,

– the right to self-archive the article.