Organization of ethnoecological systems by the East Slavic settlers in the south of Western Siberia

Abstract

This paper analyzes the sources of the author's field research, revealing the mechanisms of development of Siberian, Russian, and other Slavic peoples. Settlers in new ethnoecological systems changed the tradition of life support as well as the spiritual component of life: new places were assigned new geographical names (toponyms), and the old Turkic or Ugric names were conceptualized in terms of the Russian language and national outlook. In the process of the development of Siberia, East Slavic peoples and ethnic groups used their adaptive capabilities and their defense mechanisms. In order to harmonize the interaction between man and nature they used the rational and irrational knowledge of astronomical phenomena, flora and fauna, weather, and other natural phenomena which the settlers brought with them from Russia, and which were in demand in the new environment. However, the apocalyptic notions of doomsday as a grand environmental and spiritual catastrophe of humanity seems to remain consistently among the Siberian peasantry in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Keywords:

• ethnoecological system
• Russians
• East Slavic peoples
• Siberia
• traditional knowledge