The Crisis in Soviet Ethnography.

RUSSIANS; EAST Europeans; EASTERN Slavs; ANTHROPOLOGY; ETHNOLOGY; HUMAN beings; ISOLATIONISM; INTERNATIONAL relations

The "crisis" in Soviet ethnography has to do not so much with the social conditions under which it operates as with the discipline itself. Self-satisfaction and intellectual isolationism are as much manifestations of this crisis as methodological diktat and political control. A broad modem redefinition of the discipline might help it to overcome its unattractive image and low status and reduce the risk of its marginalization. Steps in this direction might include a "repatriation" of ethnography through new emphasis on prolonged fieldwork, with a broadening of scientific interests, methodology, and conceptions of the genre of ethnographic writing and a change in direction away from the structures of power towards dialogue with the object of study, an ethnography of the scientific community, and a new interpretation of ethnicity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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