Storytelling in Siberia is part of a hallowed tradition in the discipline of folkloristics: a study of the epic genre, in this case among the Sakha people of Yakutia in northeastern Siberia. Robin Harris focuses on three issues that have played a key role in the decline and evolution of olonkho over the course of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. They include what Harris calls three “unusual semantic domains: 1) Center (Russian tsentr), 2) nation (Russian natsiia, adj. natsionalny ‘national’), and 3) epic sreda” (4). In her quest to determine how and whether olonkho can be revived, she relies heavily on sreda, which “encompasses not only the physical surroundings and visible environment of a place and time, but also the broad social environment, including the attitudes and perceptions of people in the region to the object being discussed... Its rich semantic field encompasses not only appreciative attitudes based on musical, artistic, and linguistic understandings, but also a constantly changing mélange of performance preferences, practices, and venues, all affected by an ongoing series of both grassroots and ‘top-down’ interventions” (5).
The book may be divided into three sections. The introduction and chapter 1 provide an overview of the project and discuss the genre and its performance from Harris’s perspective as an ethnomusicologist. Chapters 2-4 focus on the history of olonkho from the nineteenth century to the present, providing a window into its decline and evolution, particularly in light of its designation as a UNESCO Masterpiece of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2005. Chapters 5-7 explore the challenges to revitalization and the role of Sakha epic as an identity marker in the post-socialist world. The book is supported by an invaluable web resource as well (https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/harris/storytelling/) that should be a hallmark for ethnographic publishing. It features audio and video files of performances and interviews with epic performers and of theatrical productions and festivals as well as interviews with a variety of people involved in the revitalization efforts. Harris should be commended for including the original text of all of her translations in the endnotes, something that most presses resist, but which are invaluable to specialists.
In the historical section, Harris ably deals with the complex sociopolitical changes that occurred in Russia in 1917, the year of the Bolshevik Revolution, and in 1991, the fall of the USSR. The relationship to the Center and the role of minority peoples (as a natsiia) in these various contexts comes to the fore in the analysis. Harris elucidates the connections between the performance of olonkho and how it has evolved in response to the often diametrically opposed and rapidly shifting views of the Moscow government over the last 100 years. She foregrounds “the words, opinions, and memories of…Sakha respondents” (32). Their opinions provide an invaluable perspective on the role of the epic genre in their lives and also its potential for revitalization. Chapters 3 and 4 discuss the UNESCO application and the effects it is having on efforts to revitalize the genre. The transcript of her interview with Elizaveta Sidorova (66-71), a prime mover in the application and its success, encapsulates the vagaries (and humorous absurdities) of Russian bureaucracy as well as the Center-region relationship better than any scholarly treatment could. I would only quibble that, in some cases, the analysis wisely centers around local voices, while in others (particularly chapters 5 and 6), they are absent in favor of other analytical tools that would also be bolstered by their opinions. Harris elucidates the fraught ambiguity of the UNESCO declaration, exploring how it has bolstered interest in a dying art, but also complicates the rejuvenation of olonkho.
Chapter 5 draws on sociolinguistic theory to illustrate how language is essential to sustain epic, but also draws intriguing parallels with the process of language death to illustrate the status of olohkho in solo performance (a moribund tradition) as compared to theatrical performances based on the epics (a practice that represents promise, even if not a traditional form, in the ongoing revival). Harris concludes that the creation of an epic sreda may be supported (or hindered) by relations to the state, the nation, and the Soviet-era attitudes toward folklore and cultural products. Harris advocates for proper identification of the community to which olonkho belongs and notes that “identifying the scope of that community may require reexamining the usual ethnolinguistic boundaries” (133). However, Harris does not follow through on this assertion in her own discussion. It is telling, for example, that one of the three living masters of olonkho in 2005 was an Evenk woman, a member of a Tungusic people (the Sakha are Turkic). While the Sakha are the majority ethnic group in Yakutia, I was left to wonder at the attitude toward this genre among the other peoples whose voices have also been ignored in socialist and post-socialist contexts. One might argue that this expectation is unreasonable in a book dedicated to the Sakha, but the fact that one master is not of that ethnic group merits at least some comment from the author.
Chapter 6 returns to the central question of creating an epic sreda from the point of view of postcolonial and neocolonial theories. She explores how olonkho has become an identity marker in the context of the UNESCO declaration: “Sakha…in the legislative and cultural sectors…frequently invoke olonkho in their public discourse as the most potent symbol of Sakha identity” (145). Harris concludes her study with an assessment of revitalization efforts since 2005 and provides recommendations to ensure that the genre thrives in its traditional solo form and in contemporary adaptations of olonkho.
While Harris makes a valuable contribution to the study of this epic genre, performance, and revitalization, some of the material could have been streamlined to avoid repetition of the same arguments and conclusions at several points. Nevertheless, it is a welcome addition to the field of post-socialist studies. Her treatment of the questions is exhaustive, drawing from a variety of disciplinary approaches necessary to understand the sociocultural situation of the Sakha olonkho historically and today. This book provides a rare window in English into the complex and vast world of Siberia and of Russia as a multiethnic state, a fact often overlooked. Because it is readable and not overloaded with jargon, this book would be a welcome addition to courses in many fields on minority voices.
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[Review length: 1051 words • Review posted on May 3, 2018]