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El artículo analiza las políticas culturales implementadas entre 2007 y 2015 en relación con el Instituto Saturnino Unzué de Mar del Plata, Provincia de Buenos Aires, Argentina, destacando la intervención estatal y la colaboración interjurisdiccional en su preservación y refuncionalización. Se estudian las acciones de diversos actores, resaltando la necesidad de políticas más integrales y sostenibles para garantizar la conservación de este patrimonio cultural. El trabajo subraya la importancia de las intervenciones conjuntas para mantener vivo este espacio emblemático, que sigue siendo un centro cultural activo y significativo para la comunidad local, provincial y nacional.

Animal husbandry is one of the oldest human occupations, and it is well spread over the world. Most importantly, during the centuries of practicing this occupation, humans have developed a solid understanding of the environment they were living in, developing in time a specific traditional ecological knowledge. This traditional knowledge is part of an intangible heritage that the communities have and cherish, although it is constantly changing and adapting to new conditions. In the past years, more and more researchers are documenting the change, by looking at the challenges and dynamics of this occupation, its uncertainties, and contemporary risks. The “Introduction” of this special issue of Martor overviews the research focusing on the changes that pastoralism is going through. It also presents the articles that are included in the volume.

The study focuses on the pastoral songs from Vrancea region1 in relation to the social changes that occurred in the last century. The local pastoral culture, sustained for centuries by devălmășie, an archaic form of community organization, started to decline after the rise of aggressive forest exploitations that began towards the end of the 19th century. From this moment on, the old musical practices and their ancient shepherding origin were partly abandoned or integrated into new contexts and situations. For example, during the communist regime that was established in the second part of the 20th century, shepherd songs were adapted and displayed on a national stage under the pressure and careful involvement of cultural authorities. Such authorities established large instrumental groups of 40-50 pipe players with the aim to represent their cultural regions in grandiose folklore events supported by the state apparatus. Individual singing, whether for oneself or for the community, declined as folklorized music, promoted by mass media, became increasingly popular. Currently, the songs of shepherding origin seem to be frozen in time and in the memory of the elders who remained connected to the musical past of the region. At sheepfolds, the whistles, the instruments specific to the place, are no longer heard. Shepherds live in a very different environment, where they have a variety of musical options, including radio and smartphone. During field research, I often felt that I was witnessing the effective disappearance of an exhausted universe that no longer has the will and strength to compete with other musical genres in today’s sound landscape. The tradition of the shepherding songs, relics of a once-prosperous archaic society, seems to be nearing its final days.

In southern Transylvania, sibling relations among herdsmen constitute a framework for organizing local shepherding practices. Our field data point to the importance of the brothers’ and sisters’ joint work in terms of the apprenticeship of young shepherds, the task rotation during seasonal transhumance, the sharing of their parents’ herds, and (as a result) the intergenerational continuity of pastoral ownership. Therefore, sibling relations among herders should be considered not only demographic evidence of consanguinity but more importantly a traditional pattern of sociality and economic mutual help, i.e., an institution. The functionality of such an institutional model is confirmed by the anthropological literature.

In order to preserve the biodiversity and cultural heritage in semi-natural pastures, it is important to manage each type of pasture in a way that resembles the historical land use that has shaped the ecosystem. We monitored the grazing regime in 28 pastures in Sweden from 1987 to 2012, and compared their management with the historical grazing regimes. The studied pastures, as well as a majority of the remaining high nature value pastures in Sweden, are located in historical infield areas, where grazing was determined by the system of fencing and use of meadows and arable fields, the so-called cultivation system. Using various sources, we compiled information about the major Swedish cultivation systems and interpreted their significance for the grazing regime. Historical grazing regimes are chacaterized by frequent late grazing and interannual variations in grazing period and grazing pressure. In contrast, the current grazing is rather intense through the entire summer and with little between-year variation. Also, the grazing in the 1980’s and 1990’s was considerably more varied and less intense than it is today. A pronounced shift in pasture management took place in the late 1990’s, and interviews with the farmers show that the shift was mainly caused by the criteria for agri-environment subsidies. Interviews also show that the subsidies have been important for continued use of the semi-natural pastures. We claim that the differences between current and historical grazing regimes constitute a severe threat to pasture biodiversity, and that it is urgent to adjust the eligibility criteria for agri-environment payments.

Although pastoralism has a special place in Romanian history and national mythology, shepherds “occupy a complicated position” (O’Brien and Crețan 2019) in contemporary technoscientific capitalism (Birch and Muniesa 2020). As their age-old shepherding routes shrink (Săgeată et al. 2022), new devices need to be adopted and associated with traditional shepherding methods to meet the new market challenges and industrialised model of sheep farming. Opting for an approach that combines science and technology studies (STS) and anthropology, our paper examines how a New Pastoral Regime (NPR) was assembled with the help of a small piece of technology: the ear tag. EU norms, market imperatives, scientific innovation, financial subsidies, political interests, and technical devices become entangled in a political and scientific network of governing nature and the future that produces different kinds of sheep as techno-natural entities. By opening the black box of ear tagging technology our paper reveals what was left ou

In recent years, there has been a resurgence of tourist and economic interest in transhumance in Sardinia and more generally Italy. Previously viewed as a hindrance to sheep farming development and associated with isolation, sacrifice, and uncertainty for the people involved, transhumance is now being reconsidered. This study aims to explore the impact of this renewed attention by examining the new transhumance routes, identifying its advocates, and understanding why pastoral mobility was once deemed as a sign of cultural backwardness but is now celebrated as a heritage object and identity trait. The paper also investigates how transhumance has been integrated into territorial marketing efforts, often through rhetorical appeals to pastoral identity and authenticity and nostalgic and poetical depictions of a mythologized past. In fact, the emotional peak following UNESCO’s recognition of transhumance as intangible heritage is not the sole driver of this trend, as Sardinia has been focusing on the heritage value of pastoral mobility since the early 2000s. This paper emphasizes the role that rural space and landscape revaluation, sustainable tourism promotion, new pastoralism models, and local agri-food production revitalization play in driving this shift, aligning with current environmental and cultural heritage conservation and enhancement policies.

This article draws on research conducted on Via Transilvanica, focusing on how sheepdogs mediate interactions between tourists and shepherds. Officially opened in October 2022 by Tășuleasa Social Association, Via Transilvanica is a 1400 km long hiking trail that crosses Romania from one end to another, specifically from northeast to southwest. Having Putna at one end of the route and Drobeta Turnu-Severin at the other, this trail passes through wild landscapes and gives the opportunity to meet different kinds of people, as well as different animal species. In the Traveler’s Guide published on viatransilvanica.com, attention is drawn to the areas where the main dangers are posed by sheepdogs in the numerous sheepfolds (stâne) on the way. For this research, I have travelled on foot or by bicycle, I have conducted interviews with shepherds and tourists, and I utilized online and media resources to analyse and explore the interaction between travellers and shepherds in the context of contemporary traveling conditions when societies seek to discover new networking opportunities. Two of the questions raised by the Via Transilvanica project are: “Do shepherds enjoy encounters with unexpected guests?” and “How do shepherds behave when strangers approach the flock?”

Until the structural change in South Tyrolean agriculture in the 1960s, the high pastures were important as essential fodder resources for the subsistence farming of mountain farmers, so it was primarily the farmers who were responsible for negotiating grazing rights. The task of the herder, on the other hand, was essentially to observe these rights strictly. Historically, herders in South Tyrol have played a socially marginal role, their activities focusing exclusively on the summer high pastures. But the current situation is different. Drawing on the example of one particular mountain pasture and one herder, the landscape can be understood as a “total social fact.” This landscape as a whole is able to give us a condensed account of the comprehensive changes over the past fifty years, expressed as the return of scrub, and the new embodied practices of the herder as well as the grazing animals.

The pastoral practice as subsistence process characterised by the “commons” in terms of property and management has declined in the industrial era because of its perceived low productivity and competition with intensified agriculture, industry, urban functions, infrastructure, and urban sprawl. Today, the animal production sector is dominated by the intensive industrial model that negatively impacts the global health. The survival in almost original form of the pastoral activity is related to its independence from mechanisation and urban infrastructure. The intensive process of urban sprawl of the last decades, characterised by the expansion of cities, often leads to various socio-economic and environmental impacts, including the creation of abandoned or underutilised spaces within urban and peri-urban settings. The adaptation of this practice to the urban context has resulted in diverse ways of management across Europe, different approaches based on the traditional form or encouraged by contemporary activism. In the Balkans, the persistence of the pastoral practice and its short and medium transhumance infrastructure is strongly related to the strategy of avoiding state management and the persistence of alternative food networks. In Western Europe, innovative aspects like developing complex management plans for marketing and communicating on the activity, local actors’ inclusion in the co-construction process of the project, connection to local food networks are important features of modern urban pastoralism. The current challenges of this activity encompass the lack of specialised know-how specific to pastoral practices and aligning the operational conditions of extensive livestock to current societal expectations and standards.

Women have always played a significant role in herding in Hungary, although their tasks and recognition have changed substantially over time. Nowadays, the vital role of women is becoming increasingly visible and recognised in Hungary. In this paper, members of the Hungarian Women Herders group and three researchers reviewed the scattered ethnographic, autobiographical and other literature, and conducted interviews with five active and retired women herders as well as with the husbands of three of them, and documented the role of women from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present day. Women have long played a fundamental role in holding the family together, providing food, and raising children. As in the past, women herders take part in milk processing and raising the lambs, but several also herd and even shear. After the 1989 revolution, many herders started herding privately again, and some women who had not been born into farming families chose livestock grazing as a profession. More recently, women in herding families have increasingly been responsible for handling the paperwork required for livestock welfare accountability, marketing and other differentiated needs requiring patience and computer skills. In 2021 the “Hungarian Women Herders” group was established, which currently has over 60 members. The group was founded with the aim of self-help and knowledge sharing, but they also participate in festivals, events and international conferences, and they are in contact with the association of Spanish women herders. Pastoral animal husbandry has not become obsolete in the face of industrial food systems. As its knowledge-intensive practices make use of spatially and temporally variable vegetation, it is becoming recognized as a more ecological alternative. It is necessary to recognize women herders’ important contribution to building a more sustainable common future, as their activities and knowledge are integral to this type of livestock production system. Moving forward, women must be included in initiatives to support pastoralism—whether it is the collection of best practices for other farmers and the coming generations to learn from, or the development of locally-based innovations, rooted in tradition while looking to the future.

This article analyses an innovative place-sensitive training experience in pastoralism implemented in rural and mountainous Italian areas: the Young Shepherds School. Adopting a methodology based on learning-by-doing and an experiential teaching approach, the School offers its participants—essentially urban young people interested in living and working in rural contexts—an unprecedented learning opportunity and the possibility of setting out on a path towards the shepherding profession. At the same time, the involvement of local actors and the post-training pathway represent concrete steps towards the participants’ project ideas taking root in the area and the development of micro-enterprises in the field of pastoralism, aimed at personal income as well as environmental care.

In the Jiu Valley, located in the southern Carpathians, shepherding was the main occupation of peasants, even after coal mining began in the area. Coal mining led to rapid economic development both in the early twentieth century and during the communist period (1945-1989). Often discouraged by the authorities, the peasants—nicknamed momârlani by the townspeople—continued to raise animals while working simultaneously in the mine. After the 1989 Revolution, during the difficult transition to a democratic regime and market economy, peasants struggled to find their place in a new market: that of purebred animals, which hold significant economic value, especially in an area further impoverished by mine closures imposed by European “green” policies.

The article refers to the cultural project Păstorit 2.1. Oaia Hai-Hui [Shepherding 2.1. The Wandering Sheep], co-financed by the National Cultural Fund Administration and carried out by the National Museum of the Romanian Peasant. This text reviews and describes the activities conducted during the project (February–November 2022). It is written from the perspective of the project manager who focuses on fieldwork, describes how the exhibition was curated, and highlights the unseen work behind such a complex project. The article mentions the external partners involved in the project and their contributions to various activities, including roundtable discussions, conferences, fieldwork, exhibition, fair, podcast participation, and the production of editorial materials that describe the tradition of shepherding and the products obtained from milk processing.

In October 2022, the National Museum of the Romanian Peasant (NMRP) will start writing an annual project, Shepherding 2.1. The wandering sheep. Colleagues from the Creativity Office, Museum Education section, contributed to the design of museum education activities that made a thematic exhibition accessible to both children and blind people. The article describes this first experience to make accessible an exhibition at the NMRP and captures the main problems identified and the solutions found to these problems, as well as the importance of transdisciplinary approaches and teamwork.

Whether harmonious or tense over time, the ways in which encounters with wild animals are narrated reflect perspectives on nature and human interaction with it. In this regard, the article reveals documents recorded by the author during fieldworks conducted among Carpathian shepherds.

This research is an incursion into the topic of memory and recollection as processes of identity reconstruction, but also as a dimension of the heritage creation process. In the context of current social mobility and alienation, this issue receives new values, especially in the contemporary context of mobility (leaving rural communities in favour of urban living in the country or abroad). This uprooting led to the demolition of old houses with traditional architecture. The text presents a case study: the example given by a local entrepreneur, whose intention is to set up a touristic pension complex and thus, he buys old houses from all the villages in Țara Oașului (a region situated in the North-west Romania). In order to prepare the houses for their new location, detailed research was carried on, in order to find out the story of the family that lived there, the use of the objects that were discovered there. The article describes this endeavour for the house of the shepherd, making reference to the lifestyle of shepherds of yesteryear, and the objects they used. All in a strong connection with the people who actually inhabited and used the house, and the objects found inside. Last but not least, the research approach is an autoethnographic one. The insider position of the researcher is assumed and instrumentalized in the work of ethnographic description.

The article presents the traditional costume of the shepherds from the Eastern Carpathians, from an historical perspective, using narrative, bibliographic, iconographic, folklore, and archival sources. The muruite [smeared] shirts treated with soot become regional and occupational signs in the mountain area of ​​Bistrița, Maramureș, and Bucovina regions.

The collective volume stands as pivotal research in recent pastoralism studies. Using a multisituated and pluridisciplinary perspective, it addresses the need to understand integratively the dynamic responses of grazing communities across Europe in the context of the new “heritage turn,” in conjunction with environmental stresses, social transformations, global institutions and their policies. Providing in-depth descriptions of the numerous challenges that transhumance in Europe faces today—security of land holding, new market relations, the growing pressures of governments, processes of social change and modernization—it reveals the complex interplay of these drivers of change and analyzes numerous examples of loss and adaptations of grazing practices to the new heritage scenario. In its attempt to ground a more holistic view on mobile pastoralism under global frictions, it proposes reframing it as biocultural heritage.

The volume Păstoritul carpatic. Tradiție și continuitate [Shepherding in the Carpathians. Tradition and continuity] (2022) coordinated by Lucian David and Ionuț Semuc presents the practice of shepherding from an interdisciplinary perspective: historical, sociological, economic, cultural, political, and religious.

The book Biserica de alături [The church next door] addresses some of the lesser-known rites of the shepherds from the Romanian Carpathians, such as the marriage at the fir trees, the confession, the prayer at the tree, and eating tree buds at Easter. Laura Jiga Iliescu describes these rites following long-term research on the mountain plateaus and in the hearths of the pastoral villages at the foot of the mountains.

This article explores the Silk Road, one of history’s most significant trade networks that bridged China and the West. The route fostered a vibrant cultural exchange, visible in the art and ornamental patterns that developed along its path. This study provides a cross-cultural perspective on ornamentation within the Great Steppe, particularly focusing on Kazakh baskur—a decorative band traditionally used in nomadic dwellings. Examining the symbolic and functional roles of baskur, the paper highlights both its artistic legacy and its broader cultural impact across the Silk Road region.

I discuss some of the current challenges to the social sciences/humanities and contend that their impact, marked by epistemological confusion and ill-founded accusatory discourse against the basics of open scientific debate and empirical methods, is damaging and undermining rational exchange. There is notable variety across disciplines, but contestation is rife. I affirm the existence and value of a historical Western telos, as a scientific-epistemological ‘project’ driven both by basic curiosity and (material) interests. In the face of some justified but also some grossly overstated accusations of science, especially during the past two decades, I plead for renewal and recalibration of such a telos (be it Western or other) based on the intrinsic value of sound, evidence-based science and non-justificationist critical rationalism, not the least because the proposed alternatives – slighting evidence-based reasoning and advocating the use of personal experience/bias as authoritative, like in ‘identity politics’– hold little promise.

This article explores the complex and often contradictory experiences of the Druze community in Israel, specifically examining how military service has shaped their identity and integration into Israeli society. While military service is typically viewed as a means of achieving social equality and inclusion, the Druze continue to face discrimination despite fulfilling their national obligations. Using semi-structured interviews, this study investigates the implications of the Druze’s compulsory conscription, focusing on concepts of reciprocity, convertibility, and identity politics. Findings reveal that while military service reinforces the Israeli identity among Druze youth, it fails to provide the expected access to equal rights and full citizenship, thus perpetuating their marginalized status within an ethno-republican state.

This article outlines the key pilgrimage sites in Baku and the Absheron Peninsula in Azerbaijan, offering a comprehensive discussion of the history of Shia Islam in this region, with a particular focus on the Republic of Azerbaijan. Each site is examined in terms of its historical development, the figure of devotion associated with it, architectural features, surrounding environment, and religious practices, encompassing both orthodox and heterodox traditions. By integrating personal observations and an analysis of existing literature, this study discusses the main patterns of worship and devotion, providing insights into the broader context of Shia religious practices in Azerbaijan.

The article examines the historical and cultural development of the Arbëreshë, an ancient Albanian-speaking minority in southern Italy. It focuses on the migration processes of Albanians from the 14th to the 18th century, which led to their settlement in Italy, and explores the integration mechanisms that enabled the preservation of their linguistic and cultural identity. Particular attention is given to the role of the Greek-Byzantine rite and the Albanian language in the religious and cultural life of the community. The article also analyses the current challenges faced by the Arbëreshë, particularly regarding linguistic erosion and social changes brought about by modern emigration. Despite these difficulties, the text highlights the ongoing cultural solidarity among the various Arbëreshë communities.

The patriotic fervour surrounding the „Great Patriotic War,“ amplified by Soviet propaganda, led to concessions for some religious groups, though still constrained by Soviet anti-religious legislation, while others were excluded entirely. This paper argues that ethno-religious groups that aligned with the Soviet narrative, which mythologised the war effort, were able to engage in limited religious activities. In contrast, communities excluded from this narrative were compelled to maintain their religious traditions clandestinely for a prolonged period. These excluded groups were also deprived of any centralised religious organisations or church structures. Consequently, unlike in Central and Eastern Europe, the struggle for religious freedoms in this context did not follow the typical church vs. state model, but rather a citizens vs. state dynamic. This phenomenon is particularly evident in northern Kazakhstan, where the deportation of various nationalities resulted in the coexistence of ethno-religious groups with vastly different statuses.

The article examines the historical and cultural development of the Arbëreshë, an ancient Albanian-speaking minority in southern Italy. It focuses on the migration processes of Albanians from the 14th to the 18th century, which led to their settlement in Italy, and explores the integration mechanisms that enabled the preservation of their linguistic and cultural identity. Particular attention is given to the role of the Greek-Byzantine rite and the Albanian language in the religious and cultural life of the community. The article also analyses the current challenges faced by the Arbëreshë, particularly regarding linguistic erosion and social changes brought about by modern emigration. Despite these difficulties, the text highlights the ongoing cultural solidarity among the various Arbëreshë communities.

Abstract Salvador, the capital of Bahia State in Brazil, has long struggled with pronounced economic and social inequality. This stratification has resulted in spatial segregation, leading to the expansion of favelas, typically near the city center, where segregation in various dimensions of social engagement intensifies tensions of inequities. The municipal government has made several attempts to address favela-related issues through urban planning policies. Notwithstanding the progress made in lowering violent crime and extreme poverty, these issues still exist. This paper explores the interaction between government-led practices and corresponding self-organized actions toward planning strategies, invoking a social justice framework and critical urban theories. It identifies mismatches between institutional objectives and residents’ expectations, highlighting that structural contradictions in the region’s social development remain unresolved. The analysis suggests that planning policies should consider key factors, such as resource redistribution, recognition of sociocultural identity, and political representation. On the basis of these findings, this paper offers insights into urban planning for favelas as examples of complex governance challenges. It also aims to contribute to the global discourse on similar urban planning issues.

The article opens a special issue of the Historical Ethnology journal dedicated to the 130th anniversary of the outstanding scholar Nikolay Iosifovich Vorobyev, geographer, historian and Turkologist, Honored Scientist of the Tatar ASSR, Honorary Member of the USSR Geographical Society, founder of ethnographic Tatar studies and one of the leading researchers of the ethno- and cultural genesis of the Chuvash people. Professor Vorobyev is the author and editor of such fundamental works as the Fundamentals of Physical Geography of the Tatar Republic (Kazan, 1936); The Kazan Tatars: Ethnographic Study of the Material Culture of the Pre-October Period (Kazan, 1953); The Chuvashes. Ethnographic Study (Cheboksary, 1956); Tatars of the Middle Volga and Ural Regions (Moscow: Nauka, 1967), as well as other academic publications. The paper outlines important milestones in the biography, the main areas of the scientist’s research activities, starting with his student passion for the ethnic culture of the peoples of Siberia to academic maturity – fundamental research on the ethnography of the Turkic peoples of the Volga and Ural regions. The article presents vectors of his teaching work at Kazan State University, at the Kazan Eastern Pedagogical Institute (KSPI), as well as administrative and expeditionary practice within the walls of the Central Museum of the Tatar ASSR and the Institute of Language, Literature and History of the Kazan branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences.

The paper examines the teaching activities of the famous ethnographer, geographer, researcher of the ethnography of the Tatars and other peoples of the Volga region, Nikolay Iosifovich Vorobyev, at Kazan University and the Eastern Pedagogical Institute in the 1920s – early 1930s. His role in organising special departments of these universities, where ethnography and related disciplines (anthropology, anthropogeography, ethnology, etc.) were taught, is shown. The views on ethnographic education of the Kazan teaching community, students and authorities at various levels are described. The paper shows that in the first years of the Soviet rule, ethnography was taught in large quantities at several Kazan institutes of higher education – Kazan University, North-Eastern Archaeological and Ethnographic Institute, and Eastern Pedagogical Institute. The main initiators of including ethnographic disciplines in the curriculum of institutes were employees of Kazan University, including N.I. Vorobyev. However, officials of the RSFSR People’s Commissariat for Education considered ethnography as a discipline that studies ‘backward peoples’ and ‘relicts’, and did not see it as a means of ideological education of students. Therefore, the number of hours assigned to this subject was reduced quite quickly. N.I. Vorobyev and his colleagues proposed a number of educational departments projects (geographical and museum-ethnographic sections of the Eastern Pedagogical Institute) in order to preserve ethnographic education in Kazan. As a result of their efforts, students of the Physics and Mathematics Department of Kazan University and the Eastern Department of the Eastern Pedagogical Institute studied ethnography and related subjects until its ‘defeat’ on the cusp of the 1920s and 1930s.

N.I. Vorobyev headed the TASSR Central Museum during the formation period of the new museum practices, when the right decisions came with experience and the main task was to develop a new structure of the institution. As the museum director, the young scholar dealt with a large number of administrative issues and difficulties, from budget and personnel shortage to elimination of external threats caused by the low level of security of museum collections. The acute shortage of funds was reflected in everything: the museum could not occupy all the areas allocated by the state, there were no more than three people in the staff of departments, the tasks of purchasing exhibits and planned acquisitions were barely fulfilled. However, at the same time, as part of preparation for exhibitions, ethnographic expeditions to many cantons of the republic were organised under the leadership of N. Vorobyev. During the expeditions, significant materials that document the culture and traditions of the peoples of the region, household items and crafts were collected, as well as a large number of photographs were taken. As a result of this work, the museum was able to adequately represent the Tatar Republic at large-scale All-Union exhibitions in Moscow in 1923 and 1927 and at the international exhibition in Paris in 1925. The public warmly welcomed the Tatrepublic sections at the exhibitions; upon the exhibitions closure, the objects replenished the museum funds. In conditions of limited funding, lack of space capacity and limited number of staff, under Vorobyev’s leadership, the museum laid down the functioning principles, which would serve as the basis of its work in the following decades. Combining museum work with his academic career, Nikolay Vorobyev left the museum during the period when full supervision of the state was being established over the institution. He left not just a museum, but also an academic institution where research work was constantly carried out.

The most important role in the formation of academic Tatar studies in domestic ethnology belongs to the outstanding scholar of the early-mid 20th century, Professor N.I. Vorobyev. With his works, he laid the foundations for a systematic approach to the study of the culture and life of the people, especially the reference group of the ethnic group – the Kazan Tatars. The use of data from related historical and geographical disciplines allowed him to pose and solve a number of important questions in the ethnic and ethnocultural history of the people. In his landmark monograph The Kazan Tatars (1953), special attention is given to their close root connection with the local Bulgarian civilisation – the ethnocultural prehistory of the people. The systematic approach consisted of the creation of N.I. Vorobyev’s first ethnocultural differentiation of the Volga-Ural Tatars, which was based on the cultural, everyday and linguistic differences within the ethnic group studied at that time. It was also manifested in the application of typological approaches to the classification of ethnographic material, which allowed him to present stable varieties of material culture (types) in dynamics, to outline analogues for them in other neighbouring and distant ethnic groups of Eurasia, and thereby to resolve a number of issues related to the cultural genesis of the people. The systematic approach was applied and improved in the research and scientific and organizational activities of his students and followers, including the authors of the volume “Historical and ethnographic atlas of the Tatar people”. Fundamental works of N.I. Vorobyev on the ethnography of the Volga-Ural Tatars laid the foundation for the formation of the Turkic-Tatar vector of academic ethnology in the Volga-Ural region of Russia. They are an invaluable resource for current and future generations of researchers.

The article examines the contribution of Professor N.I. Vorobyev to the scientific study of complex aspects of the ethnogenesis of the Chuvash people. The scientist is rightfully considered one of the prominent researchers of the problem of the origin of the Chuvash. Being one of the leaders and authors of the first volume of the collective monograph “The Chuvash. Ethnographic research. Part One” (1956), N.I. Vorobyev outlined in it his so-called "autochthonous theory" of the ethnogenesis of the Chuvash, as a people based on Finno-Ugric, but with the Turkic Bulgarian language. The article highlights the scientist's not always unambiguous views on the origin of the Chuvash, as set out by him in publications of 1930, 1950, 1953. It is noted that while many scientists at the beginning of scientific research adhered to the concept of the Finno-Ugric origin of the Chuvash, and subsequently took the position of N.I. Ashmarin, N.I. Vorobyev initially rather inclined to the Bulgarian theory, and only later became an autochthoniste. It is pointed out that one of the weak points in the scientist's interpretation of the issues of ethnogenesis was the ignoring of the factor of their Bulgarian-type language. For N.I. Vorobyev, the main basis for judgments about the origin of the Chuvash was the material and partly spiritual culture, which had a lot in common with the Mari. The article also points to the fact that the scientist did not pay attention to the factor of pagan religion in the ethnic history of the Chuvash. At the same time, it should be noted that in search of the origins of the Chuvash people, he quite widely attracted materials from famous archaeological sites of the Chuvash region. Special attention is paid in the article to the coverage of critical assessments of N.I. Vorobyev’s views by Chuvash historians V.F. Kakhovsky and V.D. Dimitriev.

N.I. Vorobyev made a great contribution to the comparative study of the history of settlement and traditional culture of the ethnographic groups of the Chuvash, their interethnic interaction with the contacted ethnoses. He identified three ethnographic complexes based on the features, both those that had archaic signs and newly formed ones. Regarding the history of the formation of ethnographic groups, the researcher argued that the population of the north-east of the Chuvash Volga region perceived more southern Turkic influences in their everyday life, began to differ in language and way of life from the north-western population, although they retained commonality with it in the main elements of language, culture and lifestyle. His conclusion that the main ethnographic groups of the Chuvash, as he considered the upper Viryal and lower Anatri, were finally formed during the 15th century in the northern regions of Chuvashia as a result of the rapprochement of the indigenous population of these areas with newcomers from the south, cannot be considered justified. The work of ethnographic expeditions in the Chuvash regions in the late 1940s and early 1950s, she showed that the archaic complex was most characteristic of the costume of the middle-aged Chuvash Anat enchi, although N.I. Vorobyev considered them an average or mixed ethnographic group. In general, he represented that group as part of the Anatri, who changed their way of life under the influence of borrowing from the Tatars. The author’s team, under the guidance of the scholar, developed in detail the classification of the Chuvash into groups and subgroups based on folk costume. N.I. Vorobyev for the first time identified three subgroups as part of anatri. The border zone between Anatri and anat yenchi, which was not clearly defined by its predecessors, in particular G.I. Komissarov, N.I. Vorobyev, was also not resolved. The riding costume was formed as a result of interaction with the mountain Mari people, although many features that unite it primarily with the anat Enchi costume were not replaced in it. The authors emphasise that the striking external differences that were recorded in the riding Chuvash northwestern subgroups and grassroots chuvashki hirti. They did not violate the common cultural community of the Chuvash people. It should be noted that the task of a more detailed substantiation of cultural and linguistic areas at the level of subgroups within the ethnographic groups of the Chuvash, divided into four subgroups in the upper zone and three in the middle and lower ones, unresolved by the expeditions of the late 1940s – early 1950s, remains relevant.

The article analyses expedition sketches of professional artist Lyudmila Mikhailovna Pozdeeva from the collections of the National Museum of the Republic of Tatarstan and the “Miraskhane” Written Heritage Center of G. Ibragimov Institute of Language, Literature and Art of the Republic of Tatarstan Academy of Sciences, which were made by the master during the expeditions of 1926 and 1927 under the leadership of N. I. Vorobyev. Costume complexes of Tatars of different subethnic and ethnographic groups are analysed. Particular attention is paid to the scientific component of L. M. Pozdeeva’s work, the consistency of the sketches to written sources, museum materials and expedition photographs. The author of the article identified nine watercolours and one graphite pencil sketch, which depict the clothes of men and women of different ages. The pieces were made in the Chelny, Chistopol, Sviyazhsk, and Tetyush cantons, in settlements such as Nizhneye Bishevo, Kainly, Akbulatovo, Stary Tatarsky Adam, Molkeevo, Stary Kurbash, and Bakorchi (Bakrchi). Some images are duplicated by photographs, which became the visual accompaniment to the texts of N.I. Vorobyev’s academic publications. The sketches by L.M. Pozdeeva found by the author of the article fully correspond to the photographic images, which is evidence of the precise reproduction of what she saw during the expeditions. The artist chose different angles of the characters in national clothing, thereby creating not just an ethnographic copy, but an artistic image.

The work under review is devoted to the characteristics of the material culture of the Kazan Tatars of the late 19th – early 20th centuries. The author set himself the task to identify the main elements of the Kazan Tatars’ material culture, trace the history of its formation, and analyse its characteristic territorial and class differences. The work is based on the monograph of the same author, Material Culture of the Kazan Tatars, published in 1930. Since that time, the author has accumulated new material, critically revised previous conclusions, and essentially produced a new work (cit.: Smirnov A.P. (1954) N.I. Vorobyev. The Kazan Tatars. Tatgosizdat, Kazan, 1953. Sovetskaya etnografiya [Soviet Ethnography]. No. 3: 168–172. (In Russ.)).

The publication is a commentary and the text of the handwritten autobiography of N.I. Vorobyev. The document is introduced into scholarly discourse for the first time. The undertaken analysis of the text allowed us to identify new facts from the life and work of the researcher and to grasp their context. The document is dated March 2, 1947 and was written by the scholar during his work at Kazan State University. N.I. Vorobyev lists in detail the facts about his parents, the process of receiving an education, the beginning of his teaching and research work. He reveals the evolution of his own academic interests, from geography to ethnography, and highlights the author’s scholarly papers that are of significance from his point of view. The document mentions N.I. Vorobyev’s research work in the Far East dedicated to the study of the life of the Nanai (the Golds) and in the Mari ASSR – limnological studies of lakes. The researcher emphasises his work on methodological support of teachers. A separate chapter of the autobiography contains a description of the academic’s participation in the work of various public scholarly organisations. N.I. Vorobyev focuses on the important aspects of his life that correspond to the spirit of those times. This is the recognition of his political unconsciousness in the first years of the Soviet power, service in the Red Army as a private soldier. The autobiography of N.I. Vorobyev is a valuable, informative source. It shows not only the significance of individual milestones in his life and work for the scholar himself, but also reveals the distinctive features of the Soviet era, which formed the conditions for work for the entire academic community.

The publication is a commentary and texts of three previously unknown letters written to each other by N.I. Vorobyev and R.K. Gareeva (Urazmanova), who would later become the leading specialist in Tatar rites and holidays. The conducted analysis of the document revealed the peculiarities of scholarly communication between these individuals, the emotions of an inexperienced but science-minded young school teacher who was involved in the research work, and the influence of Marxist-Leninist ideology on the understanding of the importance of the ethnography science in the Soviet times. Gareeva’s first letter was written on January 23, 1961. In the letter, she shared her concerns about not understanding the need for ethnography. Vorobyev wrote her a detailed response in February of the same year. Nikolai Iosifovich divided the letter into sections. In the first part, when discussing the age of science and technology, he points out the spiritual needs. In his opinion, culture and art are no less important for people than material needs. When reflecting on the importance of ethnographic science, the scholar emphasises the need for a comprehensive study of the ‘development’ of the culture of different peoples, when old skills can be useful for meeting the modern needs. In the last section, he argues that a new generation of researchers is necessary to ensure the continuity of academic knowledge. The geographical education received by R.K. Gareeva, as N.I. Vorobyev is convinced, will help her look at traditional culture much more broadly. The second letter of Rufa (Raufa) Karimovna is not as worrisome as the first one. She expressed gratitude to Vorobyev for the answer and, inspired, she reports on her research plans to collect ethnographic materials on the culture of the Tatars and on preparation for entering graduate school. The revealed epistolary documents made it possible to reveal the subtle aspects of the formation and development of ethnological science in the Volga region, the importance of the individual/teacher in the professional development of researchers of the traditional culture of the peoples of the region.

The article presents with archival materials in which the celebrations of the twentieth anniversary of the Tatar literature classic, publicist, public figure Galimjan Ibragimov, held in 1928, are documented. The funds of the State Archive of the Republic of Tatarstan (Kazan) and the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow) have a protocol and a transcript from the celebrations dedicated to this anniversary. The protocol is printed in Tatar, the transcript is presented in Russian. Due to a serious lung disease, the writer was residing in Yalta for treatment at the time. The preparation and holding of events was organised at the highest level, the anniversary date was celebrated even outside the Tatar Republic. Although G. Ibragimov was not able to attend the event personally, the anniversary was held on a large scale and was broadcast on the radio. A concert was organised and a play based on the writer’s drama New People was staged. At the end of the event, a telegram with anniversary greetings to the hero of the day was read and later sent to Yalta. Later, G. Ibragimov sent a reply telegram with words of gratitude to the editorial offices of the newspapers “Kyzyl Tatarstan” and “Eshche”. Among those invited and speaking were prominent literary and public figures and orientalists (I. Rakhmatullin, G. Nigmati, G. Linstser), birthday greetings from various addressees from Russian cities and abroad were read out. The transcript is very voluminous. As can be seen from the content, prominent figures took part in the meeting, such as N. Tyuryakulov, I. Borozdin, A.N. Maksudov, B.Kh. Mansurov, A.M. Arsharuni. The speakers’ speeches trace the significant role of G. Ibragimov in the public life of the Tatar people, as a literary scholar, researcher and public figure. The article provides quotes from archival documents in the original language and facts concerning the writer’s creative anniversary from the periodical press of the first half of the 20th century.

The article is dedicated to the 75th anniversary of Doctor of Philology, Professor, Academician of the Tatarstan Academy of Sciences, Honoured Scholar of the Republic of Tatarstan and the Russian Federation, the member of the Union of Writers of Russia and the Presidium of the Union of Local Historians of Russia – Nail Mansurovich Valeev. It describes him as an outstanding Russian humanities scholar, literary critic, art critic, historian, local historian, cultural studies scholar, major organiser of scientific events and a public official. His unique and resonant academic work, significant and conceptual projects contribute to the prestige of our republic and country. Over the three decades of his life in the city of Elabuga, he wrote hundreds of articles and ten books about the historical and cultural heritage of Elabuga, about the fate of Elabuga merchants-benefactors. His enormous work on organising a purposeful study of the history of the city led to the recognition of Elabuga as one of the tourist-attractive cities of Russia. Regularly held international scientific conferences devoted to the study of the fate of the merchant dynasties of the city and the creative heritage of the forgotten classic of Russian literature D.I. Stakheev, attracted the attention of scholars from all over Russia and around the world, as well as the descendants of the merchant dynasties of the Stakheevs from Australia, Switzerland, Great Britain, France, etc. to the rich history of the city. Huge work was carried out by N.M. Valeev to draw the attention of the Republic of Tatarstan Academy of Sciences academics and the scholars of the Federal Research Center “Kazan Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences” to the study and preservation of the historical and cultural heritage of the city of Chistopol. Academic works of N.M. Valeev about the life of Kazan art of the twentieth century, the Literary Chistopol encyclopedia, the monograph Boris Pasternak in Chistopol. To the origins of the “Doctor Zhivago” novel and other works caused a wide resonance around the country and the world, attracted the attention of specialists to the rich history of Tatarstan and Chistopol.

W artykule przedstawiono genezę powstania oraz funkcjonowania Uniejowskiego Uniwersytetu Trzeciego Wieku, który stanowi ważny ośrodek edukacji i aktywności, a także miejsce integracji lokalnej społeczności. Podsumowano dziesięć lat jego działalności i zrealizowanych w tym czasie aktywności. Dokonano analizy liczby słuchaczy oraz ich miejsca zamieszkania. Podkreślono znaczenie Uniejowskiego Uniwersytetu Trzeciego Wieku dla lokalnej społeczności, jego udział w projektach o zasięgu regionalnym, a także jego reprezentację w Radzie Społecznej Seniorów i Obywatelskim Parlamencie Seniorów, co pozwala m.in. na uwzględnianie aktualnych potrzeb osób starszych w planowanych i realizowanych z myślą o nich działaniach.

Celem artykułu jest prezentacja zachowań wyborczych mieszkańców gminy Uniejów w wyborach parlamentarnych z 2023 r. w ujęciu lokalnym. Przedstawiono w nim podstawowe zachowania wyborcze (frekwencję, sposób głosowania i jego wyniki) w każdej obwodowej komisji wyborczej zlokalizowanej na obszarze gminy Uniejów. Na analizowanym obszarze w przeważającej większości głosowano osobiście w lokalach wyborczych (głosowanie korespondencyjne lub przez pełnomocnika było rzadziej wykorzystywane niż na całym terytorium Polski). Zachowania wyborcze mieszkańców gminy wykazują pewne zróżnicowanie przestrzenne pomiędzy miastem a obszarem wiejskim. Większą frekwencję oraz nieco mniejsze poparcie partii prawicowych obserwuje się w mieście. Jednocześnie ukazują trwałość przestrzennego zróżnicowania elektoratów.

Operaty uzdrowiskowe są dokumentami określającymi zasady prowadzenia działalności leczniczej. Sporządzone w celu otrzymania statusu uzdrowiska zawierają istotne informacje o zasobach naturalnych, kierunkach lecznictwa itp. W artykule z wykorzystaniem analizy porównawczej dokonano zestawienia dokumentów przygotowanych dla gminy Uniejów w 2011 i 2023 r., koncentrując się głównie na aktualizacjach prawnych i przestrzennych.

161 lat temu miała miejsce jedna z 1300 bitew i potyczek powstania styczniowego. W historiografii nazywana jest bitwą pod Czepowem. Nie doczekała się do tej pory oddzielnej monografii. Artykuł jest próbą przedstawienia tego wojennego zmagania, a także ostatnich chwil oddziału kawalerii łęczyckiej dowodzonego przez rotmistrza Walentego Parczewskiego.

Ważnym elementem rzeźby nizinnej części Polski są wydmy śródlądowe. Cechy wyróżniające ekosystem wydmowy, do których należą: wybitna jednorodność materiału (piaski drobnoziarniste i średnioziarniste), skład mineralny zdominowany przez kwarc, przepuszczalność i suchość podłoża, bardzo słabe gleby, ubóstwo składników pokarmowych dla roślin, mają duży wpływ na sposób jego użytkowania. Obecnie w środkowej Polsce wydmy są głównie zalesione. W obrębie gminy Uniejów najwięcej wydm śródlądowych występuje w dolinie Warty. W artykule przedstawiono rozmieszczenie i genezę wydm, cechy ekosystemu, formy współczesnego użytkowania oraz jego zmiany w ciągu ostatnich stu lat. Szczególną uwagę zwrócono na rolę wydm w lokalizacji zabudowy wiejskiej w dolinie Warty. Suche, piaszczyste obszary wydmowe pozostające poza zasięgiem wód powodziowych wielokorytowego systemu Warty bardziej sprzyjały zabudowie niż okresowo zalewane fragmenty dna doliny. Zasięg zabudowy wiejskiej, zwartej i rozproszonej, prawie nie uległ zmianie w ciągu ostatnich stu lat.

W artykule dokonano oceny dostępności pieszej i samochodem do terenów zieleni urządzonej w gminie Uniejów. Przedstawiono powierzchnię budynków mieszkalnych na obszarach wyznaczonych za pomocą izochron: 0–5 minut, 5–10 minut oraz 10–15 minut od terenów zieleni urządzonej. W tym celu wykorzystano dane pochodzące z Bazy Danych Obiektów Topograficznych (BDOT) oraz OpenStreetMap (OSM). Najlepsza dostępność piesza oraz samochodem do badanych obszarów zieleni urządzonej występuje w mieście Uniejów. Najsłabszą dostępność pieszą i samochodem do terenów zieleni urządzonej mają mieszkańcy północnej i zachodniej części gminy Uniejów. Analizy te są bardzo ważne, ponieważ dostępność do terenów zieleni urządzonej odgrywa kluczową rolę w życiu każdego człowieka.

Abstract This paper discusses the political positioning of the people and the cultural image of the Chinese nation through the lens of the Social-historical Scientific Documentary Films of China’s ethnic minorities (hereafter referred to as “the Ethno-documentaries”) by restoring the problem to the site of the investigation of humanities and social sciences and the General Surveys on (Folk) Arts in the early years of the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in the 1950s. Through detailed analysis of specific Ethno-documentary films, this paper explores how the social sciences conducted its “Social and Historical Investigation of China’s Ethnic Minorities” via the medium of film to convey the advanced social concepts and ideological work of the new regime through the historical narrative of art and politics. This study highlights three key points. First, the “Chinese nation” as a modern political concept dates its origins back to the 1920s with the emergence of the “National Heritage Reorganization Movement” and the “Doubting Antiquity School.” However, it was only through the medium of the Ethno-documentaries that this concept was visually and aurally represented in films for the first time, which draws our attention to the fact that the entry point for understanding modern China lies in discerning the relationship between culture and politics. Second, when discussing the relationship between culture and politics, this study juxtaposes the Ethno-documentaries and “art for workers-peasants-soldiers,” which developed during the same period. These two forms of art focus respectively on national history and the suffering of the lower classes of society, and it is this intertextual nature of the historical narrative that jointly anchors the cultural and historical view of New China. Lastly, historical view is the core of the humanities, social sciences, and art disciplines in New China. Previous studies have mainly attributed certain phenomena to the “politicization” or “pan-politicization” of a particular historical period due to disciplinary barriers and cultural trauma and have stopped discussing such topics in depth. In contrast, the significance of the political aesthetics in the Ethno-documentaries is to have transformed classical Chinese artistic language into a modern one to represent the Chinese people and the Chinese nation. It also raises a question of re-sinicization of many modern political issues that have persisted until now: How do today’s Chinese art works vividly depict the prosperity of this country and its hardworking and courageous people?