Chud’ as a New Ethnic Group: A Traditionalistic Project in the Pinega Region

Abstract

The article discusses the case of creating a Chud’ community in a village of the Arkhangelsk region, which was initiated by an entrepreneur of Moscow origin, Sergei Grigoriev, at the turn of the 21 st century. Conceptualizing Chud’ as an ethnic category legitimizes the designing of the autonomous ethnic group of Chud’ that is claimed to possess all conventional markers of ethnicity, such as ethnic identification, territory, history, specific language, cultural patterns, etc. For Chud’ to be recognized as an ethnic group, Sergei Grigoriev had to search for means of institutionalization of the Chud’ ethnicity both at the state level (national census, appeals to the Russian Ministry of Nationalities) and at the local level (community registration, establishment of the museum of Chud’). It is noteworthy that the attempts at locating the markers of Chud’ ethnicity among the village population by way of reconceptualizing the existing cultural practices or inventing new ones met with a mixed or even hostile reaction from the community toward the Chud’ project and its author. The article examines the strategies of promotion of Chud’ as “indigenous people” with reference to the Soviet ethnographic paradigm, national policy, and post-Soviet traditionalistic movements.