The “Efforts of Ours Were Not in Vain”: An Interview with M.A. Chlenov

Abstract

In an interview to S.S. Alymov, the ethnographer and historian M.A. Chlenov, honorary vice-president of the World Jewish Congress, talks about his biography, academic career and work at the Institute of Ethnography in the 1960s–90s. He reflects on his fieldwork in Indonesia and the Russian North, as well as his research among the Nenets and Inuit, and discusses his work in the areas of kinship studies, Inuit studies, and Jewish studies, further recounting the story about the discovery of the Whale Alley archaeological site. The interview conveys important information about the Jewish movement in the USSR, the relationship between scholars and authorities, the life at the Institute of Ethnography and in Soviet academia generally.