The Steppe that Ceases to Be Itself: Migration and Attachment to Homeland Among the Nogais in Dagestan, North Caucasus

Kamil Maria Wielecki

The Steppe that Ceases to Be Itself: Migration and Attachment to Homeland Among the Nogais in Dagestan, North Caucasus

Publication date: 2021

Ethnographies, 2021, Vol 49 Issue 1-2, pp. 21 - 36

https://doi.org/10.4467/22999558.PE.21.003.14125

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Titles

The Steppe that Ceases to Be Itself: Migration and Attachment to Homeland Among the Nogais in Dagestan, North Caucasus

Abstract

In Dagestan, the Nogais – descendants of the famous Golden Horde – live mostly in the Nogai District, as well is in neighboring territories that administratively belong to Chechnya and Stavropol Krai; taken together, these territories form one geographical entity, known as the Nogai Steppe. A paradoxical situation is that despite heavy migration pressure and the fact that much of the labor force from the District works – either temporarily or permanently – in other Russian regions, the District capital – Terekli-Mekteb – is rapidly expanding. One of the reasons for this is that migrants build houses “for the future” – not to live in them now but with a view to inhabiting them once they come back after retiring. In this paper, based on ethnographic fieldwork research, I analyze how the Nogais – be it dwellers of the Nogai Steppe or economic migrants – maintain attachment to what they call “the land of the ancestors”. I argue that different forms of this attachment constitute a way of social mobilization in unfavorable political and economic conditions. Thus, they are intended to strengthen the position of the Nogais in the Nogai Steppe, in other words – to preserve its Nogainess.

Keywords

migration, urbanization, Nogais, Nogai Steppe, Dagestan, land, transhumance, desertification

Nogai Steppe, Dagestan, land, transhumance, desertification, migration, urbanization, Nogais

References

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Information

Information: Ethnographies, 2021, Vol 49 Issue 1-2, pp. 21 - 36

DOI: https://doi.org/10.4467/22999558.PE.21.003.14125

Article type: Original article

Titles:

Polish:

The Steppe that Ceases to Be Itself: Migration and Attachment to Homeland Among the Nogais in Dagestan, North Caucasus

English:

The Steppe that Ceases to Be Itself: Migration and Attachment to Homeland Among the Nogais in Dagestan, North Caucasus

Authors

Kamil Maria Wielecki

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0211-9884

University of Warsaw, Krakowskie Przedmieście 30, 00-927 Warszawa, Poland

Published at: 2021

Article status: Open

Licence: CC BY-NC-ND

Percentage share of authors:

Kamil Maria Wielecki (Author) - 100%

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Publication languages:

English

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