Survival of a Way of Life on the Yamal

E. M. Bjorklund, writing of the transformation of the North American continent from one of the Namerind (North American indigenous groups) to one controlled by Euro-American culture, poses a critical question: What happens to peoples with established cultural identity and spatial autonomy when “outsiders” persist over a long period of time? This question was set into a historical context, reflecting what has happened to Native American and First Nations peoples over time. Rarely, in our classrooms, do we have a chance to visit such issues with a contemporary perspective. The article on the Nenets in the March 1998 issue of NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC provides just such an opportunity. Using the Nenets as a context, students have a chance to grapple with both cultural identity and resource use issues in the real world. What will be the cultural and environmental future of the Nenets?

Each of the geography standards, in which this lesson is grounded, call for students to use multiple points of view to understand the world. Students will both identify the myriad points of view involved in the question posed and use them to discuss the preferred future for the Nenets.

Standard 6: “How culture and experience influence people’s perception of places and regions”

Standard 16: “The changes that occur in the meaning, use, distribution, and importance of resources”

Standard 18: “How to apply geography to interpret the present and plan for the future”

• copies of the March 1998 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC article “Nenets: Surviving on the Siberian Tundra”;
• atlases and/or maps, including an overhead transparency, depicting a northern circumpolar (Arctic) projection;
• computers with Internet access, if available, for students to review Geoguide/nenets photographs and other sites on Nenets culture. See Resources & Links and visit Arctic Circle located at http://www.lib.uconn.edu/ArcticCircle/ and The Living Yamal at http://www.nmnh.si.edu/arctic/html/yamal.html.

To engage in discussion respecting multiple viewpoints on culture and resource use in order to analyze a contemporary real-world geographic issue.

• identify ways culture influences people’s perceptions of places and regions;
• evaluate different viewpoints regarding resource use;
• integrate multiple points of view to analyze and evaluate contemporary geographic issues.

Prepare for class by reading the article on the Nenets. Begin by showing an overhead transparency of a northern or Arctic polar projection or having students find such a projection in their atlases. Demonstrate that by running a finger from mid-continent in North America (such as the 110° west longitude) north to the North Pole and across northern Russia, one ends up at the Kara Sea and the Yamal Peninsula of Russia, through which the 70° east longitude line passes. Also note the location of the Arctic Circle, which passes just south of the Yamal Peninsula, the Gulf of Ob, and Baydaratskaya Guba. If atlases are available, have students find the Yamal Peninsula on various maps to determine the vegetation or natural environment, economic activities, annual precipitation, population density, natural resources, ethnic groups, and climate of the area. Do a quick brainstorming session to probe the class for ideas of the predominant culture and way of life in this part of Russia.

Divide the class into groups of three students each. Provide each group with a copy of the article about the Nenets. If possible, provide time and access for each group to peruse the NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC interactive site on the Nenets as well. Assign each person in the group one of three categories: culture, the role of women, the role of men, the role of reindeer. Have the students scan the Nenets article and interactive Web site as if they were an insider to the Nenets culture, one who is part of the culture, to diagram their assigned cultural aspect with a focus on how it contributes to the cultural identity of the Nenets.

After each student has had a chance to complete his or her diagram, have each group discuss these questions: How does the role of women allow the Nenets culture to survive and contribute to the Nenets and to Nenets cultural identity? How does herding reindeer allow the Nenets culture to survive and contribute to Nenets cultural identity? Then ask each group to develop a short position statement on the question: Will the Nenets culture survive into the future intact? Have each group of three meet with another group to (1) compare cultural diagrams and (2) share their position statements with each other.

At this point, take time to bring the groups together and use a whole class discussion to develop a diagram of all the voices that must be heard if the issue of the cultural survival of the Nenets and the oil and gas development of the Yamal Peninsula is to be discussed and the idea of a “preferred future” for all is to be developed. These might include adult Nenets women, adult Nenets men, high school-aged young women, high school-aged young men, female elders, male elders, observers like the author and photographer of the NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC article, researchers, oil and gas development executives, oil and gas workers, new settlers, Russian government officials, etc.

Next, assign one of these roles to the students. This time, break the class into partnerships based on similar roles (i.e. group two high school-aged Nenets young people together). While in the partnership, each student should develop a second position statement on the question: Should the Nenets culture be allowed to survive intact? Questions that may help in the development of answers to this question are: Will the traditional indigenous culture be able to coexist with the modern culture? Will either the traditional or modern culture overtake the other? What is the balance between the reindeer as a resource for the Nenets and the need for gas development for those outside the Yamal area (the peninsula contains the largest known gas reserves in Russia)?

After students have developed their position statements, conduct a roundtable discussion in which each person or voice is asked to be heard without interruption. After each voice is heard, conduct a second round of discussion wherein students are asked to predict the future of the Nenets.

Finally, conduct a group discussion and have the class develop a statement of the cultural values for the Nenets. What is it about the way of life of the Nenets that the Nenets want to preserve?

• What do the Nenets value about the land?
• What do the Nenets value about the rules and laws by which they live?
• What do the Nenets value about the environment?
• What do the Nenets value about the spiritual world?
• What do the Nenets value about the way their society is organized and how it persists?
• What do the Nenets value about the rights of the individual and the tribe (the common welfare)?

Have students write a diary entry for 25 years into the future in which they are a member of the Nenets culture and they describe their daily life and how it has or has not changed over the last 25 years.

• Have students check out the Arctic Circle Web site at the University of Connecticut (http://www.lib.uconn.edu/ArcticCircle/) for its discussion of the “Struggle over Land and Resources: Yamal Peninsula’s Contested Terrain.”
• Have students explore the Nenets culture more in-depth at the Smithsonian Institution Web site on The Living Yamal. (http://www.nmnh.si.edu/arctic/html/yamal.html).
• Discuss the current political divisions of Russia and point out how the divisions affect the Yamal Peninsula. The March 1993 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC map, “Communism to Capitalism” is useful in such an exercise.
• Have students investigate other indigenous cultures and the issues of cultural and environmental survival and/or sovereignty issues. The Arctic Circle site is a good starting point for other information on other circumpolar indigenous groups facing similar issues (the Inupiat, Cree, Sami, Aleut, Innu), as well as on the Canadian Nunavut Territory.
• Have students compare the legal status, land claims, and sovereignty of indigenous peoples in various countries. For example, a comparison of the Canadian Nunavut Territory (to be born on April 1, 1999), the culture of the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait islanders and the effects of the Native Title Act, 1993, and various Alaska issues such as the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA), the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), or the U.S. Supreme Court case involving the village of Venetie and the concept of Indian Country.
  
  

  Jody Smothers Marcello of Blatchley Middle School in Sitka, Alaska, contributed classroom ideas for this Geoguide.