Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences / Traditional Knowledge of the Nganasan and Ents in the Field of Medicine (Based on Folklore Works)

Full text (.pdf)
Issue
Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences. 2026 19 (7)
Authors
Seredkina, Natalya N.; Ermakov, Tikhon K.; Gomonov, Ilya S.
Contact information
Seredkina, Natalya N. : Siberian Federal University (Krasnoyarsk, Russian Federation); ; ORCID: 0000-0002-9248-8810; Ermakov, Tikhon K. : Siberian Federal University (Krasnoyarsk, Russian Federation); ; ORCID: 0000-0002-6967-8720; Gomonov, Ilya S. : Siberian Federal University (Krasnoyarsk, Russian Federation); ORCID: 0009-0008-3395-5926
Keywords
traditional knowledge; traditional medicine; folklore; Nganasans; Enets
Abstract

Understanding traditional knowledge systems at the current stage of development of the social and humanitarian sciences allows not only for a better understanding of traditional culture as a systemic whole, but also for identifying its most significant features for solving contemporary problems in the field of socio- economic development. At the same time, medical knowledge as an element of the traditional knowledge of the Nganasan and Enets peoples remains virtually unstudied, which requires turning to a wide variety of materials, including folklore sources, which allow for the interpretation of traditional knowledge in its most authentic form. Folklore works of the Nganasan and Enets peoples, collected during field research by Soviet and Russian ethnographers in the 1920s-2000s, were used as sources. Texts containing motifs of health, illness, or treatment were selected from among these sources. Qualitative content analysis was used as a key method, allowing for the determination of the role of the concepts of disease, its causes, symptoms, and treatment methods in traditional medicine. The following provisions can be attributed to the key results: 1) disease is simultaneously an abstract and personified force; 2) the causes of illness can be divided into those that are socially determined and those that are related to external forces; 3) the symptoms of illness are primarily related to the condition itself, rather than specific diseases; 4) the key methods of treatment are shamanic intervention, offering gifts, correcting wrongdoing, and the use of medicinal plants

Pages
1452–1463
EDN
HLVAHT
Paper at repository of SibFU
https://elib.sfu-kras.ru/handle/2311/159265

Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).