Ethnographies

The Nanai people live on the lower Amur River (in the Khabarovsk Krai) and on the right tributaries of the Ussuri river (Primorsky Krai), in the Russian Far East. More than 12,000 Nanai live in Russia and some 5000 in China. Nanai is a Tungusic language. Their principal livelihood is fishing. Shamanism played an important role in their worldview and rituals until very recently, and has been studied by Tat’iana Bulgakova for many years and discussed in her books.

Apart from far-reaching changes, their ancestral traditions were also upheld less and lessduring Soviet times. Since Perestroika, some of their former shamanistic rituals have been revived. Their language, however, is only spoken by a few elderly people and is seriously endangered.

The Nanai are known for their special craft traditions, such as making clothing from fish skins. The Nanai artist Anatol Donkan, who has been living in Germany for some time, continues this tradition by transforming it into works of art. In his artistic installations, he also draws on his collection of wooden figures representing spirits. The Nanai see them as guardians and helpers, so they are treated with special respect through rituals. Overall, the Nanai worldview is characterized by the belief that the nature around them is animated by spirits with whom one can communicate and whom one can appease through appropriate behavior.