A Study On The Cultural Rejuvenation Of The Villages In The Far East Of Russia

Starting from the cultural inheritance and revival in a village of the Ewenki people in the Far East Area of Russia, this paper reveals the endangered ethnic cultural ecology of a small nationality and how they commit themselves to the ethnic culture revival process facing the state’s socio-economic development, through which the paper attempts to provide to the small-population Mongolian speaking peoples a reference regarding cultural reconstruction from out of China.The research of J. Scott and J. Bodley indicates that:the development and construction of the modern states have always been depreciating the ethnic cultures of the frontier minority peoples whose eco-cultural homelands have been sacrificed for the cost of development. Moreover, the exploitation of the aboriginals’ecological resources and the forced transformation of their traditional livelihoods have been considered as the right and proper thing to do. This results in a long-term outcome in which both the mainstream society and the ethnic minority people will become the victims. Is this progress an objective rule that is impossible to be reversed? Is "the weak falling victim to the strong" considered to be the game rule of human development? Are civilizations plundering cultures’fates? Is it necessary that the modernization of the governing system and governing ability of the modern states must sacrifice the ethnic minority culture and destroy ethnic minority areas’ecological environments? In a word, can the relationship between "tradition and modernity" that has been evolving for thousands of years throughout the history of human be reached the dynamic stage of balance and happy medium that was presented in Ferdinand Toennies’ Society and Community (1887) and in Great Transformation (1844) by Karl Polanyi?Starting from the survey on the culture revival process of the target community, the paper reflects on how the elites of the small-population nationalities in the Far East Area of Russia have been bringing into play their subjective activism (initiatives):replying on the state’s political system and policy legislation and coordinating with the local and federal governments to resist effectively the hegemony of the mainstream culture, thus pursuing the process of ethnic culture reconstruction and the process of social power rebalancing. The paper is composed of five sections:Introduction chapter, the main body (three chapters) and a conclusion.The introduction chapter brings up the problem awareness the paper focuses on. After summarizing the related research, it points out the creative value as well as presents the research approaches and the fieldwork contents and methods of the paper.Chapter one is an introduction to the target community, therein presenting the situations that the Ewenki people experienced during the three different periods of Russian history. A contrast structure of the past and the present is formed through the interpretation of the socio-cultural history.Chapter Two describes the initiative creativity of the two Ewenki elites belonging to the target community, thus manifesting the motivated mechanism during the ethnic culture revival progress carried out by a small nationality in the Far East Area of Russia, namely, the elites’activities have activated the positivity of the government and society, thus the government and universities put efforts to reviving the ethnic culture which eventually became a social climate.Chapter Three discusses the relations between the state civilization and the ethnic culture:Does the ethnic culture obstruct the development of the state’s social civilization? Does modernization necessarily have the mission of pushing the ethnic culture to become dead? The author believes that the state civilization and the ethnic culture should be mutually supporting and supplementing.The conclusion gives a response to the problem awareness brought about in the introduction chapter. Taking the reference from the frontier small nationality, the Ewenkis, living in the Far East Area of Russia, this part of the paper proposes that China should discuss a way for the culture reconstruction of the small-population Mongolian speaking people living in the Northeast of China. According to the tasks and targets that the 18th National Congress of the CPC designed in the framework on ethnic affairs, it is necessary to reinforce the ethnic solidarity which is the foundation of the break with the conventional ideas. The paper also proposes to push forward the academic paradigm shift of "from social evolution to cultural ecology" and the innovation of the state’s development mode, thus making it possible to implement fully and accurately the Party’s ethnic policies and to maintain and improve the ethnic region autonomy system, which can assist in the realization of real development, harmony and equality of national ethnic nationalities.