Kalmyk Folklore and Ethnography Studies: U. D. Dushan’s Works

Abstract

The article analyzes materials collected by Ulyumdzhi D. Dushan (1892–1974) among the Kalmyks in the 1920s to 1930s, the former serving as a valuable folklore and ethnographic source. Being a professional physician to have received a classical European medical education, he displayed an interest in the traditional ethnic culture in its various aspects. First, he was attracted by the Kalmyk culture as a sum of traditional knowledge of the world and man; secondly, due to his professional duty, he could not help emphasizing those features of the traditional Kalmyk lifestyles that required certain intervention so as to be transformed ― everyday life and traditional mentality ― from Socialist perspectives. The 2016 publication of U. D. Dushan’s works provides an opportunity to scrutinize into his research heritage which ― along with most valuable ethnographic descriptions of the material and spiritual culture of the Kalmyks, their pre-Buddhist religious ideas — contain his characteristics of separate folklore genres, narrative texts, and quite numerous examples of the aphoristic genres of Kalmyk folklore.

Keywords

• kalmyk folklore studies
• ethnography
• 20th century
• u. d. dushan
• spiritual culture
• folklore
• traditions
• superstitions
• spells