The Role Of Performance And Culture In Local And National Identity Formation In Post-Soviet Estonia

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THE ROLE OF PERFORMANCE AND CULTURE
IN LOCAL AND NATIONAL IDENTITY FORMATION
IN POST-SOVIET ESTONIA
by
Kaaren Paula Shalom
A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillm ent of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF ARTS
(Visual Anthropology)
December 1995
Copyright 1995 Kaaren Paula Shalom
UMI Numbers 1379592
UMI Microform 1379592
Copyright 1996, by UMI Company. All rights reserved.
This microform edition is protected against unauthorized
copying under Title 17, United States Code.
UMI
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UNIVERSITY O F SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
TH E G RA D U A TESCH O O L
U N IV ER SITY PARK
LO S A N G E LE S, CA LIFO RN IA S 0 0 0 7
This thesis, •written by
and approved by all its members, has been pre
sented to and accepted by the Dean of The
Graduate School, in partial fulfillm ent of the
requirements, fo r the degree of
Master o f Ar t s i n V isuali Anthropology___
Kaaren Paula Shalom
under the direction of h$X. Tkesis Committee,
Dtan
D a t e . . I .?.
THESIS COMMITTEE
Chairman
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
Restoring history to anthropology
Estonia 1993
The construction of national identity
Parnu and Tostamaa
Local form ation of ethnic identity
Perform ative identity and the self
The toppling of the church steeple: m utable symbols
C onclusion
N otes
References
1
I. Introduction
A repossessing of the past is also, at one and the sam e time, a
surgical operation on the present w ith, some w ould add, an eye
to the future.
(Vincent 1991*. 46)
In 1993, Estonia was in the w aning stages of the exultation of
independence. The exhilaration of release from the om nipresence of
Soviet ideology and an existence suffused w ith continuous watchfulness
and distrust w as being replaced by a state of uncertainty about the future, a
new governm ent ideology that suffered no tolerance of things Soviet and
an increasing level of economic hardship due to, am ong other things, a
w eaning from Russia’ s m arkets and resources. In order to establish a link
to the past w hile sim ultaneously underm ining any claims the current
Com m onw ealth of Independent States (CIS) m ight try to exert on the new
nation, Estonian leaders of the "Right", the dom inant political party,
espoused a view of the fifty years of Soviet occupation as an
"interruption" in the nation's functioning as a free state by seeking a
restoration of the current state to the condition of the nation in 1938.1
This included the reinstatem ent of the Constitution of the Republic of
Estonia, adopted in 1918 and in effect at the time of the initial Soviet
invasion. A t its m ost extreme, this view advocated a redistribution of
land in the patterns of ow nership present in pre-W orld W ar II, regardless
of the effects on current farm ing and m anufacturing practices (Lieven
1992: 216). Even the less extreme Popular Front, w ho alw ays rem ained in
danger of appearing to have inherited the m antle of C om m unist ideology,
2
gradually veered away from its populist role and supported the concept of
the continuous existence of the nation.
In the quote w ith w hich this thesis opens, Vincent m akes reference
to "repossessing the past." This is at the heart of this discussion: the art of
nation-building in Estonia is a repossession of the nation's distant and
near pasts w ith direct applications in the present to the state's construction
of national and ethnic identity. Local expressions of identity, however,
involve a repossession of the past even aw ay from the state and the
reinterpretation of local and personal histories to create new form s of
expression and im bue sym bols w ith new m eanings. In this thesis, I will
address expressions of national, ethnic and local identities w ithin a socio-
historical context that includes the agency of the self acting in congress
with the m etaprocesses of daily life— culture and nationality~as opposed to
being determ ined by them , a theoretical fram ework that reconfigures the
colonial and ahistorical approaches of anthropology's past w ith "an eye to
the future."
The term s nation, state, ethnic, and folk are anthropological
changlings, overly lim iting w hen defined as bounded categories but
am biguous, som etim es indistinctly overlapping in scope w hen left to an
intuitive interpretation. Yet they are central to this discussion; therefore I
will attem pt to clarify their usage here. For the purposes of this essay,
national identity refers to the m ental construct of belonging to the
Republic of Estonia that m ay be legitim ized as citizenship. The state refers
to the law- and policy-m aking bodies of governm ent, while nation
denotes the m etacom m unity of the governed. (These are contrasted w ith
concepts of local com m unity and identity.) Folk designates a popular
3
origin, as opposed to coming from the elite. In contrast, how ever, folk
culture refers to a variety of genre that arises from either popular or elite
origins, but carries the im pression of being generated from and associated
w ith a non-urban com m unity. The termet/im’ c is perhaps the m ost
am biguous: here I use it to connote a process of identity that incorporates
a sense of being Estonian in non-Iegalistic ways. That this is difficult to
distinguish from national identity is the essence of the nationalist
argum ent.
II. Restoring history to anthropology
There is increasing attention in the body of anthropological
literature devoted to the historical context in w hich societies live and
develop. According to Cancian (1985), the acknow ledgm ent prom pted by
W allerstein's w orld system theory that societies do not exist in isolation
from one another and therefore m ust be review ed in relationship to the
global forces at w ork has required the anthropological com m unity to
abandon form er notions that a culture or a sub-culture can be bounded
and described rem oved from its greater historical and sociological context.
Social structures develop (or continue or change) as social conditions
em erge w ith historical movem ents: The fall of the Berlin W all destablizes
the m egalith of Com m unism , and independence is subsequently declared
in the Baltic states. Decolonization of African countries contributes to a
climate of nationalism and claims that ethnic identity equals the right to
statehood that leads Israelis to struggle w ith Palestinians and Serbs to
declare their independence from Bosnia. The expansion of W estern style
capitalism yields the symbolic interpretation of M cDonalds' in Moscow as
the end of the Cold W ar. In its m ost global, unbounded m anifestation, the
w orld system netw ork shifts and reflects on itself; ethnography snaps a
fram ed picture of the m oire that one instant before or one instant later
w ould have yielded a different image, related but changed.
W ithin this fluid fabric, each social phenom enon has a "ripple-out"
effect, the intersection of ripples producing social phenom ena particular to
that geographical and socio-historical intersection. Roseberry review s the
developm ent of the stu d y of these intersections through Eric W olf's
investigations into the social structures of Latin A m erican peasants:
"Characteristic of each of these projects w as an attem pt to understand the
constitution of particular anthropological subjects at the confluence of
global, regional, and local currents of state m aking, em pire building,
m arket expansion and contraction, m igration, and so on (1995: 56)."
D raw ing on Lesser's social field theory, Roseberry argues that neither the
study of cultures can be lim ited to narrow bounded units arbitrarily
delineated by som e outside view er, n o r can cultures be generalized and
recategorized into taxonom ic groupings. Instead, com m unities and
cultures m ust be understood w ithin the com bined fram ew ork of the local
and global forces acting upon them as they are inextricably w oven into a
social "web": "The local is global in this view , b u t the global can only be
understood as alw ays and necessarily local (1995: 57)."
Carol Sm ith (1985) adds to this aggregate of social vectors acting
upon the process of culture and com m unity construction that the
intersections them selves are not w ithout local active processes that
diffuse, augm ent or redirect the trajectory of historical forces, influencing
the next ripple and contributing to the changing global m oire. Cancian
5
establishes that "while it is true that no system is isolated from the w orld
m arket forces, . . .behavior is selected and m odified on a local basis
(1985: 72)." H ow ever, Sm ith expands the region of im pact of local
processes beyond the im m ediate com m unity from w hich they are
generated (1985:109):2
. . .m ost anthropologists recognize that global forces help
shape the environm ents in w hich local system s operate, and
they actively seek inform ation to docum ent that process. But
rarely do they look at the w ay in w hich local system s affect the
regional structures, econom ic and political, on w hich global
forces play, w hich prevents them from describing the w ay in
w hich global forces have adapted to local conditions.
A m odel evolves to suggest the stu d y of com m unities and cultural
processes at the crux of their relationships to other local com m unities, as
situated w ithin the historical currents of the m om ent as w ell as taking
into account social responses and their effects outw ardly from the
com m unity— the feedback loop, as it were. U nder this m odel, Estonian
identity is a p ro d u ct of not only the international history of the nation and
its current placem ent w ithin that history but also the com pilation of its
internal histories and of com m unity reactions to those histories.
In striving to identify patterns and assign causal relationships
betw een forces and com m unity structures, the danger arises in attributing
differences betw een com m unities to random variation, thus trivializing
or even ignoring the interplay betw een national and international forces
and local social processes. To extend Cancian's statem ent above regarding
the local origins of behavior, I apply A nthony Cohen's (1994) argum ent
that it is all too com m on in anthropology to ignore that local social
processes are com posed of individuals in interaction w ith one another,
and that as opposed to culturally determ ined actions, these individuals
have autonom y and free will. They m ake choices related to cultural
dem ands through conditions fram ed by society, but m odified by their own
interpretations of these param eters and in order to further their own
relationships to social categories and structures. Therefore even w hen the
geographical and socio-historical param eters m ay be similar, variations
produced by local comm unities should not be glossed over as random but
rather m ust take into account the creative agency of the self, acting in and
through an environm ent that is constructed through the interaction of all
the forces described above. We begin to look for the m eaning in difference
as w ell as the pattern in similarity.
The individual’ s array of choices of action reflect a variety of
interpretations of behaviors and symbols, hence how the choice is m ade
contains inform ation about how identity and relationship to com m unity
is instrum ental in cultural generation and perpetuation. "We have to see
the relationship betw een group and individual as questionable. We
cannot take belonging or social m em bership for granted: it is a problem
w hich requires explanation (Cohen 1994; 21)." So the structure of
com m unity requires analysis of belonging and the self's expression of
belonging as identity, accomplished through symbol: "Symbols enable
individuals to experience and express their attachm ent to a society or
group w ithout com prom ising their individuality (1994: 19)." Symbols, as
"carriers of m eaning" are expressions of identity and, by Cohen's
definition, "culture, in this view, is the m eans by w hich w e m ake
m eaning, and w ith w hich we m ake the w orld m eaningful to ourselves,
7
and ourselves m eaningful to the w orld (1993: 1)." C ulture and identity are
not com plim entary structures but interrelated processes.
W hile Cohen does not specifically address the influences of history
on sym bol and identity formation, he identifies sym bols as being "by . their
very nature m alleable, m aneuverable, m anipulable by those w ho use
them (1994: 17)." In the analysis of identity expression in Estonia, it is
im perative to include the dem ands that historical context has m ade on the
choices of the self in form and m eaning production. The challenges to
national and local identity given by rapid and m ajor changes in people's
lives m akes adaptations to culture and sym bolization of particular interest
in understanding not just the forms them selves b u t also the process of the
production of m eaning.
III. Estonia 1993
W hile the argum ent for an historical approach in the study of
anthropology is strong in any case, the study of Estonia in 1993
underscores the necessity for historically contextualizing any exploration
of culture(s), the tem porality w ith which any social structures and
processes m ust be view ed throw n into sharp relief by the historical
m om ent and the inevitable changes dem anded by the transition aw ay
from Com m unism . Estonia had declared independence from the Soviet
Union only two years earlier, thus while the euphoria of new ly m inted
freedom was now on the decline, the tangible recognition of the historical
m om ent w as still present: changes in political and economic structures
catalyzed social processes, am ong w hich was a self-conscious construction
of national identity.
8
In the m odern post-colonial w orId/ the assum ption is m ade by
colonial and post-colonial theorists that in m ovem ents tow ard
independence, colonies shake off their hegem onic yoke and reassert their
indigenous cultural identities. In the cases of Africa and Asia, this process
has included a detachm ent from , and rejection of, E uropean (i.e. W estern
capitalist) structures, the origins of the subjugating institutions of
colonialism . Cobham , for exam ple, relates approaches to the form ation of
national identity in Africa (1991: 44):
In the rhetoric of its em ergence, the concept of African
nationalism has been defined variously and contradictorily as a
w holesale retu rn to the 'organic' values and assum ptions of
precolonial Africa; the progress of Africa out of the dark ages of
traditionalism into the era of m odern technology; the
hegem ony of one ethnic group over others; or the
transcendence of these very ethnic differences as a w ay of
countering the im perialist depredations of E urope in Africa.
Each of these definitions presages a (European) colonial presence that
w hile instigating a divisive and suppressive regim e, also b rought along a
"m odern" influence to "traditional" culture(s). A nd it is the relationship
betw een the indigenous, associated both positively and negatively w ith
the traditional, and the foreign, e.g., m odem and hegem onic, th at m ust be
redefined.
T hus in the W estern context, the ideals of Frenchness,
G erm anness, or Englishness—national essences rooted in a
sense of autochthony—becom e the basis of a m odernity that re
roots an d reconfirm s a native sense of identity. O n the other
h an d , E astern nationalism s, and in particular 'T hird W orld'
nationalism s, are forced to choose betw een 'being them selves'
an d 'becom ing m o d em nations’ as though the universal
9
stan d ard s of reason and progress w ere natural and intrinsic to
the W est. . .We can see how this divide perpetrates the
ideology of a dom inant com m on w orld w here the W est leads
naturally and the East follows in an eternal gam e of catch-up
w here its identity is alw ays in dissonance w ith itself.
(R adhakrishnan 1991: 86)
The stu d y of nation-building am ong form er m em bers of the Soviet
U nion, how ever, presents a tw ist on post-colonial theoretical
assum ptions. W hereas E urope usually represented the pow er of the
colonizer in the rest of the w orld, in the USSR, it w as the colonized.
H istorically, Russia has been the 'other' for W estern Europe,
yet how ever distant, exotic, and m ysterious, Russia w as a
neighboring colonial pow er to be reckoned w ith. Its
relationship to E urope has alw ays been that of a conflicted
sym biosis, defined by both geopolitical enorm ity and presum ed
cultural inferiority ....
(Slobin 1991: 246)
The roles of the colonizer and the colonized are not exactly reversed,
though, for w hen the Soviet colonizer is rem oved and the issue of
rebuilding arises, the dialogue does not becom e about the redefinition of
the relationship betw een the in d ig en o u s/trad itio n al and the
hegem onic/m odern. For Estonia, the issues of national identity reflect a
belief that fifty years of Soviet occupation hindered its technological
developm ent, that the hegem onic w as an anti-m odern influence and that
the w ay forw ard tow ard both tradition and m odernity involves a
reassociation w ith Europe.
To achieve this end, the Estonian state constructed a national im age
of identity to play o u t on the international stage of the W estern capitalist
1 0
system that both validates its European "birthright" and projects potential
economic and political autonom y. Estonia adopted a consum erist/
capitalist definition of state selfhood (H andler 1991), forging an identity
based upon the one com m odity that it "owns": traditional folk culture.
In studies of Swedish national culture, Lofgren notes that "fixed
conceptions em erged in the nineteenth century about how a cultural
heritage should be shaped, how a national anthem should sound, and
w hat a flag should look like (1995: 263)." These w ere the m odels for
Estonian national identity in the establishm ent of the pre-Soviet First
Republic of 1918, and have become the models for the state's construction
of national identity now. (The adoption of these m odels proves to have
two em phatic identity-shaping characteristics: these m odels are part not
only of an expression of Estonian's European identity but also of the
restoration of the First Republic.) Through a representation of the nation
based on a culture m odeled after its European neighbors, Estonia is
reunited w ith Scandinavia and Germ any as a long lost cousin, and
defiantly w aves its Europeanness (and consequently its non-Sovietness) in
the face of Russia.
IV. The construction of national identity
. . .so often in the 'nation-building' policies of the new states one
sees both a genuine, popular nationalist enthusiasm and a
system atic, even M achiavellian, instilling of nationalist ideology
through the m ass m edia, the educational system , adm inistrative
regulations, and so forth.
(Anderson 1992: 113-4)
11
The country of Estonia is sm all, 45,215 square kilom eters, w ith a
population (in 1989) of roughly one and a half m illion (Lieven: 434).
A pproxim ately tw o-thirds of its borders are coastal, and the rem aining
one-third is shared w ith Latvia and Russia. A lthough the Russian border
forms a sm all percentage, it is w atched very closely by the entire country.
Local new s program m ing regularly includes reports on the size and
m ovem ents of Russian troops in the border regions. The threat of
reinvasion is perceived as real and possibly im m inent.
The near-obsession w ith geographical border protection is reflected
in the process of national identity construction. The attention that goes
into defining and m aintaining the recognized boundaries of the nation is
reflected in the efforts to describe and prom ote a unified national culture,
the boundaries of identity. Estonia's declaration of independence in 1991
created an opportunity to clarify the param eters of Estonian identity on a
national scale, an im age to be projected externally to the w orld and to be
circulated internally at hom e. W hile there are dissenting groups and
alternative versions of w h at it "m eans to be an Estonian," the currently
m ainstream and m ost visible form s of E stonian identity are w idely
encouraged, and a patriotic nationalist spirit is evident.
Estonia has alw ays m aintained an uneasy sense of inclusion in the
Baltic region. O f the three Baltic states, Estonia alone speaks a non-Indo-
E uropean language and is predom inantly L utheran as opposed to Catholic.
(There are also a sm aller num ber of form ally recognized R ussian
O rthodox and Estonian O rthodox churches, and a tiny percentage of Jews.)
The role of religion, dow nplayed during the Soviet occupation, has n o t yet
resurfaced as a m ajor elem ent of people's lives.3 By contrast, language is a
I 2
p aram ount com ponent in both Estonian politics and culture. Estonian, a
Finno-U gric language w ith strong sim ilarities to Finnish, provides the
cornerstone of m odern Estonian identity. Some Estonians reach deep into
linguistic and tribal ancestry, deriving a feeling of ethnic fraternite w ith
other Finno-Ugric cultures, even ones that are as distantly related in
language or custom as the Karelia near Finland or the group of U dm urts
near the Volga, incorporating the ancient roots into and intensifying an
Estonian identity created through a historical m ythology th at w as
m anufactured by the Estonian state. The association w ith an ancient
linguistic tradition validates the m yths of m ore recent history and locates
Estonians in the land (an im portant concept of national identity) since pre-
C hristian tim es, providing a defense of an indigenous origin in the land
against the region's history of m ultiple occupations.
The land area now called Estonia w as populated originally by Finnic
tribes betw een 7500 and 3500 B.C. (Taagepera 1993). By A.D. 1000, the
location had becam e geographically strategic to the control of grow ing
trade routes through the Baltic and therefore becam e the site of repeated
invasions by early G erm ans and Scandinavians, the crusading Teutonic
Knights, Danes, Sw edes, Poles, and eventually the R ussian M uscovites.4
A lthough the D anes form ally founded Tallinn in 1219 and the Sw edes
established institutions such as T artu U niversity (1632), urban
developm ent cam e u n der the reign of G erm any (Taagepera 1993: 234).
The long presence of Baltic G erm an landow ners and the social structures
that solidified u n der the jurisdiction of their nobility left lasting
im pressions in Estonia's cultural institutions, particularly those of
language and folk culture— now m ajor com ponents of E stonian identity.
1 3
For centuries in Estonia, G erm an w as identified w ith urban life,
education, and the elite classes.5
Estonian, on the other hand, w as the language of the peasants, the
serfs to the Baltic G erm an nobility. A variety of dialects descended from
early Finnic tribes w ere spoken over the country. The m ovem ent tow ard
independence spaw ned another nationalist m ovem ent to codify the
language and render the official Estonian a state language. By 1914, shortly
before Estonia's declaration of independence know n as the First Republic,
the governm ent determ ined that the dialect m ost com m on in northern
Estonia w ould be the official state language (Lieven 1992). W hen Estonia's
independence w as redeclared in 1991, reinstatem ent of E stonian as the
official language of state provided an enorm ous sym bol of national
potency, a post-facto retaliation against perceived C om m unist attem pts to
destroy Estonian culture.
The Estonian state has adopted a recognized, if old-fashioned,
E uropean m odel by w hich to construct sym bolic supports for Estonian
national identity. H ow ever, it is as strongly influenced by the presence of
another national identity to respond against: Estonian identity is form ed
as m uch by the intense rejection of all residues of the Soviet era~i.e.
Russian or C om m unist~as it is by the elem ents of folk culture and state-
sponsored m ythology. H ere the lines, already blurry betw een Estonian
national and ethnic identity, nearly m erge and developm ents of social
phenom ena and effects on Estonian society caused by tensions betw een the
local R ussian-speaking population and Estonians is the subject of m ost of
the recent literature on ethnic identity published on Estonia. The
com plexity of the relationship betw een R ussian-speaking and Estonian
1 4
speaking inhabitants of Estonia and their claim s to nationality is deep and
far-reaching and a subject for another essay. I lim it m y discussion to the
issues of language and citizenship as they relate to state constructions of
identity, only tw o of m any issues u n d er investigation.
U nder the Soviet adm inistration, R ussian w as the language of
business and governm ent as w ell as entertainm ent in the form of radio
and television broadcasts. The colonization of the E stonian language
struck a painful blow to the heart of Estonian national identity, and
subsequently now in independence, the use of Russian, w hile not
outlaw ed, is unofficially and culturally avoided. The reinstallation of
official use of the Estonian language w as equally balanced by the active
elim ination of the use of R ussian not only in m atters of legality b u t also in
everyday life. A foreign tourist w ho attem pts to use Russian to an
Estonian is likely to m eet a blank hostile stare and an unhelpful m anner.
The reception is even m ore cold and direct w hen attem pted by a Russian-
speaking resident of Estonia.6
To Estonians, the ultim ate injustice currently perform ed by ethnic
R ussians living in Estonia is their lack of know ledge of Estonian,
perceived as a refusal to learn and taken quite personally as evidence of
Russian inferiority and a rejection of Estonian culture. This over
sim plification overlooks, of course, that R ussian w as the language of
pow er an d law u n der the occupation, and that in som e areas such as
Tallinn and N arva, the num bers of R ussian speakers greatly exceeded the
num ber of Estonians, so that Estonian w as not really present or needed in
these areas. (A ccording to the Estonian H um an D evelopm ent R eport of
1995, Estonians m ade u p 60 per cent of the population of the country,
1 5
while Russians m ade up approxim ately 30 per cent— a sizable minority.
The proportion of Russian-speaking residents in urban com m unities is
even greater.) A language proficiency exam has now been m ade a
cornerstone of the application for Estonian citizenship; w ith particular
focus on Russian-speaking residents. Foreign descendants of Estonians,
for example, w ho m ay have never set foot in Estonia, can apply and
som etim es receive citizenship w ithout the language exam. It is therefore
apparent that language provides a two-directional force in the identity
shaping process: speaking Estonian engages in an active construction
process w hile sim ultaneously elucidating a reactive non-Russian identity.
Hence ethnicity is linked to language and language to citizenship:
national identity and ethnicity are m erged.
The other cornerstone of Estonian national identity as defined by
the state lies in folk culture. W orld climate supports the idea of bounded
ethnic groups (if not nations) w ho "own" their cultures and their histories
as keys to identity and survival (H andler 1991). Thus Estonian folk
culture becomes a w orld-acknow ledged sym bol of identity as it becomes a
world-recognized image (world being any presences outside the national
boundaries of Estonia). To this end, Estonian folk culture has been
reinvented to support the state's trend tow ard nationalism .
The official face of folk culture is show n through the perform ance
of Estonian dance and song in national costum e, sym bolizing tradition
and conjuring up a quality of naturalness and an authenticity that then
reinforces the authenticity of the concept of an indigenous Estonian
culture. Dances are supposed to have originated in m edieval villages as
rites of courtship and celebration. Costum es reflect variations affiliated
1 6
w ith particular regions: like clan tartans, each region from the islands of
Saaremaa and Kihnu to Parnu and Tostamaa has an identifiable cloth
pattern based on vertical stripes.7 Regional identification is m ade on the
basis of color com binations and relative w idth and frequency of stripes.
Tostam aa's cloth, for exam ple, is prim arily red w ith varied w ide and
narrow stripes in m ostly w arm colors w hile Kihnu Island (renow ned
throughout Estonia for having a particularly vital folk culture) has a red
cloth w ith m any narrow stripes am ong w hich are som e dark colors like
black and blue. The cloth is fashioned into skirts, w orn now m ostly
during folk festivals both by female perform ers of the regional dances and
songs and by female attendees w ho w ish to exhibit their regional (term ed
"national") pride.8
The production of the symbol of national costum e is a ready
example of self-conscious construction of identity and the interaction of
the sym bol w ith cultural process. Folk costum es and perform ances are
counted am ong Estonia's oldest cultural treasures. Song festivals held in
Pirita near Tallinn were attended by nearly the entire country.
Representatives of regional com m unities sang regional songs, dressed in
regional variations of "national" costum e before audiences of thousands
in public and perform ative displays of ethnic identity. These festivals
came to be expressions of Estonian national identity which are now
publicized by the national governm ent as a tourist com m odity and as a
m eans to represent a singular authentic Estonia to the international
world. Yet although the song festivals have been a part of Estonian
tradition since the nineteenth century, the application of the regional
peasant costum e came into practice after 1934. In addition, the codification
1 7
of "correct" regional association w as not an "indigenous" decision but
rather a concurrent assignation of cultural forms dictated by the Estonian
N ational M useum (Lieven 1992: 111-113). By continuing the path of its
First Republic folklore "creators", the current state entrenches the creation
of its predecessors as a tradition, adding a tim e-honored quality through
repetition— w h at had been constructed in order to build national identity is
now a m anifestation of it.
Folk culture yields an ideal im age to em body a state narrative of
youth and innocence. W hile adults do engage in folk dancing and
singing, the iconographic im ages of folk culture participants are those of
pre-adolescent children, w reaths of flowers in the girls' hair, sw eet voices
raised in song. This picture is created by regional and national folk
festivals, particularly the children's song festival. T housands of children
from all over the country com e to Tallinn to m arch in a parade and
perform national songs at Pirita, the site of previous festivals, inevitably
recalling the historic im ages of the song festivals of 1990-1992 w hen song
festival crow ds sym bolized the force of Estonian pride and resilience even
under Soviet control. N ow , the crow ds of children singing Estonian
songs, em bodying Estonian identity, sym bolize the pow er of Estonia, "the
Fatherland (Isantaa)," to care for its children, the citizens of the state. At
the sam e tim e, they represent Estonia's latent potential and a m easure of
the invulnerability of the young republic.
Even as the form of m ass perform ances, song festivals, and national
displays of culture echoes the m ass rallies of W orld W ar II as w ell as
Soviet national "perform ances" and show s of political propaganda, the
use of folk culture as a national sym bol precludes the rom anticization of
1 8
history. W hile im plying the prom ise of the future in the faces of the
children, the institution of folk culture also offers a recreation of the past,
the golden years of the First Republic, and perpetuates the ideology of
Estonian cultural continuity. The years of Soviet occupation that
"interrupted" progress from the First to the present Republic are
sym bolically obliterated by the nostalgia recalled by folk perform ance.
The nationalization of folk culture concretizes and fuses the
c u ltu re/id en tity process, abstracting folk culture out of its regional context
of m eaning and appliqueing it to a larger expression of identity. The
sym bolic im ages of Estonia "the Father," and Estonians "the children," are
sanitized in the national im age, rem oving a divisive (and pow erful and
adult) sexuality, perhaps too rem iniscent of the vulgarity of the "folk," of
the peasant classes from w hich the cultural form em erged. It then
becom es easier to draw sim ilarities of folk culture w ith elite culture— the
G erm anic influences in the m usic and dance, parallels w ith Scandinavian
and G erm an m odels of folk festivals-adding strength to the perception of
Estonia's E uropean heritage. Furtherm ore, w ith the rem oval of sexuality,
the presence of w om en is also rem oved from the national im age w hile
sim ultaneously eliciting an im age of fam ily (w ith no m other— the w om an
is hidden in the background), and any dialogue or question of w om en's
issues in the new republic is subsum ed into the all-encom passing
nationalism (R adhakrishnan 1991).
The m yth of folk culture as an intrinsic expression of local identity
is accepted. W hether variation w as organically developed or dictated from
a central institution, people have accepted the extent of variation betw een
regional folk costum es (variation exists in dances and songs as well) as a
1 9
symbol of the diversity that serves to distinguish com m unity from
com m unity. Affiliation to the regional variations provides a local entree
into a group identity that can then be m anipulated by the state, as these
contrived but accepted regional differences are conflated into a single
category of national culture. The individual is encouraged to equate being
from Tostam aa, for example, w ith being Estonian, w hich on one hand,
prom otes a feeling of solidarity and belonging in the new State and on the
other hand, dilutes indigenous diversity and local fealty. The
nationalization of folk culture lays claim to sym bols of local identity,
rem oving them from their com m unity context and installing as part of a
comm odified package of national identity a fractured version of folk
culture which is disconnected from a particular locale. In addition,
variation from the "new and im proved1 1 form can som etim es be
discouraged as unpatriotic. In this capacity, the nationalistic form ula that
allowed the construction of a unity for resistance and ultim ately rebellion
ajgainst dom ination runs the risk of becom ing a new oppressive regim e
through a coercive national identity policy (W hisnant 1991).
Nonetheless, people find ways to express local identity on a
com m unity level that incorporate a place in Estonian society w hile
m aintaining the diversity of the regions by exhibiting a m ultifaceted
rather than a m onolithic identity. W hile Estonian national identity
absorbs Estonian ethnic identity into itself through a reification of
language and culture, local social identity draw s essence from the
intersection w ith the local experience of Estonia's history. O ther factors
include the needs of the individual m em bers of the locality, for w hom the
international does not necessarily have im m ediate relevance but w ho
20
define a sense of belonging on the basis of kinship and com m unity
interaction.
V. P am u and Tostam aa
I cam e to Estonia in 1993 in response to a request from the Parnu
Visual A nthropological Society for an English-speaking stu d en t to
coordinate the Seventh A nnual P arnu International V isual A nthropology
Film Festival. My stay included four m onths in Parnu, a resort city w ith
about 50,000 inhabitants, and one m onth in residence on a farm in
Tostam aa, a dispersed rural com m unity w ith a regional population of
2,000.
A lthough the m ajority of m y stay w as in Parnu, I use exam ples
from Parnu only as points of reference and corollary su p p o rt in this
discussion of local form s of national and ethnic identity expression. Parnu
is an urban com m unity and shares m uch w ith other u rb an centers like
Tallinn. The urb an com m unities overall consist of essentially tw o
separate b u t parallel social units--the Estonians, w ho hold the m ajority of
the w hite collar an d service occupations, and the predom inantly w orking
class R ussian-speaking population (lives 1991). As the concentration of
R ussian-speaking residents is by far m ore significant in urban areas than
in rural ones, the expression of national identity in urban areas parallels
that of the E stonian state by centering on (inter)national boundaries to
distinguish the "Estonian" from that w hich is "not Estonian" i.e. Russian.
In addition, the urban E stonian population is also the prim ary com ponent
of the intelligentsia classes, particularly in Tallinn, P am u and T artu, and
are strongly aligned w ith the state's goals on issues of ethnic identity,
2 1
draw ing heavily on elite form s of culture and identity expression.
As an urban com m unity, P arnu follows the urb an trends tow ard
nationally defined patterns of national identity expression. The presence
of a "nationally" diverse population is increased and em phasized by
P arnu's role as a sum m er resort com m unity for R ussians before the
transition in political control and now for Finns and G erm ans seeking an
inexpensive vacation destination. (Parnu also d raw s som e dom estic
tourism , but the econom ic focus on international tourists m akes it pricey
for Estonians.) As a location that regularly draw s people from outside
Estonia, P arnu m aintains a outw ard unity of n atio n al/eth n ic identity in
its role as host and representative to outsiders. Exhibitions of local
identity in Parnu paralleled national versions (song festivals, costum ed
parades) as did dem onstrations of national identity that utilized elite
form s readily seen in other urban com m unities such as fine art show s
featuring w idely accepted Estonian artists and E stonian-language theatre.
The Parnu International V isual A nthropology Film Festival w ith
w hich I w as involved serves as an exam ple of a local display of identity
that resonated m ore w ith expressions of national identity than local
distinctions as it responded to an international focus. W hile the festival
w as intentionally international in scope an d content and drew attendees
from Scandinavia, W estern Europe, Russia and even Japan as w ell as a
large attendance from the local com m unity, the practice of the festival
reflected several of the issues of Estonian national identity such as the
prom otion of E stonian language over Russian and the presentation of
Estonian ethnicity to both foreign and dom estic audiences through
nationally oriented cultural institutions. This w as reflected in the
22
Estonian films that were show n, and, during the hours betw een
screenings, attendees were treated to perform ances of folk m usic and
dances from K ihnu Island. In an original form of expression that
prom oted nationalism as a prized value, festival activities included a
com petition inviting guests to organize by nation of origin and build
scarecrows w ith a national them e, creating their ow n symbolic
representations of nationhood, w hich w ere then aw arded prizes.
In order to draw participants from the w idest possible international
pool, the w orking language of the festival was English w ith Estonian as
the second language. Submissions w ere accepted from Asia, America,
South America, and Europe, particularly Scandanvia, as well as from
countries of the form er Soviet Union. Films in languages other than
English w ere required to have English subtitles or sim ultaneous
translations. Screenings predeterm ined to have a larger appeal or
inform ational value to the local population w ere prepared w ith Estonian
translations as well. H ow ever, no accomodation was m ade for guests who
spoke Russian only, a potentially significant portion of the audience based
on the local dem ography. For these guests, only films that originated with
Russian soundtracks w ere understandable This choice of screening
presentation effectively excluded Russians from the national celebration
present in the festival form at and further em phasized their non-Estonian
identity w hile at the sam e time strengthening the association of Estonian
culture (in this case, film) w ith Europe and the West.
In contrast to Parnu's em phasis on the national boundaries of
identity, the inhabitants of Tostamaa often expressed complex integrations
of local and national identity w ith m ultivocal representations that
23
involved form s of culture included in the state's repertory of
n atio n al/eth n ic identity displays as w ell as new form s of perform ance that
revealed alternative aspects of identity that contradicted or w ere left out of
the national versions.
Tostam aa is located near the coast of the G ulf of Riga, 51 kilom eters
w est of Parnu. The inhabitants of both com m unities readily identify
P arnu as the "city" (linn) and Tostam aa as the "country" (man also
translates to "land") and bestow sym bolic and cultural attributes to this
distinction.9 There is one m ain road com ing in to Tostam aa from
direction A udru (east) w hich splits into tw o forks off to the west. A t the
site of the split is the tow n center: half a dozen or so large stone buildings
that hold a superm arket, a couple of drygoods stores, a cafe/bar, a
d oug h n u t s h o p /b a r and a bar. There are also a tow n building w ith a
notice board out front and a bus stop. O utside the tow n center, b u t still
inside tow n lim its, are a L utheran church, a sm all hospital, several
K ruschev-era apartm ent buildings, the tow n physical p lan t (a coal-burning
facility that provides heat and hot w ater to the apartm ent buildings), som e
industrial businesses, and a few lanes of private hom es. Im m ediately
around the tow n are sm all farm s, other businesses such as the Tostam aa
cheese-m anufacturing plant, and a school. It is difficult to tell w here the
Tostam aa region officially ends and Tohela or A udru begins. W hile
apparently all hom es have electricity and m ost have television, few, if
any, have flush toilets. Some have running w ater. The farm houses rely
for cooking and heating on a centrally located w ood stove, the chim ney of
w hich provides am bient heat for the rest of the house. Farm households
haul w ater in from outside wells.
24
People in Tostam aa engage in a variety of occupations in areas of
agriculture, retail, and m anufacturing such as raw m aterials processing
(e.g. lum ber). D ue to its proxim ity to the coast, people both farm and fish.
W hile m ostly m en hold jobs in the industrial sector, nearly all retail sales
or food service jobs are staffed by w om en. Fishing is apparently done
exclusively by m en, and both m en and w om en perform farm -related tasks,
like m ilking. H ousekeeping, child-rearing, and kitchen activities are still
the provenance of w om en, although m en m ay occasionally cook. Both
m en and w om en fill w age-earning jobs, although there are m ore m en
than w om en in m anagerial positions.10
The econom ic structure of Tostam aa and the m anner in w hich
occupations are divided is a legacy of history. Prior to the Republic's land
reform s of 1920, ( the tim e referred to as the "estate age"), m ore than half
of the region's farm s w ere generally ow ned by Baltic G erm ans and farm ed
by the Estonian peasants in a feudal-like structure. The land reform s
redistributed the land and eventually, large incom e producing, cash crop
farm s existed alongside sm aller subsistence level farm s, setting the
precedent for a return to subsistence farm ing after the elim ination of
com m unal agriculture.
There was also a pre-Soviet m iddle class in Tostam aa, prim arily
ow ners of industrial enterprises. One interview ee’ s grandm other had a
yarn factory in A udru. A nother interview ee's father h ad a bus com pany
that not only facilitated travel betw een Tostam aa and P arnu and Tallinn,
b ut that conducted excursions to W estern Europe as well, th at w as
patronized by both urban and rural inhabitants. In patterns characteristic
of the m iddle class, both of these families em igrated at the onset of
25
W orld W ar II, one to Sweden, the other in "forced m igration” to Siberia.
There was, of course, no officially recognized m iddle class during the
Soviet era. H ow ever, m any of the children of these families have
returned to the region, either as residents or foreign visitors w ho then
establish businesses in the region they identify as theirs (their parents').
W ith the Soviet occupation of Estonia, property w as eventually
confiscated and given to the direction of the com m unes (kolhaused).
Large farm s were constructed to build cash-crop production. W hat was
not produced under actual com m unal labor w as nonetheless ow ned by the
collectives. Fisherm en w ere allowed to fish on sm all boats (the Soviets
prohibited Baltic fisherm en from using large boats, fearing escape
attem pts) and their catch w as sold collectively to the fish-packing plants
nearby Tostam aa^
The years im m ediately following collectivization w ere extrem ely
difficult years for rural inhabitants. The quotas im posed by the Soviet
governm ent left little for regional and personal use. People began to
w ithhold tiny am ounts from their Iabors--a piglet from a litter, seeds from
a harvest— and to cultivate additional crops outside the standard economy.
These perks were not always illegally obtained. The fish packing
plant, for instance, allowed the workers to take hom e som e of the smoked
fish. A form er fish-industry w orker said that this w as one of the best
reasons to stay at an otherw ise m essy and unpleasant job, rather than take
a job at one of the animal collectives which had few perks. She also
adm itted that the fish w orkers w ould take the best of the sm oked fish for
themselves. As is com m only the case in Eastern Europe (see V erdery
1995), this secondary economy, or "shadow econom y,” a term applied by
26
the Estonian H um an D evelopm ent Report (1995), w as crucial to the
survival of m any of the rural inhabitants, and soon became a w idespread
practice; legally and illegally obtained extras from w ork became the
substance of bartering relationships which led to intricate netw orks,
m ostly locally based. W hile Kathleen Verdery states that secondary
economic practices in m ost of the form er Soviet colonies are undergoing
conversion into official occupations, I did not see evidence of this yet in
Tostamaa. All the shadow practices are still being conducted outside of the
limits of official channels, although those involved say that it is getting
m ore difficult w ithout the Soviet apparatus around w hich they w ere built.
The restoration of independence to Estonia did not autom atically
restore the time of independence's pre-Soviet affluence. W hile the
com m unes w ere dissolved and the process of privatization of land and
businesses is ongoing, economic pressures are com ing to bear on
Estonians, particularly the people of rural areas like Tostam aa. The
replacem ent of centralized redistribution of goods is slow ly being
supplanted by private m arket entrepreneurs, but despite the ready m arket,
rural areas are not seen as high priority for the establishm ent of business
due to their low profit potential. Pre-Soviet patterns of social life and
commerce are therefore being re-established, such as sm all subsistence
farm s combined w ith localized netw orks of shared excess and bartering.
These commercial exchanges reflect and reinforce social ties w ithin the
com m unity, in the sam e m anner as did the shadow economic practices
un d er the Soviet system . For exam ple, one fisherm an interview ed fishes
w ith a partner w ho used to be a forest ranger and still likes to hunt. W hen
they fish together, they split all the costs and all the catch, but on
27
weekends, w hen the hunter goes hunting and shoots a boar, he also brings
portions of the m eat to the fisherm an’ s family. W ithin the prim ary
economic practice~the fishing, their financial relationship is strictly
business, b u t outside this sphere, their economic relationship is m erged
w ith their social responsibilities. This is further illustrated in the
relationship betw een neighboring farms. N eighbors purchase m ilk and
eggs from each other, but property and tools are shared. A ram m ay be
lent to a neighbor for a week or two for breeding purposes on the casual
prom ise of a lamb. The socio-economic relationship intensifies w ith
kinship. A lthough not com pulsory, sharing am ong fam ily m em bers is
valued as is patronizing businesses ow ned by other m em bers of the
family.
Nearly all Estonians, in both the city and country, continue to
cultivate a "kitchen-garden", (iiiamaa). This is often a substantial
endeavor and contributes enorm ously to the food supplies of any given
household. People in Parnu either w ork a plot of land on a com m unally
ow ned garden, som ew hat like an Am erican "victory garden," on the
outskirts of the city to which they com m ute by bus, or they have a
"sum m er house," an unw interized house near b u t outside the city limits
w ith enough land to farm .1 1
The Estonian grow ing season is very short— norm ally late M ay to
m id-A ugust— yet in an average year, people produce abundant am ounts of
cabbages, potatoes, cucumbers, beets, garlic, tomatoes, fava beans, and
various berries— straw berries, cranberries, black and red currants,
lingonberries. Some of the perishable harvest is consum ed im m ediately
but m ost is preserved— canned, pickled, juiced, or jellied-and stored in a
28
pantry or cellar to supplem ent store-bought food supplies for the winter.
Excess produce is also shared w ith friends and family or sold at the open
air m arketplace in Parnu, i.e. tree bearing fruits such as apples which are
dried or juiced and then further processed into apple wine.
In addition to the garden harvests, people go into the w oods for
seasonal collections such as wild berries and m ushroom s. O n m ost late
sum m er days, the early m orning buses out of P am u fill w ith people on
their w ay to the woods, em pty at two stops, and the one o'clock and two
o'clock afternoon buses fill again w ith people on their w ay back to the city,
baskets brim m ing w ith m ushroom s, sm all children w ith faces sm eared
with berry juice, clutching pails of berries. W hile m ost collect the forest
harvest for their ow n use, m any elderly people sell w hat they collect in
small cups in the parks for a few crowns. The state does provide a pension
for the elderly but it is very low. Although this activity is illegal, the
police seem to overlook it, and those w ho can afford to buy the berries at
exorbitant prices in a gesture of support for the elderly. This supplem ental
income, as well as the additional food resources, depend on the public
nature of the forests. As land privatization continues and Estonia is
increasingly influenced by capitalist structures that place an economic
value on the sales and restrictions of land use, this form of secondary
economy m ay be curtailed.
VI. Local form ation of ethnic identity
From the brief ethnographic description above, w e can determ ine
local concerns that translate into com ponents of identity: local identity
houses concerns that are often survival oriented. Belonging to the nation
29
is a m atter of pride, b u t belonging to the com m unity, particularly in the
econom ic clim ate of 1993, is a m atter of survival. Factors w hich contribute
to the form ation of local identity include fam ily and kinship, com m unity
involvem ent, and food production, especially in excess as this provides
som e product to participate in bartering and sharing. From these stem
participation in local institutions such as regional "folk days"; although
the sym bol has the form of national identity, it acquires a new m eaning as
a site of reaffirm ation of com m unity involvem ent.
Tow ns throughout Estonia hold regional festival days w ith parades
of tow nspeople in local folk costum e, perform ances of regional folk m usic
and dances, raffles and food, and usually an evening party. W hile
national Estonian culture has absorbed and solidified these festivals in
sym bolic abstraction, the continued celebration of "town days" provides a
forum for local identity expression as w ell as reaffirm s the regional
affiliation w ith the nation. Local participation w ithin Tostam aa is active;
m any people turn out, com ing in from the surro u n d in g farm s, w earing
their local costum e. Some of the older w om en w eave the regional cloth
and sew the accessories by hand. P art of the draw is the festive
atm osphere, b u t it is also an opportunity to touch base w ith neighbors and
other tow nspeople. Since the village is dispersed and there is no central
m arket or m arket day, contact w ith others is by specific arrangem ent or
purely by chance. Therefore the tow n festival encourages tow nspeople to
socialize and re-establish netw orks, as w ell as affirm ing their regional or
national cultural identities. For exam ple, Tostam aa inhabitants
som etim es attend festival days in neighboring com m unities such as
Tohela for sim ilar contact, although they do not go in costum e.
30
In Tostam aa, the folk songs and dances have been institutionalized
and are passed along as elem ents of heritage in the sam e forms that they
are taught in Tallinn to non-regional residents. Their m eanings as
symbols of local identity lie in recognition of the colors and patterns of the
costumes attributed to the region and the shared know ledge of the
elem ents of the dances and song lyrics, w hich can then be rallied around
as regional symbols. Beyond this arbitrary application, the costumes and
customs have little specific relationship to life in that particular
com m unity, nor are new dances and new songs being w ritten on the local
level.12
VII. Perform ative identity and the self
...the position has been taken in the past in anthropology that
ethnicity-politicized cultural identity— w as m erely contrastive:
that is, that it is invoked only to draw a real or conceptual
boundary....in treating ethnicity m erely as a tactical identity, it
ignored both self-consciousness and the symbolic expression of
ethnic identity.
(Cohen 1993: 2)
In Tostam aa, new expressions of identity take on forms outside
traditional folk culture. Individuals w ithin the Tostam aa region borrow
forms from other genre of perform ance— poetry recitation, storytelling,
and singing and dancing— to express alternative aspects of identity,
som etim es agreeing in content w ith the state version of national identity
and som etim es directly at odds w ith it.
D uring m y stay in Tostamaa, I collected video m aterial for an
ethnographic portrait of tow n life. I w as given entree into Tostamaa
3 I
through the daughter of an Estonian em igrant to Sw eden, w hose family
had come from A udru, a nearby m anufacturing town, and w ho still had
relatives in Tostam aa. I came not only as the associate of my Swedish
friend and as an anthropologist, but also as a videographer. W ith the
camera in hand, I took on two different roles, one offered by me to the
people I met, the other granted to me. I told everyone that I w as a
graduate student in visual anthropology and that I w as interested in
m aking a video about the people of Tostamaa. The concept of visual
anthropology w as not com pletely unfam iliar as P am u's visual
anthropology film festival had good publicity and w as well know n in the
area. In addition, the m an responsible for the Visual A nthropology
Society in Parnu w as an ethnographic film m aker of notable reputation
whose w orks had appeared on Estonian television. Therefore the
inhabitants of Tostam aa had perhaps a better grasp of the concept of visual
anthropology, if a preconceived notion of w hat m y film m ight entail, than
people I m ight m eet at hom e in Los Angeles.
The role that w as attributed to m e stem m ed from this last fact: I
was not only from America, I w as from Los Angeles, equated by the
residents of Tostamaa w ith Hollywood. I w as frequently introduced as a
"Hollywood filmmaker." This w as of great im portance to Tostam aa (even
w hen I explained as clearly as possible that I w as a student, this w as a
visual anthropology thesis, etc.) because it proved that the privileged
nation of America w as interested in Estonia, and that Tostam aa w as a
conduit of inform ation and representation.
Consequently, I w as treated to a great num ber of perform ances,
formal and informal, m any of which I recorded on videotape. I am aw are
32
that the perform ances w ere frequently staged for the benefit of the camera,
and that the camera and I together represented the "eye of the world,"
rather than a com m unity m em ber. Nonetheless, m any of the
perform ances w ere repeated w hether the cam era w as present or not; m ost
had been com posed or created and previously perform ed as full
perform ances for other m em bers of the com m unity prior to my arrival.
There are even hom e videos of som e of the sam e perform ances that I
recorded. Thus I propose that the nature of perform ance is that it be
perform ed to an audience, w hether the audience is foreign or familiar,
and that in the form of the perform ance as well as the content, aspects of
identity are revealed by the perform ing self. It is entirely possible that in
the context of another audience, other aspects of identity m ight be
revealed. H ow ever, this does not negate the value of either collection of
expressions; it only reinforces Cohen's statem ent above on the m utability
of sym bols and the processual nature of both identity and culture.
In this context, I use the term performance to encom pass any public
display w here the participant is m aking use of a consciously constructed
role to present som ething, in m ost cases a narrative. A role m ay be a
character, or it m ay be the role of the storyteller; in any case, there is a
distinction betw een the perform er and an audience, the latter a necessary
com ponent of the perform ance. I use the term informal to describe a
perform ance in which the view er m ay or m ay not be aw are of h is/h e r role
as audience.
The m ost complex collection of perform ances I recorded in
Tostamaa were those perform ed in cabaret style, as sketches. These
involved costum es, recorded m usic, and characters. A local restaurant in
33
Tostamaa staged a nightclub floor-show once a week. Usually the ow ner’ s
family m em bers perform ed a show w hich involved dancing and singing
num bers in a m usical com edy style.
O n occasion, another m em ber of the com m unity, Helga, perform ed
at the restaurant. (This was not her only venue; Helga had perform ed at
parties and other locations around the region. H ow ever, the restaurant
venue described here w as the only place that I saw her perform ances
staged for the general public during the tim e I w as in Tostamaa.) Her
battery of characters and costum es has identified her w ithin the
com m unity as an extrovert and som ew hat of an eccentric, although her
day-to-day life is identical to that of other farm wom en and fisherwives in
the region. She is prolific in creating new content for her acts, and people
attend them and enjoy them, even w hen the acts appear to cause some
em barrassm ent in the audience.
Analysis of H elga’s perform ances reveals a num ber of aspects of
identity form ation at w ork, both in her choice of characters and in the
m essages she conveys. In one piece, she dresses as a ballerina, a snow
queen, and walks around the restaurant looking for a m ale partner from
the audience. W hen she finds a volunteer, he is taken backstage and
"transformed." H e returns to the stage dressed only in his underw ear, a
wig, and a crown, to dance a comic ballet w ith Helga and com plete the skit.
Part of the elite stereotype of the peasant class is that they lack
cultural awareness, that is, an appreciation for elite cultural forms. Helga
defies this stereotype by co-opting a prim ary balletic im age even while
satirizing it. The dance is an acceptance and appreciation of the rom antic
fairy tale image as well as a com plete ow nership of the form. By adopting
34
the elite form and m aking it symbolically hers, she has also inverted the
pathw ay of the elite adoption of folk culture for use as a national, e.g.,
elite symbol of Estonian identity. In addition, she breaks dow n the norm al
perform er/audience boundaries of stage perform ances, bringing to the
form a layer of social participation associated w ith folk culture that was
rem oved from the nationalized folk culture in the process of transform ing
it into an exhibition m edium .
W hereas the latter exhibits a blurring of lines of class distinction,
H elga's "Indian snake charm er" and "Mexican m ariachi" express, through
opposition, the place of Estonia in a global w orld. The snake charm er is a
visitor to Tostamaa; he speaks in a nonsense language and is translated by
an Estonian helper. H e casts spells and entices (foam rubber) snakes out of
a basket. W hile the elem ents of the skit are recognizable to m em bers of
the com m unity— the basket is handm ade in a regional style, the blanket
w orn as a cape is a Russian im port found in m ost drygoods stores in
Estonia— the effect is one of exotic imagery. (Helga has never traveled
outside of Russia and therefore the inspiration for her characters is draw n
m ostly from m edia images.) She is unconcerned about cultural accuracy:
the language of the snake-charm er and that of the m ariachi songs are not
authentic languages, but rather Estonian w ords or nonsense syllables that
recall the sound of the foreign languages. The im portance is not to inform
about other cultures, but to reinforce the present one. Symbolized in
opposition by the figures of foreign visitors, Estonia is included on a world
stage as w orthy of interest to, for example, a traveling Indian dignitary.
In another aspect of redefining Estonian identity, Helga reaches
deep into the Estonian past and fortifies her sense of Estonian identity
35
from the rich supply of folktales and superstition of early Estonian
religion. She is a source of folklore on witches and m agicians, and
practices a folk belief that one can collect energy from an oak tree— by
standing against the trunk, the tree's spirit will com bine additively w ith
that of the individual’ s. In another of her perform ances, H elga dons the
persona (and costum e) of a sham an, adding sym bols from her ow n life
such as eels and a stuffed m ouse of Russian origination. She again
"creates" a language and casts spells, and through the character, reasserts a
relationship w ith nature that has been rom anticized by national culture.
This is a direct interpretation of Estonian folk tradition— folk m edicine and
folklore— that predates the national costum e m ythology, an d provides a
validation of the authenticity of Estonian identity.
O ther skits perform ed by H elga overtly and obliquely address social
issues through a characterization that positions the stereotype of the coarse
rural peasant against the stereotype of Estonian national character. She
perform s as a stripper, blatantly b u t coyly sexual, a contrast w ith the
desexualized national im age of pre-adolescent youth. This perform ance
pushes the edges of the local culture's com fort zone. H elga's character
strips to a costum e of nudity, an illusion literally w orn by the perform er;
she is never really naked or even uncovered. N onetheless, sexuality in
Estonia is a topic that generates enorm ous discom fort w hen addressed in a
public arena and especially the overt pow er of female sexuality. According
to Lieven, w hile not overly repressed, Estonians are em otionally
restrained by Protestant and O rthodox traditions that encourage fatalism
and stoicism (1992: 22-23). In addition, for the previous fifty years, Soviet
policy attem pted to discourage the public view ing of w om en as sexual
36
beings. H elga's overt expression of sexual pow er is in direct conflict w ith
these traditions w hich com bine to m ake sex an uncom fortable topic,
beyond a subject for perform ance. H er choice to perform this skit is a
repeated confrontation w ith this elem ent of Estonian identity and its
hybrid history. N o construction of identity is m onolithic in practice; for
Helga, the stripper adds the facet of female sexuality that is left out of m ore
generic and m ore com fortable im ages of Estonian culture.
The audience reaction to H elga's perform ances is often m ixed.
Some get noticeably nervous and em barrassed, particularly during the
m ore ribald skits. Few w alk out. (This could be due to the stoicism
m entioned above.) M ost, how ever, laugh and enjoy the perform ances.
H elga is neither ostracized by the com m unity at large nor does she enjoy
visibly enhanced prestige based on her perform ances. Instead, they seem
to be acceptable form s of expressions of social com m entary and identity
expressions that do not dem and agreem ent b u t contribute to the social
fabric of the com m unity. In the study of clow ning and perform ance in the
Faeroe Islands, Gaffin argues that deviant behaviors begin a com m unity
dialogue that "activates social norm s and law s (209)." H elga's
perform ances allow her a stage for self-expression b u t also provide
stim ulus for com m unity discussion w herein the norm s of local
com m unity identity can be illum inated.
D uring one of H elga's perform ance nights at the restaurant, I w as
videotaping w hen a m an confronted m e after the perform ance, agitatedly
insisting (in English) that this w as n o t Estonian culture— w hy did I w ant to
film it? "It's Indian, it's Mexican, it's a joke, '' he said. "It's all a joke, not
Estonian culture." Later, I asked one of m y local inform ants about this
37
com m ent, and he replied, "The song festival is ju st w h at Estonia w ants to
show , b u t it's not really Estonia." M y inform ant interpreted the m an ’ s
agitation to be concern that the identity that I, the foreign outsider, was
capturing on videotape w ould then be view ed o u t of context. The m an,
one of the elite (he had spoken to m e in English), could tolerate the lack of
refinem ent of H elga's folk perform ances as long as they rem ained
contextual to the rural com m unity. R em oving them from the
com m unity, though, m ight cause the sym bols to be "wrongly" interpreted
and som ehow confused w ith the "authentic" sym bols th at w ere to
represent Estonia to the international com m unity. H e perceived m y
videotape as a threat to the goals of the state’s national identity agenda,
because as an outsider, I could not (he thought) recognize the aspects of the
sym bols that w ere to be sites of shared m eaning. My inform ant did not
share this particular set of concerns about m isinterpretation, although he
added a statem ent that reflected an aw areness of the m anipulability of
sym bols of identity:1 3
In the song festival, there are the brass bands, and they're all in
uniform s. It w as film ed by som eone, and it w as [m istakenly]
show n that this is the arm y band, because they w ere all in
uniform s. It's all ho w this A m erican understood the film. But
that's how it alw ays is. W hen a person says som ething, they
d o n 't know how it's going to be cut up and p u t back together.
A nd that’ s w hy som e people get m ad and say stuff.
W hile H elga's perform ances give an individual and som ew hat
controversial insight into the social forces shaping local com m unity in
Tostam aa, Rosie Vare's poetry is a folk expression of political identity. H er
poetry is perform ed by oral recitation: w hile som e of h er poem s have been
38
w ritten dow n by others, she prefers to perform them from m em ory.14
Vare's poem s draw on im agery from the areas in w hich she has
lived, nam ely M uhu Island and Tostamaa. The characters are farm ers and
fishermen, and young children. The im ages are infused w ith nationalist
ideology-rom anticized childhood, nostalgia for the loss of the golden
years before the Soviet era, flag symbols, and a call to emigres, the prodigal
sons, to return to their hom eland. H ow ever, she does not espouse the
concept of the fifty-year "interruption." M any of her poem s criticize
changes that occurred under Soviet hegem ony, physical changes to the
environm ent like pollution and overfishing, and em otional
dem oralization and the corruption of w hat she sees as the Estonian w ork
ethic. A lthough the subject m aterial is explicitly stated, she lays no blame
but bem oans losses and flings out accusations w ithout barbs by addressing
the fish, not the fisheries. H er poetry then calls for a reparation of the
dam age to these lifeways. These life ways are seen as her vision of
Estonian identity; to restore the lifeways and the values they em body is to
restore the integrity of Estonian identity.
Vare also reaches out to Estonian wom en. She identifies w om en as
a global entity, using traditional biological roles as m other and nurturer,
w om an as giver of life. H er use of the symbol of m other w orks as a
counterpart to Estonia's engendered "fatherland," w ithout negating it.
Instead, in Vare's poetry, the father symbol is m erely insufficient to
include all present in Estonia.
The third form of perform ance and identity expression to be
addressed here, the telling of historical narratives as personal accounts,
39
differs from the last two in its informal nature. In the nationalist ideology
of "cultural interruption," the agenda that repairs Estonia's cultural
history also obliterates the experiences of those w ho lived through the
"interruption" and alienates them from their Estonian identity by
invalidating the value of their personal experience in the configuration of
their "Estonian-ness." This is especially true of those w ho were deported
to Russia. O ne antedote to this feeling of alienation has been the telling
and recording of the stories of their experiences, w hich include extended
confirm ation of their loyalty to Estonia and the role that Estonian culture
played in m aintaining their feelings of identity and resistance to
Russification, converting their m arginality into a heroism , and thus
reincorporating them into the "epic" of Estonian history.
Luule, a Tostamaa wom an, was deported along w ith her family to
Siberia in 1941; she w as eight years old at the time. In collecting the
m aterial offered by Luule, I became aw are that the im pact of the presence
of the cam era w as m ost pronounced; in this encounter, I was in the role of
videographer, the representative from America, and for this reason, Luule
offered m e her story. W hat she chose to tell m e reveals facets of identity
by w hich she w ould like to be know n to a non-Estonian. H er choice to
reveal the story of her deportation, her life in Siberia, and her return as
well as how she chose to tell it show s aspects of how Luule constructs her
national identity.
In describing her life in Siberia, she recounted the follow ing:1 5
Yes, we played— I rem em ber m ore how w e lived. In our village,
w e w ere given an office building w ith two rooms. The room s
w ere really big. Let's see: one family had four kids— two grow n
sons and a big sister and a little sister, Vivi. Then there w ere
40
Vaike and M other and other relatives. W e w ere in a room ,
about the sam e size— about 20 people living all together, living
in these tw o room s. Your relatives had really nice singing voices,
and they w ere singing all the time. A nd in the evening there
w as really nothing m uch to do, but you talked about life in
Estonia, you ate, and then w e sang Estonian songs. As far as I
rem em ber, people w ere alw ays singing. T hat’ s w hat stayed in m y
m em ory. . . W e had our gam es and w e w ent berry-picking o u t in
the taiga, and w ith the Russians, w e chased squirrels that had
hidden n u ts in the ground. We had a lot of fun. Played all sorts
of games. But still every day w e talked about hom e. Every day.
T hat’ s how it w as.
It w as crucial for Luule's sense of Estonian identity and belonging that we
understand both that life in Siberia w as extrem ely hard and that she never
forgot h er Estonian identity. Both her history and her loyalty to Estonia,
and therefore her rightful claim to Estonian identity, are validated
through the process of telling her story.
The content of Luule’ s storytelling not only allow ed her to reassert
her historical place b u t also inadvertently affirm s the nationalist im age of
folk culture as a perform ative sym bol of Estonian identity, actually
lending substantive evidence to validate the state's m ythological
construction of national identity through folk culture. W ithin a tw o hour
storytelling session about h er life in Siberia, Luule refered repeatedly to
the use of Estonian and the perform ance of Estonian songs not only as
outw ard proof of the deportees' continued Estonian identity in the foreign
environm ent b u t also as m anifestations of internal Estonian-ness. She
im bues these form s w ith significant pow er and holds them responsible for
m aintaining the transplanted Estonians' m orale an d their connection to a
sense of "roots" and "home," functional applications of identity in tim es
of crisis.
VIII. The toppling of the church steeple: m utable symbols
Explanation (like description) is a pragmatic m atter. W hat
should count as an adequate explanation of a phenom enon
does not depend solely on the nature of that phenom enon
a n d /o r the current state of relevant theory. It also depends on
the particular purposes for which and context in which the
explanation is being developed ....
(Hammersley 1992; 39)
In this final section, I w ish to give a specific example of storytelling
perform ance that illustrates directly the m utability of symbols given
sim ilar historical and social param eters. Cohen writes, "If we are the
agents and substantia tors of our cultures, rather than their creatures, we
m ust resist the tem ptation to depict culture as the m onolithic determ inant
of our behavior. If culture did have that character, it w ould equip us with
uniform rather than w ith identity (1993: 7)." As Ham m ersley says above,
conditions for explanations, and I w ould argue for cultural products as
well, are contextual. In the following example, one event occurs and four
different people turn this event into a cultural product that, for each,
involves a reinterpretation of the im portance of the event from a different
set of conditions and a re-creation of the event's symbolic content.
On St. John's Day in 1972, the steeple on the Tostamaa Lutheran
church collapsed. The story of this event was told to m e four times during
my stay in Tostamaa, in four versions. All the tales agree factually;
however, in each case, the teller em phasized different details, in order to
bring out a m eaning relevant to him or her. This story becomes a myth,
42
each em bellishm ent a sym bol for an aspect of identity that varies from
local to national to supranational.
In the first version, H erm an and Helga, a m arried couple, share the
storytelling. They relate that w hen the church fell over, H erm an w as in
the nearby fields and came riding over on his m otorcycle. A fter narrating
the details of the day that usually accom pany the story (the thunderous
sound, clouds of dust, the canalization beneath the church that w eakened
the soil), H erm an and H elga relate that Helga's family was falsely accused
of contributing to the collapse because there is an Estonian superstition
that if seven brothers go into the church at the sam e time, the church will
"fall down." The accusation was proven false because H elga's brothers
only num ber six and therefore could not be responsible for the accident.
Kinship and folklore serve as equal sites of m eaning for H elga in
establishing ethnic identity. As in H elga's perform ance of the sham an,
folklore provides Helga w ith a sym bol to her Estonian tradition that
connects w ith her life; she can incorporate her daily relationship w ith the
land w ith the elem ents of ancient pagan folklore.
In the second version, Aino, a retiring w om an w ho w orks quietly
in service occupations, tells how she was standing before the church at the
exact m om ent that the steeple fell over. She tells how children tried to
take the m etal rooster that had been on top of the church, b u t she helped
to stop them from carrying it off.
For Aino, the church story asserts her place in the com m unity. That
she w as the eyew itness to an event of m ythological proportion gives her a
firm claim w ithin the com m unity, further confirm ed by her role in
helping to save com m unity property.
43
In the third version, H eino expands the event's chronological
param eters to a year before w hen, w hile attending his uncle's funeral, the
family had noticed cracks in the roof. After the steeple fell dow n, three
days passed before the news reached him although his farm is only a few
kilometers away: the new spapers were forbidden to print bad news.
Heino heard about the Tostamaa church accident while listening to an
illegal broadcast on Voice of America. Then he hopped in his car and
w ent to see.
Heino is Helga's brother, b u t his concern w ith family is contextual,
not folkloric. H e is a very pragm atic m an and the mystical side of
Estonian folklore is peripheral to his ethnic identity. H ow ever, the
m eaning he provides the m yth is a symbol of shared com m unity,
physically isolated from one another b u t joined by the currents of history
and resistance.
In the fourth version, the church caretaker w eaves in an
explanation of the religious sym bolism of the steeple rooster along w ith
the event facts. He also seam lessly continues the historical tale to the
present day, including the actions of subsequent pastors in rebuilding the
tower to its present half-height, and connects the ultim ate com pletion of
the steeple and the reinstallation of the rooster proactively w ith the future
zof Tostam aa.
The issues of identity expressed by the church caretaker transcend
the national: he connects the church w ith the Riga parish, thereby
illustrating a geographical category that steps outside the national limits.
In addition, the story for this m an is not about the m om ent in history; he
comes close to the national ideology about an interruption in history as he
44
tells of the rise and fall in attendance, in baptism s, and in pastors in and
around the story of the steeple falling, except that there w as no
interruption. There is no reason to anchor him self in history because he
rem ains outside the tem poral fram ework im posed by the presence and
then rem oval of the Soviet influences (the era referred to by Estonians as
Before). His job w as peripheral, even illegal, under the Soviet occupation
and therefore, seem ingly paradoxically, his time frame finds that era
irrelevant.
In each of the above versions of the church story, the self acts upon
the historical event, w ithin the context of the cultural form of storytelling,
to create a m eaning that has social (community) recognition but whose
relevance is particular to the self. The sym bols are recognizable to the
com m unity as sym bols, yet each self experiences the symbol differently, a
significant effect on the production of m eaning.
IX. Conclusion
Perform ance as a m edium of public participation in the
construction of sym bols and the participatory recognition of (and
expression of) a definition of com m unity has precedent in Estonian
history. In addition, forms of perform ance offer a structural fluidity that
allows an individual perform er to adapt the content, the sym bols
them selves and the sym bolic m eaning generated to the perform er's needs.
As Cohen's analysis of identity indicates, an individual's relationship to
com m unity is not only m ulti-tasked b u t also polyvocal at a given
m om ent; the needs of a vehicle of identity expression do not rem ain
45
constant even for an individual b u t are subject to the interaction of the
individual w ith the historical m om ent. Perform ance, as in the definition
of culture cited above, is a m utable process w herein m eaning is negotiated
by the perform er and the audience and derived w ithin a socio-historical
fram ework. It is therefore easy to see how exam ples of perform ance
become such w idespread social phenom ena for any group experiencing
dram atic changes, such as those currently happening for Estonia.
For Estonia in 1993, the route to com m unity definition is
dom inated by the in d iv id u al/co m m u n ity /n atio n ’ s experience w ith its
colonial past. All aspects of identity definition and expression incorporate
and respond to the experiences of having been a m em ber of the Soviet
U nion and now being one no longer. C om ponents of ethnic identity such
as language and history, of contentious pow er under the Soviet Union,
now provide justification for the origin of the new Estonian nation, and
m uch of the sym bolism previously reflective of Estonian ethnic identity,
such as the song festivals and institutionalized folk culture, has now
become representative of Estonian national identity, w ith a predictably
disruptive and exclusory effect on ethnic non-Estonians.
W ithin local com m unities, recent history, particularly of such rapid
and substantial change as the m ove to independence, also serves as a site
at which identity boundaries are tested and defined. The release from the
social and political censorship that w as the rule under the Soviet U nion
has opened a floodgate of storytelling and perform ance, expressing a
relationship to historical experiences that recalculates the individual's
relationship not only w ith his or her personal history b u t also w ith that of
com m unity and country. H istory thus is "repossessed" and converted into
46
an elem ent of present com m unity construction. In this w ave of
reconstruction, the public m edium of perform ance has facilitated quick
reassociation w ith others of sim ilar experience, such as for Luule and
other deportees, as well as generated a m echanism for the establishm ent of
new symbols, bringing into foreground for discussion social issues that
had been relegated to the shadow s, such as concern over the environm ent
as expressed by Rosie Vare's poetry or the am biguity of the role of wom en
in independent Estonia as addressed by both Helga and Vare.
A com m unity, local or national, is com posed of individuals
involved in the negotiation of com m unity definition. The difference of
scale m ay come in the intention of shared sym bol recognition: it is
instrum ental that m ore individuals recognize the sym bols utilized to
im part a national identity than a local one as the intended com m unity is
greater. W hile this is not to say that the experience of the symbols is
universal am ong those w ho recognize it, it is the recognition of the
symbol and participation in m eaning generation that establishes a sense of
identity.
As they respond to the widely recognized symbols, local processes
absorb and readapt national sym bols and even understandings of national
identity. Local expressions of identity m ay provide new forms of
perform ance, new m ethods of expressions, local symbols of identity may
becom e m ore w idely recognized and inform the construction of national
identity. O ld m odels need to be continually evaluated and replaced; even
as governm ents and com m unities attem pt to codify them in order to
strengthen the symbolic presence for the largest num ber of individuals,
the processes of culture and identity form ation respond to historical and
47
individual changes, thereby resisting reification. Certainly the interaction
of the individual w ith symbol construction and interpretation will
continue to challenge the obsolete and prod new forms into existence.
NOTES
1 In 1993, Estonia celebrated the 75th anniversary of the Republic. This
celebration was predom inantly a textual one, w ith banners and printed
m aterials (envelopes, posters) expressing the com m em oration. In the two
com m unities in w hich I lived during 5 m onths in 1993, no special festivals or
participatory celebrations occurred.
2 Smith (1985: 84-85) offers an example, suggested by Eric W olfs studies of
Latin Am erican peasants and explored further in her ow n w ork in
Guatem ala, of how peasant com m unities that form closed system in defense
against plantationism or other colonial institutions also contribute a
problem atic situation to the larger capitalist expansion and resist
proletarianization, fom enting rebellions and disrupting the sm ooth
im plem entation of hegem onic pow er structures— a certain and form ative
contribution to the regional history and eventually a m odel for other
com m unities w ho resist foreign dominance: "...how people m ake their own
history—how people form local-level institutions that are often opposed to
the interests of capitalism, how these institutions are som etim es the m eans
by w hich peasants or other groups resist capitalist incorporation, and thus
how they are responsible for the particular kind of capitalism extant in
peripheral social form ations" (em phasis in Smith).
3 Religion did not appear to play an im portant political or cultural role in the
areas of Estonia in which my fieldwork w as conducted. I w as informed by the
caretaker of the Tostamaa Lutheran church that services w ere perform ed
there perhaps once a m onth and on major church holidays. At the regular
services, they felt lucky to have 10-15 congregational m em bers attend. This
was attributed to several factors, including an unpopular pastor and fifty years
of C om m unist discouragem ent of religious attendance. Baptisms are on the
rise, and not only of children but of adults who were skipped over during the
Soviet occupation.
t
48
On the other hand, the church buildings— the church itself and the
small second building that houses the children’ s bible school still have
central significance to the com m unity if not as religious centers then as
am ong the few public buildings in town. The bible school building housed a
popular rum m age sale w hen it came to town; it is also the site of the land
privatization office. The toppling of the church steeple provides a local
historical event that is narrated by everyone in the tow n and has achieved the
status of local legend.
4 For a m ore detailed description of Estonian history, see Taagepera 1993; see
also Lieven 1992.
5 At Tartu University, courses that had been conducted in Latin since the
founding in 1632, changed to teaching in' Germ an through the nineteenth
century, w ith som e even continuing into the Soviet era (Lieven 1992).
6 Interestingly, I noticed one outstanding exception to Estonians' extreme
distaste for and avoidance of Russian language usage. This w as the television
broadcast on Ostankino, a Moscow TV channel, of a Mexican soap opera,
"Simply Maria". Despite the fact that the program was dubbed in Russian, it
was the single m ost popular television show in P am u at the time I w as there.
A nyw here in tow n during its late afternoon time slot, the fam iliar strains of
the them e song w afted from back rooms, from behind hotel desks, or over the
counters at the superm arkets. It w as always on, and everyone, m en and
wom en, knew the story.
7 There are other variations in regional costume: shapes and presence of
aprons, hats, blouses, em broideries and laces, each attributed to the region and
w orn as an expression of national pride. W ithin an acceptable regional outfit,
personal variations occur, m ostly in degree of decoration and slight color
changes. O lder people express unhappiness in the changes they see in the
younger people's costumes, noticing particularly if the regional cloth has been
handm ade or m ade by m achine— the latter often perceived to be a decline in
tradition and the industriousness of young people.
8 A notable exception to this ritual w earing is am ong the w om en of Kihnu
Island. There the older w om en w ear the folk skirts every day, all year round—
no sm all feat since they are m ade of handspun wool sheared from sheep
raised on Kihnu. In the sum m er, they w ear t-shirts or cotton blouses on top,
soften w ith a colorful kerchief around their heads; in the w inter, sw eaters are
always w orn because it is dam n cold. The younger w om en do not always
w ear the skirts in sum m er because they are so hot; however, m any girls and
young w om en talked about the im portance of w earing the skirts for the
continuation of the culture, and m ore w ear them as the w eather grow s cool.
For regional dance festivals, wom en of all ages w ear the com plete outfit that
includes an em broidered blouse, heavy knitted stockings, and leather shoes
w ith laces u p the legs.
K ihnu m en w ear black wool pants and heavy knitted sw eaters w ith
49
one of m any jacquard patterns alw ays in black on natural wool, w ith a
characteristic joining at the shoulders edged in red. These sw eaters, too, are
recognized throughout Estonia as K ihnu troi.
9 This difference w as articulated by one P arnu resident w ho cited exam ples of
a lack of sophistication in language and hum or as w ell as differences in
lifestyle. A class distinction along w ith inferiority w as im plied b u t not stated.
U rban residents w ere expected by those in the country to be m ore educated
and cultured, b u t m ore stodgy. O ther urban residents noted differences
betw een coastal people and inland people, w ith the style of hum or again
being noted. Coastal village jokes w ere deem ed obvious or
"in co m p reh en sib le."
10 The Estonian H um an D evelopm ent R eport findings su p p o rt these
statem ents regarding division of labor, adding that w hile w om en are
em ployed in w age earning jobs, the m anagerial positions are held by men. In
the fish packing plant near A udru, all the w orkers packing fish and office
personnel w ere female. In the Tostam aa cheese-m anufacturing plant, all the
w orkers in the factory w ere fem ale w hile the director and the forem an w ere
m ale.
11 The practice of kitchen gardens did not originate w ith the Soviet
occupation. A n A udru w om an w ho em igrated to Sw eden d u rin g
W orld W ar II spent long hours convincing her landlord in Stockholm to
allow her to convert a little corner of unused land to an aiamaa. She claim s
that having a kitchen garden is p art of her Estonian identity. H ow ever,
Russians in Estonia have adopted this custom . W hile both ethnic Russians
and Estonians in Parnu have iiiamaat, the R ussian com m unal area is
segregated from the Estonian garden and even has a separate bu s stop. Both
groups say that this is how they w ant it.
12 This occurs to varying degrees throughout Estonia. K ihnu Island, for
exam ple, is a significant contrast to this argum ent. There are K ihnu residents
w ho continue to w rite new songs in the old style that becom e part of the body
of folk culture. K ihnu w om en continue to w ear elem ents of the folk
"costume", in particular the distinctively patterned w ool skirts, in their daily
life.
13 This m aterial is taken from transcripts of interview s I m ade in Tostam aa
in October 1993.
14 M y analysis here is based on a videotape of ten poem s w ritten and recited
by Rosie Vare in O ctober 1993.
15 Luule's interview /storytelling session w as videotaped in Tostam aa,
October 1993.
50
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Asset Metadata

Creator Shalom, Kaaren Paula (author)

Core Title The Role Of Performance And Culture In Local And National Identity Formation In Post-Soviet Estonia

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

Degree Master of Arts

Degree Program Visual Anthropology

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag anthropology, cultural,OAI-PMH Harvest,Theater

Language English

Advisor Simic, Andrei (committee chair), Christiansen, Roger S. (committee member), Moore, G. Alexander (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c18-11302

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