Thematic Network on Circumpolar Archives, Folklore and Ethnography (CAFE)

The CAFÉ network is devoted to exploring how ethnographic and folkloric materials can enliven Arctic cultures around the world. 

Activities

In this year we put our energy in attracting external funding to support our work through three high-profile funding initiatives. Those were not successful but we are working on reapplying.  Parallel to this our members have carried out an ambitious programme of organizing meetings [4], presenting papers [29], and publishing ethnographic and folkloric texts [38].  In terms of impact our medium term goal over the next three years is to work directly with Arctic communities on the legacy of community radio, photographic collections, and folkloric collections. This will be the focus of our continued effort to apply for funding. Our major activity will be a network meeting in Reykjavik for the UArctic Congress.

  • Supporting and developing new research projects
  • Designing methods courses in the digital humanities with a focus on the Arctic regions
  • Encouraging working groups from many sites to work together on peer-reviewed publications
  • Developing new types of ethnographic, folkloric, and archival research
  • and specifically in 2020-21 several meetings: 1. Arctic Culture and Climate Exhibition– The British Museum  [A. Lincoln P.Loovers, D. Anderson D Arzyutov], 2. "Topics in Circumpolar Archives, Folklore and Ethnography (CAFÉ)", UArctic Congress Reykjavik Iceland [Tom Miller, Kristinn Schram, Tota Arnadottir Natalia Drannikova, Krister Stoor], 3. Polar Libraries Colloquy, Laval University Quebec in June 2021 [Sandra Campbell]

Award in 2019 - The 2019 Ab Imperio Award (to Prof. David G. Anderson & Dmitry Aryutov) for the best peer-reviewed article in new imperial history and history of diversity in Northern Eurasia, up to the late twentieth century. 

Meetings organized in 2019:

    1. SIEF network Meeting – Santiago de Compestela Spain 16 April (in conjunction with the SIEF conference),
    2. Co-organizers of XI Siberian Studies Conference at Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (Kunstkamera), St. Petersburg 28-30 October (Russia) [D.Arzyutov, L.Siragusa, D.Anderson. Theme: Energy of the Arctic and Siberia: Resources, Technologies, and Infrastructure
    3. Main organizer of international conference, University of Helsinki 19-20 September (Finland) L.Siragusa. Theme: Árran—Ecology of Indigenous Languages (Celebration of UNESCO Year of Indigenous Languages), more can be seen here.
    4. Co-organizer of international conference, University of Helsinki 26-28 August 2019 (Finland) L.Siragusa, Theme: The Great White North. See information here.

A full list of publications and conference presentation in 2019 can be found in the attached pdf.

If you are interested in joining the network, please send a paragraph describing your interests in circumpolar archival research, folklore, or ethnography, your address, and your email and website to the network Lead or Vice-Lead.

Other Information

David Anderson, Lead of the UArctic Thematic Network on Circumpolar Archives, Folklore and Ethnography (CAFE)