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 Editor’s Note 

 The past year has been a difficult one for those of us who study the folklore, culture, and 

ethnography of the countries to which SEEFA is dedicated. All across the Slavic, East European 

and Eurasian world, it seems, there have been socio-political shifts. They have resulted in a 

fraught atmosphere and a great deal of conflicted emotions for all of us, both here in North 

America and across the territories we love in Europe and Asia. SEEFA’s mission is “an 

exchange of knowledge among scholars interested in Slavic, East European and Eurasian 

folklore. SEEFA shall seek to promote joint research, scholarly exchanges and conferences, 

expeditions, and publications with scholars in Slavic, East European and Eurasian countries.” As 

scholars, we hope for the best in the political arena, regardless of our personal attitudes toward 

those developments, and believe that continued exchange will improve understanding among 

peoples in all our countries.  

It is particularly fitting then that this issue of Folklorica features articles from our sister 

journal Traditional Culture [Traditsionnaia kul’tura] as well as a report from the editor of 

another respected journal in our field, Living Antiquity [Zhivaia starina]. Our scholarly 

exchanges persist in the face of violence and nationalism and prejudice and upheaval and testify 

to the mission of our organization. As Vladimir Klyaus writes below, Traditional Culture, like 

Folklorica, is dedicated to the study of folk culture. Unraveling the complexities of folk life 

certainly fosters mutual understanding in ways that few other disciplines can achieve. 

 The scholarly journal Traditional Culture (see www.folkcentr.ru for more information on 

the journal or on submissions) is one of the most authoritative periodicals in Russian academic



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publishing today. It is dedicated to the detailed study of folk culture in all its forms, including 

prose and poetic genres, music, artifacts, spiritual and religious practices and also socio-cultural 

issues in folk life, both in the past and in the contemporary period. 

The journal was established in 2000 by the State Center of the Republic for Russian 

Folklore, one of the academic research institutions of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian 

Federation. It was created at the initiative and with the participation of the Center’s general 

director, Professor Anatolii Kargin (Doctor of Science).  Until 2007 the post of the editor was 

occupied by the Doctor of Cultural Studies Nikolai Khrenov. Vladimir Klyaus, head of the 

Folklore Division of the Gorky Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 

currently serves as editor. The associate editors, Natal’ia Kotel’nikova, Irina Raikova and chief 

secretary Anna Nasonova are all professional folklorists and philologists. The editorial board is 

composed of specialists in various areas and from different regions, which ensures publication of 

material after rigorous peer evaluation. The journal is cited among the publications on the 

Highest Attestation Committee of Russia, the list of approved, peer-reviewed journals for 

publication of the work of Candidates and Doctors of Science. All publications in the journal are 

included in the Russian Index of Academic Citations (elibrary.ru/defaultx.asp). 

Over the years journal authors have represented a variety of disciplines, including 

folklorists, ethnographers, ethnomusicologists, ethnolinguists, cultural and literature specialists, 

and art historians. Contributors represent all the regional, educational and academic centers of 

Russia, from Vladivostok and Iakutsk in the east, to Petrozavodsk and Kaliningrad in the 

northwest and Vladikavkaz and Astrakhan in the south. The journal also has published the work 

of international scholars from the countries of Abkhazia, Armenia, Belarus’, China, Italy, Japan, 

Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Serbia, Tadzhikistan, Turkey, Ukraine, and The United States.



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Traditional Culture is divided into thematic sections based on the theoretical issues in the 

articles. It includes discussions, field notes, overviews, reviews and commemorative articles. 

More importantly, each issue features scholarly articles that are organized thematically, e.g., 

Home in Language and Culture; History of Epic; Immigrant Folklore; Contemporary Holidays; 

Folklore and the Written Word; Urban Magical Practice and the like. The articles are illustrated 

with photos (black and white and color) as well as drawings. The editorial board of Traditional 

Culture and Folklorica invite submissions from its international colleagues. We hope that this 

exchange proves worthwhile for our membership and will mark an improvement in the 

international and domestic situation for all of us. 

 

Jeanmarie Rouhier-Willoughby, Editor, Folklorica 

Vladimir Klyaus, Editor, Traditional Culture