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4.1 Attitude to traditional knowledge

The indigenous people interviewed in this study in general valued traditional knowledge in relation to early warning and coping mechanisms for natural disasters. Only a few self-confident young people, who are accustomed to the use of transport vehicles, said that they regularly rely on radio weather forecasts, compass, GPS, and other modern means of navigation and weather prediction.

However, the interviewers reported that many of the indigenous people interviewed, especially those who lead settled lives in big settlements (all age groups and especially women) did not hold traditional knowledge on biodiversity conservation and on strategies of early warning and mitigation of negative consequences of disasters. Instead they tend to look back to a past time when �elders knew everything, and could feel everything in advance�. The absence of knowledge is substituted by the mythology about wise behaviour of elders in past times.

Knowledge transfer

In the cases where this was discussed, the respondents explained that the way of knowledge transfer is a story or demonstration. An Even man from Esso (Kamchatka) explained it this way, �In local traditions nobody specifically teaches someone about something. Nobody says: in this situation you have to do this and that. Always there is just an example of how you can act, though it is not a law, and you can act in another way. Everything depends on the real situation.�

The manner of transferring knowledge was often described as confidential. Again, in the words of the Even man, �He doesn�t say to me openly, �You are an idiot!� He just mildly tries to explain to me; he doesn�t try to humiliate me. Because then a humble person is closing up, stopping to listen, and starting to defend himself. When you say it in a good manner, you give him an opportunity to think, and to decide by himself what and how things should be done. It is about providing a subject for thinking. You have action and you have an example�.

The above words are from the interview of a person who was a reindeer herder when he was young, and who led nomadic way of life. The interviewers reported that in the reindeer herders� interviews one can not see reference to any system of prohibitions. Instructions are only stated in the form of advice.

The interviewers also reported that among the settled and baptized population they could see parents and elders giving children more prohibitions and instructions, mostly related to children�s behaviour. For example: �Do not go out of house during the blizzard�, �Do not go to the river during floods�, �and �Do not stay under a tree during thunder-storms with lightning.� Examples of instructions are: �Immediately leave the house during an earthquake�, �Clean the ground of leaves and put down stones before fixing a fire�, and �Blow out the fire when you leave the place.�

The assistant who conducted interviews in Kovran noted that most young people learn everything they know in school and that knowledge transfer from older generations is weak.