The book traces the conceptual lens of historical-cultural ‘survivals’ from the late 19th-century theories of E.B. Tylor, James Frazer, and others, in debate with monotheistic ‘degenerationists’ and Protestant anti-Catholic polemicists, back to its origins in Jewish, Christian and Muslim traditions as well as later more secularized forms in the German Enlightenment and Romanticist movements. These historical sources, particularly the ‘dual faith’ tradition of Russian Orthodoxy, significantly shaped both Tsarist and later Soviet ethnography of Muslim Central Asia, helping guide and justify their respective religious missionary, social-legal, political and other imperial agendas. They continue impacting post-Soviet historiography in complex and debated ways.
Drawing from European, Central Asian, Middle Eastern and world history, the fields of ethnography and anthropology, as well as Christian and Islamic studies, the volume contributes to scholarship on ‘syncretism’ and ‘conversion’, definitions of Islam, history as identity and heritage, and more. It is situated within a broader global historical frame, addressing debates over ‘pre-Islamic Survivals’ among Turkish and Iranian as well as Egyptian, North African Berber, Black African and South Asian Muslim Peoples while critiquing the legacy of the Geertzian ‘cultural turn’ within Western post-colonialist scholarship in relation to diverging trends of historiography in the post-World War Two era.
Author(s): R. Charles Weller
Series: Islam and Global Studies
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 410
City: Singapore
Preface
Acknowledgements
Contents
Chapter 1 Introduction: Framing the Study
Background and Context
The Question of Kazakh Religious-Cultural History and Identity: An Illustrative Case Study
Concluding Reflections and Overview of Chapters and Sections
Part I Historical Sources of Tsarist ‘Survivals’ Ethnography
Chapter 2 Religious-Cultural ‘Survivals’ in Euro-American and Euro-Slavic Christian and Secular Sources
E.B. Tylor and Protestant Anti-Catholic Polemicists as Sources for Soviet ‘Survivals’ Ethnography?
Tylor and ‘Survivals’ Historiography in the Nineteenth-Century: Monotheistic Degenerational versus Evolutionary Developmental Theories of Early Human History
‘Survivals’ Historiography in Seventeenth-Century German Enlightenment Sources
Hebrew-Jewish and Christian Sources of ‘Survivals’ Historiography
Nineteenth-Century Romantic Nationalism and the Russian Orthodox Tradition of ‘Dual Faith’
Concluding Reflections
Chapter 3 Middle Eastern and Central Asian Islamic Sources of ‘Survivals’ Ethnography
Qur’anic and Middle Eastern Islamic Sources
Eleventh-Century Karakhanid and Other Turkic Sources
Sixteenth-Century Central Asian Sources
Western (Christian) Orientalist Scholarship
Concluding Reflections
Chapter 4 ‘Pre-Islamic Survivals’ Among the Kazakhs in Tsarist Russian and Kazakh Colonial Ethnography, 1770–1917
Early Tsarist Colonial Ethnographers of Kazakh Religious Identity, 1770–1860
The First Kazakh Colonial Ethnographer, Shokan Ualihanuhli (1863–1865)
“Remnants” Historiography and ‘the Kazakh of Kazakhs,’ Abai, in the Later Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
The Terminological Shift to “Perezhitki” in Early Twentieth-Century Writings of Tsarist Russian Missionaries
Part One Conclusion: Summary of Tsarist Historical Sources
Part II Historical Sources of Soviet ‘Survivals’ Ethnography
Chapter 5 Sources and Aims of Soviet ‘Survivals’ Ethnography in Its Initial (Pre-World War Two) Phases
The Persistence of ‘Survivals’ Ethnography in Russian Orthodoxy
‘Survivals’ Ethnography in Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin
Tylor, Frazer and Other Euro-American Sources of Influence
Early Soviet ‘Survivals’ Ethnography of Kazakh and Central Asian Islamic History, 1920s–40s
Concluding Reflections
Chapter 6 Transformations in Soviet ‘Survivals’ Ethnography in the Post-World War Two Period
Soviet “Theoretical and Practical Narrowness in Evaluating the Beliefs and Rituals of the Peoples of Central Asia”?: G.P. Snesarev’s Late-Coming Challenge
Revisiting the Marxian-Engelsian Framework
The Curious Absence of Concern for ‘Pre-Islamic Survivals’ in Soviet Anti-Islamic Propaganda Literature in the Pre-World War Two Period
Snesarev and the Soviet Deployment of ‘Pre-Islamic Survivals’ for Renewed Anti-Religious Propaganda Efforts in the Post-World War Two Period
Clarifying the Chronological Frame of Soviet ‘Survivals’ Ethnography
The Importance of Kazakh Nomadic Steppe Culture in Snesarev’s Understanding and Deployment of ‘Pre-Islamic Survivals’ Among Other Central Asian Muslim Peoples
Part Two Conclusion: Summary of Soviet Historical Sources
Part III Historiographical Constructions of and Debates Over Kazakh Religious History and Identity in Soviet and Post-Soviet Kazakh Scholarship
Chapter 7 The Framing of Kazakh Religious History and Identity in Post-World War Two Soviet Kazakh Publications
Kakimzhanov, About the Reactionary Essence of the Religion of Islam (1953)
Bisenov, The Origin of Islam and Its Class Significance (1955)
Duisenbin, About the Religion of Islam and Its Current State (1961)
K. Mashrapov Devotion to Islam—A Detrimental Survival (1962)
Concluding Reflections
Chapter 8 Religious-Cultural Revivalism as Historiographical Debate: Post-Soviet Kazakh Perspectives on Their Past
Framing the Essential Issues
Tengrist Historiography
Islamic Approaches and Christian Interludes
Concluding Reflections
Part IV International Post-Soviet ‘Survivals’ Scholarship in Global Historical Perspective
Chapter 9 Divergent Views on the Historical and Present Relation of Shamanism and Islam in International Post-Colonialist Scholarship
Sultanova, Zarcone and Hobart on Female Musical and Healing Traditions in Post-Soviet Studies of Shamanism and Sufism
Deweese’s Critique of Turkish, French and Soviet Scholarship
Revisiting the Evidence from Privratsky, Muslim Turkistan
Historically Interactive and Transformational Understandings and Definitions of ‘Islam’ and ‘Shamanism’
Concluding Reflections
Chapter 10 Retrospect and Prospect: Situating Post-Soviet “Survivals” Scholarship Within a World Historiographical Frame
Post-Colonialist Agendas and the Historian’s Task
Debates Over Terminology: Beyond ‘Syncretism’ and ‘Pre-Islamic’ Constructs?
Continuities and Discontinuities in Colonialist vs. Post-Colonialist Historiography
In Search of the Historical End Point of Conversion
Distinguishing Historical Fact from Fiction: Description vs. Analysis vs. Thesis
Historiographical Trends in the Post-World War Two Era
‘Survivals’ as Historical Heritage, ‘Remnants’ of Crosscultural Contact and Exchange
‘Religious Survivals’, ‘Dual Faith’ and “Integral” Religious Identities
Conclusion: A Summary of the Main Points of the Study
Appendices
Notes
Bibliography: Primary Sources
Index
