Alan. Lords of the Mongolian taiga: an ethnohistory of the Dukha reindeer herders

Bloomington: Indiana Uruversity, Depaftment of Central Eurasian Studies, 2000. — v, 64 p. A thesis submitted to the faculty of the Univetsity Graduate School in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts.Tucked away in the northernmost district of Mongolia is a small gtoup of apptoximately thirty reindeer-herding families who call themselves the Dukha. For centuries unknown to the Western world, the history and culture of the Dukha have remained largely a mystery. Significant works on the Dukha's history are rare at best in Western literatue and basically nonexistent in English. According to the Finnish ethnographer and linguist Juha Janhunen's brief description, the Dukha "can probably be regarded as the most 'primitive' reindeer people presently living." Moreover, "creating a maximally complete recording of their life, as it still continues today is one of the most urgent tasks of North Asian ethnogtaphy'' (1983: 76). While a "maximally complete" record of the Dukha's life is beyond the scope of this thesis, the aim here is to provide a concise ethnohistory of the Dukha with a specific focus on their reindeer-herding populace so as to create a basis for future research.