Anna A. Zabiyako,
Doctor of of Philological Sciences, Amur State University, Blagoveshchensk, Russian, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Zhang Ruyan,
Candidate of Philological Sciences, Amur State University, Blagoveshchensk, Russian, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Oral History of the Russian Habitants of Trekhrechye (Sanhe District): Memoirs vs Narrations Based on Photos
DOI: 10.31518/2618-9100-2020-5-7
The article is based on memorats and narrations based on photos collected in Russian and Chinese during five international expeditions to the three rivers region (Hulunbuir dist., Inner Mongolia, China) in 2015–2019. Modern Russian-speaking people of Trekhrechye present a mixed-race population born in Russian-Chinese marriages (in the first, second, and today – the fifth generation). Russians of the older generation are mostly illiterate (they do not speak written Russian, only some of them can read and write a little Chinese). The history of Trekhrechye region, of the settlement of these territories by the ancestors of the modern inhabitants of the region, and the socio-political and socio-cultural transformations they experienced does not exist. Therefore, family memorats and their stories about photos become the “folk” history of the Russian enclave in the territory of Trekhrechye. The subjects of memorats are typologically united by the motives of the settlement of these territories by their ancestors, the Russian-Chinese marriage, the Japanese occupation, the liberation by Soviet troops, and the “cultural revolution”. The presented narrations tell the history of family relationships, family traditions, social and cultural transformations of the twentieth century. Сorrelation of themes and plots of the narrations explicates the value foundations of ethnic consciousness of the Russian people, their bipatriotism in relation to Russia and China. In general, these verbal and verbal-visual texts are considered not just as a historical document, but as an implementation of an important component of ethnic identity of the Russian enclave in China – its historical memory.
Publishing: 30/10/2020
The article has been received by the editor on 12.07.2020
How to cite: Zabiyako A.A., Zhang Ruyan. Oral History of the Russian Habitants of Trekhrechye (Sanhe District): Memoirs vs Narrations Based on Photos // Historical Courier, 2020, No. 5 (13), pp. 83–97. [Available online:] http://istkurier.ru/data/2020/ISTKURIER-2020-5-07.pdf
Links: Issue 5 2020
Keywords: Trekhrechye (Sanhe district); Russian nationality; oral history; memorats; narrations based on photos; ethnic identity; historical memory
The study was supported by the RFBR grant, project no. 20-012-00318