Question

We Are Going Underwater
SUSAN A. CRATE
Summary The Viliui Sakha, a horse- and cattle-breeding people of northeastern Siberia, live in an extreme, subarctic climate that has continuous permafrost and annual temperature swings of 180 degrees Fahrenheit. This place-based community has adapted to many different changes over hundreds of yearsbeginning with Russian imperial expansion in the 1600s and as recently as a result of the breakup of the Soviet Union in the 1990s. More recently, their adaptations have been in response to local, physical changes brought about by global climate change. In her essay, Susan Crate outlines the most notable ways global climate change has impacted life for the Sakha, and details their remarkable capacity to adapt to these changes.
Crate conducted surveys and interviewed elders of the community who had the advantage of witnessing many decades of change, offering a perspective that not many other community members could. Crate's research identified nine ways in which global climate change has impacted the Sakha, including increased water on the land, late and lagging seasons, a decline in certain game species, and temperature fluctuations. These changes cannot be attributed solely to climate change; many of them have multiple stressors. Regardless, the Sakha have had to make psychological, social, and physical adaptations to accommodate the new reality of their physical world. Interestingly, very few of the Sakha attribute the changes to global climate change, and instead point to other local causes such as a hydroelectric reservoir or the overabundance of technology and mechanization. Despite this, the Sakha will continue to adapt as they have for hundreds of years, figuring out how to negotiate the additional water on their land, learning how to adjust their practices to have enough hay for their cows and horses, and purchasing electric freezers to replace the traditional buluus (underground freezers) that are now increasingly flooded out. The Sakha and their adaptations are offered by Crate as an example of how communities and scientists might benefit from sharing information. Scientists have much to learn about how climate change is affecting local environments and culture, and communities can learn from scientists how to adapt in ways to address these local changes.
While many think of geologists and chemists as those best equipped to help the world adapt to the effects of global climate change, Crate believes that anthropologists can help communities weather these changes by fostering a greater understanding of how people like the Sakha have adapted and continue to do so successfully. By identifying and learning about those communities that are the most flexible in their responses to local changes, communities will have a model to follow when global climate change begins to have a greater impact on the more temperate zones of the planet.
In the world of the Viliui Sakha, black shamans travel from the middle world where humans live to interact with sky spirits during the Sakha summer festival, thereby ensuring a plentiful harvest.

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