Tents, Taiga and Tourist Parks: Vernacular Ewenki Architecture and the State In Kolas, A. & Xie, Yuanyuan (eds.) (2015) RECLAIMING THE FOREST: The Ewenki Reindeer Herders of Aoluguya. Berghahn Books: Oxford Richard FRASER This chapter provides an account of vernacular architecture among the Reindeer Ewenki of China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. It describes the vernacular characteristics of Ewenki dwellings and their transformation over time, offering insights into the changing nature of minority-state relations and the potential future of the community. In the opening section I describe the vernacular features of Ewenki architecture, specifically the birch-bark and animal-hide tepee-tents that were the sole dwelling of the community up until the mid1980s but remain in limited use today. Here we shall see how the tents comprised materials drawn from the immediate taiga environment, served to maintain the community’s mobile hunting existence, physically structured people’s everyday social relations, and reflected the broader cosmological aspects of the Ewenki lifeworld. This is then followed by an account of how the community’s dwellings have changed over time, specifically replacing the birch-bark and animal-hide tepees with canvas-covered ridge-tents. Situating this in a context of increasing relations between the Ewenki and the Chinese state, I show how the former has come to influence the characterisation of Ewenki architecture, presenting the tepee-tents as the archetypal dwelling of the community and the newer ridge-tents as a non-traditional transformation. As we shall come to see, this evokes the discourse of ‘cultural decline’ from the perspective of the modern socialist state, something which has been perpetuated in the contemporary era with the newly constructed ‘Aoluguya Ethnic Reindeer Resort’ featuring reproductions of the ‘original’ tents at the expense of their canvas-covered counterparts. Contrary to this characterisation, I argue that the adoption of the ridge-tents should be seen as a locally-mediated and vernacular transformation, one which suited the demands and context of collectivisation. This is correlated with the contemporary situation where, as we shall see, the present-day reindeer herders continue to experience the ridge-tents as vernacular dwellings, responding to further transformations by featuring new architectural innovations. At the same time, drawing inspiration from Evans and Humphrey’s (2002) account of architectural afterlives, I argue that the reproductions featured in the ‘Aoluguya Ethnic Reindeer Resort’ themselves signify a non-vernacular transformation, with the state having appropriated the style and symbolism of Ewenki architecture in its politicised representation of ‘traditional culture’. By exploring the changing nature of Ewenki architecture, as well as the political implications associated with it, the chapter ends by offering insights into the potential future of the community, an issue of particular significance since the 2003 relocation. Here I argue for the continuation of taiga-based residence in the form of ridge-tents, something which demands recognition and support from the regional government. As shall be shown, this is not to suggest the devaluation of the newly constructed dwellings in the Aoluguya Ethnic Reindeer Resort; on the contrary, basing my argument on a phenomenological approach to architecture I emphasise their mutual interdependency with regards to the viability of contemporary reindeer-herding. Vernacular architecture among the Reindeer Ewenki The Ewenki are a Tungusic people of Northern Asia who, according to Russian sources, trace their origins to one of numerous possible locations near the vicinity of Lake Baikal. It was from here, between the third and fourth centuries A.D. that a number of groups were said to migrate, some making their way east to the Okhotsk coast, others north to the basin of the River Lena, and some northwest to the upper tributaries of the River Yenisey (Ermolova 2003). By the seventeenth century, some Ewenki groups had also entered what would later become the People’s Republic of China, and indeed, prior to the formalization of the Sino-Russian border, numerous bands of Ewenki hunters traversed both sides of the Amur, or Heilongjiang River, moving across the remote region in search of suitable hunting grounds (Heyne 2002). Often referred to in Chinese sources as Yakut, the Reindeer Ewenki entered Chinese territory from Yakutia in Russia’s Sakha Republic at the end of the 1820s (Heyne 2002). Partially sedentarized in the mid1960s, the community was relocated in 2003 to a purpose-built settlement on the outskirts of Genhe City, justified on the grounds of environmental conservation in the Daxing’anling forests. Since then, the majority have remained permanently in the settlement, where they reside in wooden dwellings provided by the state and receive free electricity and a monthly welfare payment. Concurrently, between thirty and forty individuals live and work in the Daxing’anling taiga, practicing mobile reindeer-pastoralism from six campsites, through which they procure and sell antler and other reindeer products (Fraser 2010). During the time that they first entered Chinese territory the Ewenki From here on, ‘Ewenki’ refers to the reindeer herding Ewenki unless otherwise specified. resided in tepee-like tents called djiu. These dwellings, which are sparingly used in northeast Inner Mongolia today, consist of twelve to sixteen larch-poles erected lengthways and tied to form a conical hut. Using strips of bark to secure the dwellings, the djiu’s surface would be covered with animal hides in winter and birch-bark in summer. Measuring five to six meters in diameter and with an open fire in the centre, a single dwelling would be occupied by four to six people and is an apt example of vernacular architecture. As Forsyth remarks, ‘[the Ewenki] lived in easily transportable conical tents consisting of a few larch poles and a covering of reindeer-skins or sheets of birch-bark. Here, within a diameter of some fifteen feet, they disposed their fire, their sleeping places, and their meagre accoutrements’ (1994: 49). Although the term ‘architecture’ is typically associated with the built environment, having connotations of urban structures such as houses and buildings, it is in fact more accurate to envision it in broader terms, as the material manifestation of human dwelling, including that within so-called rural or non-urban environments (Ingold 2000). As Lawrence and Low (1990) point out, architecture is the product of human building-activity, including not only houses, plazas, buildings, and streets, but all built-forms such as shelters, enclosures, and semi-permanent coverings. Writing in regards to the dwelling-types of hunter-gatherers, for example, Ingold remarks; ‘the fact remains that hunter-gatherers do build shelters of various kinds. So who are we to say that they have no architecture?’ (2000: 180). What this suggests is the need for a more grounded conceptualisation of architecture, one envisioned not as material ‘construction’ but as the dwelt-effect of fulfilling practical and existential requirements. In a remark directly related to Heidegger’s own rearticulation of this human capacity for dwelling, Ingold states; ‘The concern is to regain that original perspective, so that we can once again understand how the activities of building – of cultivation and construction – belong to our dwelling in the world, to the way we are’ (2000: 185-6). Here it is useful to distinguish between two kinds of architecture; namely, vernacular and non-vernacular. The latter, otherwise known as polite architecture, is characterised by stylistic elements of design intentionally incorporated for aesthetic purposes, specifically going beyond the functional requirements of the dwelling. By contrast, vernacular architecture refers to the product of built-activity geared solely towards local physical needs and using materials drawn from the immediate ‘natural’ environment. Apt examples include the Igloo-dwellings of the Inuit, the Mongolian yurt, and the Native American tepee but, as Brunskill (2000) points out, it may also refer to more static dwellings such as the South African Banda and the Swiss log-cabin. In Rudofsky’s (1987) famous words, vernacular architecture is ‘architecture without architects’. Typically the individual or group behind its construction is guided by local considerations and needs rather than style or fashion, ‘a series of conventions built up in (their) locality […] The function would be the dominant factor, aesthetic considerations, though present to some small degree, being quite minimal. Local materials would be used as a matter of course’ (Brunskill 2000: 27-8). This characterisation is readily applicable to the djiu, which comprises construction materials drawn from the immediate taiga-environment. Indeed, the environment in which the Ewenki reside features an abundance of larch and birch trees, both of which serve as the wooden poles for the tent, strips for the lashings, as well as the outer-covering of the dwelling. At the same time, the djiu is designed to satisfy the traditional needs and subsistence of the mobile Ewenki, with the dwelling being easily transported and erected, specifically ensuring mobility between hunting-grounds. As Brunskill points out, ‘All forms of vernacular architecture are built to meet specific needs, accommodating the values, economies and ways of life of the cultures that produce them’ (2000: 28). In this regard, vernacular architecture can be seen as intrinsically influenced by the occupant’s way of life, with the activities and experiences going on around the dwelling influencing the specifics of dwelling-construction. For example, the size of the family unit and how space is shared within the dwelling both have an impact on the layout and size of vernacular architecture, something seen in the case of the djiu where there existed a clear relationship between the dwelling’s material features and the social structure of the Ewenki themselves. Indeed, here each tent would traditionally be divided according to age distinctions, with seating places distributed among unit members according to levels of seniority and status. The place directly opposite the entrance of the tent (Ewenki: malu), for example, would be reserved for honoured men only, the upper right-hand side for the chief of the unit and his wife, the upper left-hand side for seniors and children over a certain age, and the lower left-hand side for guests and outsiders (Shirokogoroff 1929). This spatial division served to visualise everyday social relations in the physical composition of the dwelling itself, including the specific forms of interaction between unit members such as the embodiment of respect shown towards elders. Here there are interesting parallels with Bourdieu’s description of the Berber house, including its underlying symbolic significance and domestic spatial arrangement. Indeed, consisting of a simple rectangular form, the Berber house is divided into two parts, a division that becomes the basis for an elaborate system of binary oppositions between male and female (Bourdieu 2003). Similarly in the case of the djiu the dwelling necessitated a gender division whereby women not associated with the unit would not be allowed to pass along the right-hand side of the dwelling at all, externalising normative assumptions of ‘male’ and ‘female’ specifically through the architecture of the tepee. This would be further extended to the positioning of multiple tents within a single encampment, with different dwellings placed alongside one another in a specific order of status. As Anderson (2006: 3) remarks: The circular space within the lodge was conceived as a sort of corridor, which wrapped around its hearth. During the day, the lodge mistress and other women would take up their places to the right (as one entered the lodge) while the master would sit at the very back at the place called the malu. Guests and children would occupy the left. At the night, a different arrangement would result with the lodge owners sleeping together to the left, the children and other relatives to the right. Belongings would be stored in various specific places in the lodge according to one’s status. There was a prohibition against ‘circling’ (or walking through the corridor). If a man entered the lodge, and having turned to the right, sat down, he would have to exit the lodge in the same direction. Here the vernacular characteristics of the djiu are evident, not only in their use of local materials, but in the relationship between the tent and the kinship networks that they contain. In this regard, both the dwelling’s internal structure and external placement can be seen as lived reflections of Ewenki society as a whole, serving to structure people’s everyday social relationships and inculcating normative modes of behaviour. Staying in a djiu in 2008 I myself remarked upon the tent’s resemblance to the ribs of an animal, with the vertical poles evoking the imagery of an animal carcass. This is something that was similarly noted by Vitebsky who remarks the image reflects an old Eveny The Eveny or Even are a people in Siberia and the Russian Far East. According to a 2002 census, they have a population of 19,071, living primarily in Magadan Oblast, Kamchatka, and northern parts of Sakha. The Eveny are closely related to the Ewenki, sharing similar origins in the Transbaikal region and are traditionally hunters and reindeer-herders. legend where ‘A reindeer rescues two little children from an evil spirit by turning its body into a living tent, with its ribs serving as the framework and its hide as a cover’ (2005: 90). In both a literal and symbolic sense, therefore, the djiu can be said to ‘contain’ the embodiment of Ewenki social life. Like other peoples of Northern Asia, many Ewenki do not construct a conceptual division between the sociality of human beings and that of spirits, animals, and non-human entities (Heyne 1999; Fraser 2010), embodying what is generally termed an animist ontology (Pedersen 2001). This too is reflected in the vernacular characteristics of the djiu, such as in the rule that the entrance of the tent must always face south, considered locally to be the source of good fortune The practice of setting up a tent with the entrance facing south also has practical implications, specifically as it provides more light inside the dwelling and avoids the cold northern wind. This practice is also shared by the Mongolians who always set up their yurts with the entrance facing south. . Here there is a lived-relationship with the agency attributed to aspects of ‘the environment’, with the experience of good and bad fortune manifested in the tent’s positioning. At the same time, there would traditionally be a specific order involved in the setting up of a djiu, an order specifically aimed at showing respect to the non-human agencies thought to reside in the chosen locale. Here the tent’s vernacular features are made visible in its physical positioning within the human and non-human environs, something similarly encapsulated in the placement of fire in the centre of the dwelling. Indeed, fire is perceived to be sacred by many North Asian indigenous peoples and is held in great awe amongst the community. As a result, whenever a fire is lit a person will first offer a portion of liquor into it as a gift, an act referred to locally as feeding the fire (Fraser 2010). Here fire is attributed a degree of personhood typically reserved for the human species, something explained to me by one of my informants; ‘Fire is very important in our lives. The fire-spirit is like an old woman called Gulum-ta. We make an offering to her by pouring alcohol into the fire, before a meal’. A number of rules and taboos also exist concerning the treatment of fire, such as that one should never thrust a sharp object into it which, it is believed, will cause harm to the fire-spirit. Accompanying this, fire is said to possess a degree of personhood by ‘speaking to people’, specifically through its cracking, hissing, and burning; ‘Fire can […] be perceived as a being that is able to communicate with humans […] if a person has troubles in hunting, sparks can be understood as the fire’s wish to comfort the hunter’s feelings’ (Brandisauskas 2007:103). Here the personhood attributed to fire is spatially marked in its positioning in the middle of the djiu, located directly beneath the opening of the tepee (and sky) and acting as a centre-piece around which people interact, eat, drink and communicate with the non-human domain. In this regard, Ewenki vernacular architecture can be seen as the material manifestation of, not only human social relations, but the interaction between the human and non-human as well. Vernacular architecture and indigenous ‘cultural decline’ At the time of their arrival in Chinese territory the Ewenki derived their livelihood from hunting, with reindeer used as pack-animals and for subsistence milking. With the founding of the Peoples Republic in 1949, the new Communist administration actively integrated the community into the emerging nation-state, transforming the hunting economy into a ‘hunting production brigade’ (lieye shengchangdui), specifically by acquiring a portion of the hunted pelts, furs and meat in exchange for production points, credits and, eventually, monetary payment. By the middle of the 1960s, the state also carried out an analysis of the community’s reindeer-antler and, recognising their viability for use in traditional Chinese medicine, reorganised the hunting economy into a collective enterprise modelled on the Soviet sovkhoz design. Here approximately one thousand1000 head of reindeer were collectivised, with the state providing the Ewenki with a salary in return for supplying the harvested antler on an annual basis Reindeer antlers grow throughout the year and are cut before any bone substance has formed. Consisting of high quantities of rantarine, said to increase the immune system and build masculine virility, it is highly prized in Asia. If antlers are not cut they will shed naturally but are less potent and hence diminish in value.. Despite such a transformation, the djiu continued to serve as an apt dwelling, facilitating the community’s ongoing hunting practices, as well as the recently collectivised reindeer-economy. Accompanying this was the construction of Aoluguya, a settlement specifically designed for the community and including wooden houses and an antler-processing factory. Here an increasing number of people began to distance themselves from the hunting and herding economies, some finding employment in the forest industry and government, something that created a division between those who prioritised the taiga-based lifeworld and those who found employment outside it, the latter happily accepting the modernised facilities of the new settlement. By the early 1980s, a new dwelling-type also emerged, specifically a ten-foot square ridge-tent that gradually came to replace the birch-bark and animal-hide tepees. These dwellings, which remain the most common tent used today, consist of sewn canvas-material hung on a rectangular frame of larch trunks. Able to house five to six people they feature a wood-burning stove in the centre, something which replaced the open-fire, connected to an iron chimney which disperses the smoke from the top of the dwelling. While in the djiu people slept on the floor circling the fire, the new tent also featured benches for sitting during the day and sleeping at night, adding to the dwelling an element of increased comfort and practicality. It is interesting to note that a similar transformation took place at this time amongst some Evenki and Eveny in Siberia, whose own tepee-dwellings were replaced by canvas-covered ridge-tents (Vitebsky 2005; Anderson 2006) It is interesting to consider the parallels between the reindeer-herding peoples of the Russian North and those in China, both of which have embodied a quasi-militarisation of the reindeer-herding lifeworld since collectivisation. This includes the use of canvas-tents, army-boots and clothing, all of which have become the ‘hallmarks’ of reindeer-herding in the contemporary era. . As Anderson remarks, ‘They were ‘acquired’ in some unspecified complex transaction from departing soldiers at the nearby, abandoned Soviet Army weapons testing range’ (2006:10). In the case of the Reindeer Ewenki in China, a comparable transaction took place between the herder-hunters and the local forestry industry, the latter having utilised ridge-tents for their work in the taiga and with the state making these available with the intention of increasing productivity. Here the adoption of ridge-tents can be seen as part of a broader shift across Northern Asia, something which relates to earlier debates concerning the vernacular architecture of the region. Indeed, the peoples of Northern Asia have provided much food for thought in the analysis of vernacular architecture, the majority of which has been framed in evolutionist terms. As Anderson remarks, ‘Roughly one hundred years of published work on Ewenki vernacular architecture dictated certain ideals of how designs and behaviours should be exhibited in a pure form’ (2006: 3-4). Indeed, drawing upon the writings of Shirokogoroff (1929;1935), Suslov (1936) and Turov (1975) have argued that changes in architecture reflect transformations in social structure, with increased complexity in built-structures seen as representative of cultural development. Here dwelling-types are positioned along a taken-for-granted scale of social evolution, something which continues to influence contemporary research of the region; ‘Rather than writing in the ethnographic present, researchers have tended to prefer the past perfective where documented behaviour in the past is seen to hold up a standard for the living today’ (Anderson 2006: 4) Pikunova’s (1999) recent Ewenki dictionary aptly illustrates this, where the structured distribution of space within a standing Ewenki dwelling is portrayed as a solemn cultural ideal (Anderson 2006).. The corollary of this is that as vernacular architecture undergoes change, new dwelling-types such as log-cabins or altered tent-structures are inevitably seen as cases of ‘cultural decline’, placed in opposition to an idealised ‘traditional’ architectural model from where all subsequent dwellings are thought to have originated. As Anderson remarks, ‘When presented with hybrid structural forms, for example conical lodges made of plastic sheeting, there is a great temptation to evaluate them as denigration of a cultural ideal rather than a clever adaptation of the same architectural intuition to new materials’ (ibid). I argue that this is precisely what occurred in the case of the Aoluguya Ewenki, where the state constructed a discourse surrounding ‘traditional’ Ewenki architecture, specifically by characterising the new ridge-tents as a non-traditional transformation. Indeed, as the ridge-tents had been provided to the Ewenki on the basis of modernisation they could not, from the perspective of the modern socialist state, be equated with ‘traditional culture’. In turn, the djiu came to be seen as the ‘true’ Ewenki dwelling while the ridge-tent exemplified their apparent ‘cultural decline’. This, as we shall come to see, is a division which continues to pervade contemporary attitudes and policy. The origins of this division can be traced to the construction of Aoluguya, where the state erected a museum alongside the settlement to ‘scientifically’ position the community along a scale of social and economic development. Here the museum featured a diorama-like display including a reproduction of a djiu, something which came to define the tent as the archetypal dwelling of the Ewenki lifeworld via its placement in an official ‘scientific’ setting. This is something that was explained to me by an anonymous government official; ‘The aim of the old Aoluguya and museum was to settle the community and present the Ewenki people’s real culture. It was important that the museum did not show the changes they were experiencing. The djiu is traditional and so it was featured’. Here the entire character of the settlement, including the museum and other quasi-museum decorations, demanded a specific ‘use’ of Ewenki architecture, specifically to actualise the state’s representation of ‘traditional culture’. In this way, the djiu came to defined as the ‘archetypal’ dwelling of the Reindeer Ewenki, a manipulation that can be seen as an early precursor to the ‘ethnic minority villages’ characteristic of contemporary China, where minority culture is compartementalised through the medium of, among other things, ‘traditional architecture’ (Gladney 2004). Contrary to this characterisation, I argue that the adoption of the ridge-tents in the early 1980s was a locally-mediated, vernacular transformation, something which suited people’s needs in relation to an emerging context of opportunity, changing relations with the state, and the availability of new and more practical materials. This is the case because, as Anderson remarks, ‘The vernacular architecture of hunters, as with any other people, responds to their ability to access certain materials’ (2006:4). Indeed, I argue that it is imperative to look at architectural change not from the perspective of an idealised form or state-sanctioned discourse on cultural denigration. Instead, in keeping with the phenomenological perspective outlined above, architecture should be approached as emerging from within the context of people’s everyday lives and practices, their ‘involved activity in the relational contexts of their practical engagement with their surroundings’ (Ingold 2000: 186). From animal hides to canvas: A vernacular transformation With collectivisation the Ewenki were, for the first time in their history, integrated within a system that prioritised output at the expense of subsistence. I argue that this, coupled with early attempts at sedentarisation, came to be manifested within Ewenki society itself, specifically transforming the community ‘from hunters to herders’ and inculcating a modernist production-ethos. Although the origins of this had already been laid in the formation of the ‘hunting production brigade’ (lieye shengchangdui), I show that it was the introduction of the antler-industry that signified the most notable attempt to bureaucratise the reindeer lifeworld, including the designation of quotas, targets, and deadlines that induced what Forsyth calls in the context of Siberia, ‘a comprehensive social revolution’ (1994: 296). As we have seen, the Ewenki were, prior to collectivisation, hunters who used their reindeer as pack animals, supplemented with subsistence milking. Becoming members of the collective, however, redefined them as ‘reindeer herders’ (yangluren); individuals employed by the state on the agreement that they supply the antler crop to the state company. Although they continued to engage in subsistence and collectivised hunting until 2003, government statistics show that the economic importance of hunting began to decline at the time of collectivisation, eventually leading to the antler-industry taking precedence. Of course, such a transition can never be ‘pin-pointed’ to an exact degree, but rather, as I show below, emerged gradually over an extended period of time. Firstly, as the Ewenki came to be integrated within a system that instituted ‘points’ for credits combined with ration cards, an incentive developed amongst the herder-hunters to maintain a more stable and predictable level of output, something which could be more easily achieved through reindeer-herding as it was annually orientated rather than seasonal and not dependent on the availability of game. Another factor was the introduction of hitherto unknown time-scales within the reindeer-economy. Indeed, having to crop and deliver the antler during the Spring season meant that the herders had to adjust their movements in accordance, something which affected the positioning of taiga encampments and altered the practice of hunting. In the process, the hunters became herders within the new structure of collectivised ‘employment’, something reflected in the community’s decision to increase the size of their herds to match the demands of the new antler-industry (Nentwig 2003). Such a transformation was similarly noted in the context of the Siberian Evenki, who themselves went ‘from hunters to herders’ in the middle of the twentieth century; ‘In 1927, 92.7% of all far eastern (Evenki) economic units were orientated towards hunting and trapping. After collectivization […] the average proportion of hunting and trapping income dropped to 24.2%, while the proportion of income derived from reindeer breeding rose to 39%’ (Anderson 1991: 15). A corollary factor behind this change was the construction of Aoluguya where, despite some in the community avoiding the settlement and spending most of their time in the taiga, its mere presence necessitated consequences for the entire Ewenki population. Indeed, with its construction increasing numbers of people began to identify with a ‘settled way of life’, particularly those who had sought employment outside the reindeer-economy and were drawn to the modernity offered through housing and electricity. This inevitably affected the self-perception of the herder-hunters themselves, inculcating their production-orientated ‘work’ via their integration into the salaried antler-economy. Here increasing numbers of herder-hunters began to divide more of their time between the forest and the settlement, the latter coming to be included as a feature of the Ewenki lifeworld. At the same time, it indirectly connected the herders to the broader national economy, specifically via the availability of consumer goods and foodstuffs. It must be remembered that already at the time of their arrival in Chinese territory the Ewenki engaged in trade and barter (Heyne 2002); having traded with the Cossacks living along the Argun River and, following the establishment of the People’s Republic, in the town of Cigan (Nentwig 2003), Aoluguya served as the next logical site for the acquisition of needed goods, including ammunition, salt, food, and alcohol. Here inevitable linkages were forged between the taiga and village lifeworlds, a physical and conceptual relationship that was mediated by the state and integrated the community into the production-orientated structure of the collective economy. Of course, this is not to suggest the uniform replacement of ‘traditional life’ with that of collectivised modernity. On the contrary, traditional practices and attitudes continued to be embodied in relation to the various efforts at ‘modernisation’, much as they do in the contemporary era. At the same time, however, such practices became increasingly intertwined with the policies of the socialist state, something similarly noted in the context of Siberia. As Ssorin-Chaikov remarks, for example, the state came to be embodied, not as an agent of overarching authority, but in everyday behaviour and practice; ‘What appears as a visible centre of power, hides, in fact, an opposite move: that the power operates not between this visible centre and the overseen subjects but as a relation inside the subjects…statehood operates by vanishing as an entity in the ‘microphysics’ of power’ (2003: 116). Similarly in the Chinese context, although some in the community continued to hunt and herd reindeer as they had done in the past, reproducing the practical skills and knowledge demanded from a taiga-based lifeworld, transformations inevitably occurred at the level of practice and self-identification, with the herders not only identifying themselves as ‘reindeer-herders’ but with the modernist ideology of ‘production’ itself. In the language of practice-theory, the Ewenki can be said to have come to identify with the illusio (Bourdieu 1972) of modernity and production rather than solely subsistence. I argue that it is out of this complex series of entanglements that the adoption of the ridge-tents must be elucidated. Indeed, in keeping with Ingold’s phenomenological approach to architecture, as well as Anderson’s comments on architectural change, I argue that the adoption of ridge-tents was a vernacular modification, something which ‘made sense’ within the context of collectivised reindeer-husbandry, the shift from hunting to herding, the rise of a production ethos, and the availability of new and more practical materials. Here it is useful to delineate three specific points for consideration. Firstly, the ridge-tents could be adopted because by this time the taiga had begun to feature an increasing number of logging-roads, specifically for the burgeoning forestry-industry, alongside which the herders could set up their dwellings. Being in close proximity to these ensured access to the government-supplied vehicle, which not only provided supplies and support but assisted the herders with their movements in the taiga. Having already begun making the transition from hunting to herding the herders could thus afford to use the ridge-tents as they themselves had reduced their mobility and could now rely on state-supplied transportation. As we have seen, the ridge-tents allowed for benches to be used for sitting and sleeping, something that would have been impossible in the djiu where the dwelling had to remain light-weight and erected at short notice. This served the growing number of herders who had become accustomed to increased levels of comfort via their visits to the settlement The transformation from sleeping on the floor to raised ‘beds’ has important implications with regards to changes in bodily experience which cannot be dealt with here. However, this correlates with a series of other transforming ‘techniques of the body’ such as the experience of electricity.. The combination of the tents becoming available, the increasing presence of logging roads, the corollary supply of transportation, and the increased levels of comfort provided through the dwellings, thus meant that the ridge-tents became a suitable option from the perspective of the herders, a vernacular response to a series of interrelated transformations. Secondly, the adoption of the ridge-tents ‘made sense’ as they no longer required animal hides to act as a covering, specifically as the hides had now acquired a value as something that could be sold. Here the availability of new materials, including canvas for tents and multi-purpose plastic-sheeting, served as suitable replacements for both tree-bark and hides, being light-weight, low-cost, water-proof, and reparable. As Anderson remarks, ‘Plastic sheeting is highly valued since it is extremely light and can also be used to cover saddlebags at night…The lesson…seems to be that architectural strategies are applied to materials that are on hand and that match local needs’ (2006: 17). As we shall come to see, this continues to be the case with regards to the contemporary reindeer-herders, who emphasise the importance of plastic-sheeting and regularly acquire it when visiting the settlement, specifically as it remains the ideal material to cover their tents and supplies. The third and perhaps most important factor was that the ridge-tents allowed for wood-burning stoves to be used instead of open-fires. Indeed, this was the most common reason told to me by the contemporary herders for the switch to ridge-tents, something which allowed the new dwellings to remain considerably warmer during the long winter months. Here the vernacular characteristics of the ridge-tents correlate with people’s own (shifting) physical and existential requirements, a change which suited local needs and made practical sense within the social and economic circumstances in which the herders found themselves. In this regard, while the djiu served as an apt dwelling for subsistence hunting prior to collectivisation, the ridge-tents were a suitable choice for collectivised reindeer-herding, a vernacular response to a new context of livelihood and production. As Anderson remarks, ‘transformations in the social and economic situation have allowed Evenki and other Siberian peoples the luxury of creating multiple living and working spaces of a transitory nature which, although ‘non-traditional’, nevertheless bear a signature of taiga life’ (2006:2). In a similar vein, I argue that collectivisation had allowed the Reindeer Ewenki in China the opportunity to develop new kinds of flexibility and luxury, with the ridge-tents suiting local needs, being in accordance with the antler industry of the contemporary era, and facilitated by new and more practical materials. As in any case of social change, however, there emerged contradictions with the adoption of the ridge-tents. For example, the wood-burning stoves are extremely heavy and require motorised transportation between encampments. This reduces the mobility of the herders which, in turn, limits the scale and frequency of their movements, something which has detrimental effects on the grazing of reindeer, as well as making people more dependent on the state. In this regard, although the adoption of the ridge-tents must be seen as a vernacular transformation, this does not preclude the far-reaching consequences this has upon the livelihoods of the herders, something which, as we shall now see, has had important implications with regards to the 2003 relocation. Vernacular architecture and forced relocation In 2003 the state began its relocation of the Ewenki, constructing a purpose-built settlement on the outskirts of Genhe City where the community was offered housing as compensation for relocating and accepting the newly implemented hunting ban. At the national level, the relocation was characterised as a necessary step in the environmental protection of Inner Mongolia, defined as an ‘environmental resettlement’ (shengtai yimin). This can be seen in the words of Wun Nanlan, former mayor of Genhe Municipality, who notes in regards to the subsistence practices of the Ewenki; ‘Their living methods resulted in a sharp decline of wild animals and environment degradation. Mushrooms and bryophyte on which reindeer feed have almost disappeared in the area due to overgrazing. It will take at least 25 years to grow back to its original state’ (China Daily 2003). It is important to note that some in the community had agreed to relocate, specifically those who had been separated from the reindeer economy at an earlier stage and who have, on the whole, adapted well in the new settlement. Others, however, opposed the decision, such as former hunters who are now unemployed and dependent on government payments, as well as the family members of the current herders who do not reside in the forest campsites, typically because they have children in regional schools. It is these latter individuals who have been most affected by the relocation, seeking to maintain ties with the taiga-based lifeworld but finding themselves disengaged from the herding economy and dissolution of subsistence-hunting. The new settlement includes forty wooden houses, an antler processing factory, a cultural museum, a hotel, and a number of Ewenki-inspired constructions from where traditional handicrafts are manufactured and sold. Each of the houses is divided into two halves, one for each family. There are two bedrooms in each half, as well as a kitchen, bathroom, and living room, with electricity and water freely provided. With the assistance of a Finnish consultancy firm, the intention has been to transform the settlement into the ‘Aoluguya Ethnic Reindeer Resort’, a residential-cum-tourism centre providing housing to the relocated while simultaneously creating opportunities for tourism-related employment. Architecture has played a fundamental role in the planning and construction of the settlement, with both the state and consultancy-firm using reindeer-culture inspired designs to assist in the ‘preservation of Ewenki culture’. This includes reproductions of djiu and djiu-inspired buildings positioned within the settlement, as well as Finnish designs for the houses themselves. Here tourists are encouraged to stay in the settlement’s hotel, which itself features comparable stylistic elements, in order to experience the cultural uniqueness of the ‘reindeer-tribe’, the settlement being akin to the model-villages found throughout contemporary China where ‘traditional culture’ is equated with tourism presentation (Gladney 2004). Across the street from the main settlement is the so-called ‘forest-exhibit’, an outdoor display akin to the former Aoluguya depicting the reindeer-herding lifestyle, featuring a djiu reproduction and including a dozen reindeer grazing on a fenced patch of forest. As part of the tourism performance, former reindeer-herders and hunters dress in traditional clothing and demonstrate ‘how they used to live’, sitting with tourists in the reconstructed dwellings and presenting activities such as crafting birch-bark storage containers, telling stories, and baking traditional bread (Fraser 2010). Most notable is the way in which the state (and consultancy firm) has maintained the discourse surrounding ‘traditional’ Ewenki architecture, with the new settlement featuring djiu reproductions at the total expense of the ridge-tents. This is reproduced in the new state-of-the-art museum where a djiu has been erected as part of the display, once again characterising it as the ‘true’ Ewenki dwelling. As was the case in the old Aoluguya, the state here purposefully uses Ewenki architecture for its own ideological and conceptual purposes, failing to associate the ridge-tent as a (new) feature of the Ewenki lifeworld, despite it being the primary dwelling of the reindeer-herders for the past twenty-five years. Here there exists a contradiction, however, because while the ridge-tent was a vernacular response to the social and economic context of collectivisation, the state has imposed a non-vernacular transformation in the form of the djiu reproductions and broader design of the settlement, appropriating the style and symbolism of Ewenki architecture in its politicised representation of ‘traditional culture’. This is comparable to Evans and Humphrey’s (2002) discussion of architectural afterlives in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. Indeed, here they argue that while in Mongolia itself the yurt has a vernacular afterlife in providing non-pastoral residence for urban-dwellers on the outskirts of Ulaanbaatar, in Inner Mongolia, where the use of the yurt is diminishing, a non-vernacular transformation has occurred, with the structure and style of the dwelling inspiring the architecture of museums, restaurants, and tourist-camps. This, Evans and Humphrey propose, is not the result of a vernacular transformation, specifically because it is an imposed design, with the yurt being appropriated and replicated in the politicised Mongolisation of the Chinese architectural landscape: The Chinese-built yurt is very different from the contemporary urban yurts of Ulaanbaatar. These are lived-in dwellings, and often consist simply of the standard pastoral yurt placed in a city compound. The Mongol urban yurt […] may thus evolve through an unbroken practical vernacular architecture into a number of hybrids between the mobile dwelling and the house. This is in contrast to the Inner Mongolian case, where the Chinese ‘yurts’ are a reintroduction as it were, of a building form that is ideologically held to belong to the past (even though there are regions of Inner Mongolia where yurts are still used). Our article suggests that the processes of substitution, quotation, and estrangement of ‘yurts’ that are taking place in the Chinese environment are quite different from the vernacular evolution of yurts in the towns of Mongolia itself (2002: 204). In a similar vein, I argue that the reproductions featured in the ‘Aoluguya Ethnic Reindeer Resort' are themselves non-vernacular appropriations; indeed, the djiu featured are static dwellings permanently fixed into the ground and not conducive to a hunting and herding lifeworld. At the same time, they feature added stylistic modifications such as furniture, seating-places, and electricity, all of which have emerged not from the practice of reindeer-herding but with the intention of allowing tourists to ‘feel comfortable’ while they experience ‘traditional’ Ewenki culture. In this regard, the djiu reproductions can be seen as re-introduced versions of an idealised ‘original’ tent, erected for ideological purposes and disregarding vernacular considerations. As Ingold remarks, compared with the substantial buildings of the village settlement ‘most of life, for hunter-gatherers, goes on around dwellings rather than within them’ (2000: 180). Such a comment aptly characterises the specificity of a hunter-gatherer ontology, something which calls to attention the divergence between building and dwelling as modes of being-in-the-world. Indeed, while building captures a Cartesian ontology, epitomised by the notion that ‘worlds are made before they are lived in’ (ibid:179), dwelling refers to direct perceptual engagement, where ‘acts of dwelling preced(e) acts of worldmaking’ (ibid). In this regard, the hunter-gatherer mode of apprehending the world is one of engagement and practical immersion, ‘not of building but of dwelling, not of making a view of the world but of taking a view in it’ (Ingold 1991: 121). Such a distinction is readily applicable to the Ewenki and the Chinese state, as well as the divergence between vernacular and non-vernacular architecture. Indeed, while, as we have seen, the ridge-tent is radically different from the ‘original’ djiu, it remains a lived-in dwelling, one that has evolved along an unbroken line of practical vernacular architecture. By contrast, the reproductions featured in the ‘Aoluguya Ethnic Reindeer Resort’ have been erected according to a building ontology, featured as a substitution for the vernacular dwelling and serving a purpose beyond use and functional design. In a remark epitomising this latter perspective, Rapoport writes, ‘the organisation of space cognitively precedes its material expression; settings and built environments are thought before they are built’ (1994: 488). In a similar vein, the Chinese state can be said to have cognised the organisation and use of (Ewenki) architecture before its material expression, something in direct contrast to the vernacular ridge-tents which have emerged from within the ongoing dwelling of the herders themselves. As I shall now show, the state’s failure to recognise the ridge-tent as vernacular architecture is problematic because, while tourists are entertained in the appropriated dwellings of the new settlement, the ridge-tents continue to serve as vernacular architecture for the contemporary reindeer-herders. This has important implications with regards to the future of the community, specifically in maintaining a flexible reindeer-economy and serving as a symbol of contemporary Ewenki identity. Vernacular architecture and the contemporary reindeer lifeworld There are 30-40 Ewenki living and working in the Daxing’anling taiga, herding reindeer from six campsites and harvesting antler on an annual basis. This number fluctuates according to the seasons as well as personal preference, with many spending all of their time in the forest and rarely visiting the settlement, while others visit periodically, primarily to purchase supplies, deliver the harvested antler, and visit family and friends (Fraser 2010). Together the herders own seven to eight hundred head of reindeer and reside in a combination of ridge-tents and a small number of djiu. There are between two and six dwellings in a single encampment, with the djiu found in only two of these. As noted above, the relocation and construction of the new settlement was accompanied by a hunting-ban, leaving the antler-industry the last remaining feature of the reindeer lifeworld. In accordance with this, the ridge-tents continue to serve as vernacular dwellings, with all of the herders I spoke with emphasising their ongoing satisfaction with the tents, remaining a low-cost, reparable, and practical option. At the same time, the ridge-tents are viewed not as an unchangeable dwelling but as one that responds to new circumstances and contexts by featuring new architectural innovations, something which demonstrates their ongoing vernacular characteristics. For example, the herders have developed a new practice of leaving the birch-bark frames that support the tents standing once an encampment is moved. Thus, travelling through the taiga one comes across the empty ‘shell’ of an encampment, with the herders simply removing and transporting the canvas-material to the next site. Here the herders have a number of favourite locations to which they return at different times during the year, taking advantage of their dependence on the state with regards to the use of motorised vehicles, as well as their exceptional status as the only people legally entitled to reside in the taiga. As a result, the herders are able to leave the frames standing when moving between camps, a vernacular response to the increasingly sedentarised reindeer-herding of the contemporary era. Another example is the emergence of a new dwelling-type, specifically a larger-size canvas-tent featuring an increased number of sleeping positions and with no fire-stove in the centre. Elucidated within the context of the contemporary reindeer-economy this ‘non-traditional’ transformation once again makes practical sense and demonstrates the ongoing flexibility of vernacular architecture. Indeed, with the Ewenki having to rely on antler-cropping as their primary source of income, and, having experienced a general decline in the number of permanent herders, the need for seasonal workers has increased. As a result, the new tent is found only in those campsites which feature large numbers of reindeer where there is a demand for additional workers, typically Ewenki men living permanently in Aoluguya or Han-Chinese from nearby villages. The absence of a fire-stove is a result of the tent being used only during the busy Spring season when antler-cropping gets underway and there is less need for additional warmth. The combination of these factors induces a vernacular response on the part of the herders, acquiring what I called the ‘workers-tent’ Other examples of this include the setting up of yurts by Mongolian pastoralists in Inner Mongolia alongside their brick homes. These are often used for storage during winter and autumn when it is more practical to reside in the (warmer) brick house. In spring and summer, however, the yurts are brought out to the pasture and serve as lived-in dwellings.. As Anderson puts it in a remark directly comparable to this example, the most important conclusion is that ‘the presence of ad-hoc or hybrid structures does not imply the collapse of architectural intuition. Instead it shows a clever marshalling of skill to make the best use of the resources churned up in post-Soviet conditions’ (2006: 24). Another transformation is the practice of using the djiu as a cooking tent rather than for sleeping. Indeed, I found that in the larger campsites which feature these tents they were primarily used for the purpose of baking a traditional bread, featuring a brick stove constructed in the centre of the dwelling. The Ewenki bake a yeast-free bread on an iron plate. This is continued in the campsites whilst simultaneously being appropriated in the ‘Aoluguya Ethnic Reindeer Resort’. It is an apt example of the kind of skills maintained by the herders which are gradually being presented in a tourism setting. Here the djiu would typically be erected directly beside a ridge-tent, with the individual performing the baking using the former for cooking while sleeping in the latter. It is interesting to note, however, that in winter, when reindeer are left to graze deeper in the mountains and are accompanied by a small number of men, the djiu is again used in its mobile form, namely, as an easily transportable sleeping tent. This exemplifies the persistence of vernacular architectural intuition amongst the contemporary herders, as well as the relationship to dwelling within a (changing) environment. Here the herders use different dwellings depending on the context, such as in the adoption of the ridge-tent, as well as the same dwelling for different purposes depending on the season, such as in the case of the djiu. In this regard, the relevance of a phenomenological approach to architecture is brought to the fore, deconstructing the division between ‘traditional’ and ‘non-traditional’ and viewing instead the practical articulation of people’s dwelling-in-the-world via, among other things, vernacular architecture. Another example concerns the cosmological features of the Ewenki lifeworld which, as noted previously, formerly manifested itself in the community’s architecture, something which continues to be the case today but in more variable ways. For example, the entrance of each ridge-tent continues to face south when erected, reproducing the assumption that the southerly-direction is the source of good fortune. At the same time, offerings and libations continue to be made to the fire-spirit within the tent, with the herders regularly communicating with the fire-spirit of their dwelling. As the open fire has now been replaced with an iron stove, however, the offering of liquor is now made by throwing the alcohol directly onto the stove itself, rather than ‘into’ the fire. This, I was told, is just as effective with regards to making the offering, with the fire-spirit perceived to ‘take’ the offering through the surface of the iron stove. A final example concerns the relationship between the ridge-tents and the social composition of the herders. Indeed, as we have seen, there existed a spatialisation of age and gender divisions within the djiu, something that is less visible today where men and women, young and old, share multiple living and working spaces. Despite this, however, certain divisions continue to remain visible; for example, in all of the new dwellings I stayed the older generation herders were granted the sitting and sleeping positions at the far end of the tent, directly opposite the entrance. Here this ‘division’ would not be accompanied by the strict codes of conduct described in the classical literature, with young people occasionally sitting in the place of their seniors and vice-versa. At the same time, however, it continued to manifest itself as a normative mode of behaviour, with a young herder instinctively moving out of the senior’s place if, and when, the latter re-entered the dwelling or made it apparent that s/he wished to occupy the space. This instinctive showing of respect is itself part of a broader system of embodiment that includes a series of gestures and postures expressing ‘proper’ relations between young and old. The most common example is when two people make a toast and the younger individual instinctively uses his/her left-hand to support his/her right elbow. Here the embodiment of seating-places is but one example of this system, something that has been reproduced in the ridge-tents despite the fact that they are a different shape to the djiu. Indeed, as suggested above, it is interesting to note the rearticulation of the malu as the most respected part of the dwelling, remapping its position onto the structure of the new tent. Here I am not suggesting, however, that the ridge-tents somehow reproduce an intrinsically ‘traditional’ relationship between the generations, but rather, that it is through the embodiment of social space within the new dwellings that norms and attitudes concerning status are (partly) rearticulated. Indeed, the adherence to certain norms (such as those reflected in bodily behaviour) are themselves caught up in the representation of 'ideals' and ‘tradition’, much of which remains unconscious and taken-for-granted. For example, on numerous occasions I myself was ‘taught’ the ‘proper’ way of doing things, such as how to hold a glass when making a toast with an elder. This purposeful rearticulation of ‘tradition’ was further mediated through vernacular architecture, with people explicitly articulating what they perceived to be idealised modes of behaviour in relation to their dwellings. For example, I was seated at the time of my arrival at the far-end of the tent directly beside the host, in turn marking my position as a guest. When the time came for sleeping, however, I was not granted a position at the far-end but in the lower left-hand side of the dwelling, something justified because ‘that was the ‘guest’ position of the djiu’. Here there is an ongoing relationship between the embodiment of shared norms and values and the new ridge-tents, the latter providing the physical context behind the rearticulation of ‘tradition’ on the part of the herders. The revitalization of age and gender divisions is something that has similarly been noted by Anderson in the context of the Siberian Evenki, where post-socialism appears to have loosened the formalised divisions within people’s vernacular architecture; ‘At first glance, the interior space of the summer tents were used in a disappointingly unstructured manner – a far cry form the stereotypes prescribed in the literature’ (2006: 12). At the same time, however, Anderson shows that this does not mean that age and gender no longer influence vernacular architecture, as well as the practice of reindeer herding: After repeated residence one quality of the residential architecture began to stand out. If, in the relatively deep Soviet past, members of one family, or even brigade, were confined to one tent, today the people in a hunting and herding unit were dispersed across many tents. This elaboration […] was often linked to how people ‘obtained’ coverings, be they canvas, bark, or reindeer-skin, for long-terms structures, or the use of plastic sheeting […] Correspondingly, gendered and status activity that would have been structured under the roof of one tent […] has now been broken up into different spaces – but it is nevertheless structured. (Anderson 2006: 12) In this regard, while postsocialism can be said to have relaxed the divisions within individual tents, new divisions have been (re)embedded across multiple tents, something similarly seen in the case of the Reindeer Ewenki in China. Indeed, new divisions have emerged since relocation between different encampments, specifically manifested in vernacular architecture and people’s ability to acquire new materials. For example, of the six campsites currently operating three are located at a distance closer to Aoluguya, while the remainder are in the same area as prior to relocation. As a result, the closer one travels to Aoluguya the more ‘modern’ the campsite is said to become, with one encampment featuring solar panels as part of its vernacular architecture, while those situated furthest away rely on more ‘traditional’ architecture such as the djiu. This division has become part of people’s own characterisation of the reindeer-herding community, including that of the local government. Speaking with members of the regional administration, for example, I was told that Camps 1 and 2 (those furthest from Aoluguya) are the most ‘traditional’, specifically because, in the words of one official, ‘they continue to use traditional tents’. This is also visible in the regional government taking foreign tourists or researchers interested in the reindeer-herding Ewenki to the campsites situated furthest away from Genhe, specifically as they are perceived to be ‘more traditional’. Although the campsites closer to the settlement are also part of this presentation, the division between encampments is regularly made. Of course, this division has little to do with ‘tradition’ and ‘modernity’ but the fact that the herders closest to the settlement move more frequently between the forest and Aoluguya, being able to develop more flexible strategies with regards to architectural innovation and the acquisition of new materials. Vernacular architecture and the future of the Reindeer Ewenki The fact that new divisions have become visible between different encampments through vernacular architecture alludes specifically to the viability of the dwelling-perspective outlined above. Indeed, unlike normative definitions, a phenomenological approach to architecture includes the totality of sites people engage with, regardless of whether they are local, foreign, permanent, or temporary. In a remark directly related to this perspective, Anderson notes; ‘When one looks at standing buildings not as unitary structures, but as the result of building action, it becomes difficult to distinguish a ‘camp’ as an entity in itself’ (2006: 13, my emphasis). In this regard, I argue that Ewenki vernacular architecture should not be equated solely with the ‘fixed locations’ of the tent or campsite, but must include the storage sites, plastic sheeting, solar panels, rivers, roads, and even urban-settlements associated with the practice of reindeer-herding, with everyday life ‘going well beyond the walls of a conical tent and the hearth at its centre’ (Anderson 2006: 2). From this perspective, the ‘built-environment’ of the Ewenki is extended outwards into the landscape itself. This has important implications with regards to assessing the future of the Reindeer Ewenki, specifically as reindeer-herding has become ever more integrated with life in the settlement, particularly since the recent relocation. Indeed, I argue that the settlement and newly constructed houses should be seen as part and parcel of Ewenki vernacular architecture, something which demands a revised conceptualisation such as that outlined above. Here it is imperative to coalesce the ridge-tents and new houses as multiple sites of opportunity for the practice of reindeer-herding, regardless of the divisions between the ‘traditional’ and the ‘modern’, the ‘authentic’ and the ‘inauthentic’. In this way, ‘the focus is shifted from the walls and hearth of the tent to the ways in which the Ewenki themselves ‘order’ the world around them, maximising flexibility in relation to various kind of architecture (Anderson 2006: 2)’. The relevance of this perspective can be seen in the family members of the herders integrated within the taiga-based lifeworld but residing permanently in the settlement, as well as the numerous herders who divide their time travelling between the taiga and Aoluguya. Indeed, here a phenomenological approach allows us to see new uses of vernacular architecture emerging, such as the individuals who have set up shops selling reindeer-antler from their houses (Fraser 2010), as well as those who have set up websites from their houses facilitating delivery of the antler-product, capitalising upon the increased access to technology in the settlement. Here people can be seen as flexibly ‘making use’ of the architectural affordances provided by the settlement, incorporating their houses into the reindeer herding enterprise, much in the same fashion as was previously achieved with a birch tree, ridge-tent, or logging road. In this way, the new houses of Aoluguya are experienced not in opposition to the ridge-tents, but as another site of opportunity, not as ‘inauthentic’ dwellings but as part of contemporary vernacular architecture. Perhaps the most important factor in this regard is the role of kinship in facilitating the inclusion of multiple architectural forms. Indeed, although people complained that the relocation created increased distance between the settlement and the taiga, kinship has provided the primary means through which to overcome this. For example, on one occasion I travelled with a group of herders from one of the campsites to the settlement, driving for four hours. Upon arrival, one met his brother at his newly constructed house and delivered the recently harvested antler, another visited his wife and son who reside permanently in the settlement where he ‘rested’ and acquired supplies. A third herder ‘went home’ after having spent four months in the taiga, replaced with a ‘new’ herder (his brother) who travelled back to the campsite. Here the relationship between vernacular architecture and kinship allows the herders to arrange strategies in accordance with the availability of state-supplied transportation, complementing the architecture of their ridge-tents with that of their new dwellings. This is the case even with regard to those herders who spend the majority of their time in the campsites, taking advantage of the new architecture to ‘rest’, ‘store supplies’, or ‘house their families’. As Anderson notes, ‘We must not assume that all hunting societies at all times will necessarily use a single roof in such a structured way’ (2006: 13). Indeed, as can be seen in the case of the Aoluguya Ewenki, vernacular architecture can include tents and houses, with divisions between the settlement and taiga mediated by strategies that cut across the divide. This ability to use different kinds of architecture is comparable to urban Evenki households in Siberia, where people extend their residence across multiple dwelling-types over the course of different seasons. As Anderson writes, ‘Instead of seeing built structures as confining families to single rooms, separate rooms or rigidly stratified spaces, we can reinterpret this as a testimony to how built structures, and their spaces, express the vibrancy and solidarity of kinship’ (2006:24). In this regard, despite an increasing number of herders dividing their time between the settlement and the taiga, this is not to suggest a uniform pattern of sedentarisation. On the contrary, new architecture facilitates the reindeer-lifeworld alongside sedentarisation, enabling herders to move from one location to another depending on the season, the number of people currently in the campsites, as well as personal preference. This was made visible when, during one of my stays in the campsites, an Ewenki youth arrived to spend the summer in the taiga after having completed his school exams. Now, he explained, was his time to ‘live in the forest’ and ‘be a reindeer-herder’, at least until the end of the summer when he would return to the settlement. Of course, despite such cases of flexibility, it would be misleading to present the situation in overly simplistic terms. While some develop strategies that cut across the divide, for others the taiga-settlement division remains problematic. As noted, there are those who almost never visit the settlement and stay in the campsites for over three hundred days a year. These individuals dislike the new Aoluguya and what they perceive to be its radical divergence from life in the forest (Fraser 2010), something that was brought to the fore when I travelled with two herders from one of the campsites back to the settlement. Embodying their unease with the prospect of travelling to Aoluguya the two individuals drank heavily throughout the duration of the trip, arriving at ‘their’ houses disorientated and physically uncomfortable. After collecting supplies they quickly rushed back to the vehicle and immediately returned to the campsites. Later that evening they explained the reason for their unease, telling me that they simply do not feel comfortable in the settlement; ‘Life is hard in the forest but it is better than the settlement. There is nothing to do there. There are no animals, no reindeer. I can never visit for too long. I cannot live in a place like that’. Here we see that although some in the community are able to ‘use’ the settlement to their advantage, creating new kinds of vernacular architecture, this is not the case for all individuals. Indeed, for some herders what matters most is not the newly-constructed dwellings or layout of the settlement but the existential security provided by living in the taiga. As I have noted elsewhere (Fraser 2010), the lifeworld of the reindeer-herding Ewenki necessitates a specific ontology of human and nonhuman personhood that is grounded in the ongoing relationship between the community and their lived-environment. Here ecological relations are intertwined with those of human sociality, with the environment experienced not ‘out there’ but ‘ready-to-hand’ (Heidegger 1962). For many this is in direct contrast to the new Aoluguya where the lack of person-based networks results in the de-personalisation of the settlement, capturing the divergence of life between the taiga and the settlement. Here ‘getting used to’ life in Aoluguya is an ongoing process of embodiment and skill, an ability to incorporate new architectural features into one’s everyday lived-experience. In this regard, while vernacular architecture has, for some, come to include multiple dwelling-types such as tents and houses, for others it refers only to taiga-based residence, a variation that has important implications with regards to the state’s intention to ‘preserve traditional culture’ amongst the community, as well as the viability of contemporary reindeer-herding. Conclusion In this chapter I have provided an account of vernacular architecture among the Aoluguya Reindeer Ewenki. I have argued that, contrary to the division promulgated by the state, the vernacular features of Ewenki architecture continue to be evident in the ridge-tents, both at the time of collectivisation and in the contemporary era. Here the herders do not construct a division between ‘traditional’ and ‘non-traditional’ architecture. Instead, transformations are experienced from within the exigencies of the reindeer-herding lifeworld, making changes to their architecture when they see fit and acquiring new materials if, and when, they become available. In this regard, the ridge-tents and new houses should not be seen as a non-vernacular transformation, but rather, as one dimension of contemporary Ewenki architecture. The history of the Reindeer Ewenki in China demonstrates that reindeer herding demands a fixed centre through which the reindeer-lifeworld can be facilitated. At the same time, the relocation and construction of the settlement has created a series of new constraints. As a result, it is imperative that the ‘Aoluguya Ethnic Reindeer Resort’ be seen as only one dimension of the contemporary Ewenki lifeworld, something that exists alongside, rather than instead, of taiga-based residence. Here a consideration of vernacular architecture might serve to demonstrate how herders can live both in the settlement and the taiga simultaneously, something which demands a revised conceptualisation of architecture such as that outlined above. This suggests the importance of the regional government in providing support for the maintenance of the ridge-tents, ensuring flexible strategies such as more regular transportation between the taiga and settlement, as well as recognising the specific demands of those individuals who are less accustomed to life outside the taiga. References Anderson, David. 1991. “Turning Hunters into Herders: A Critical Examination of Soviet Development Policy among the Evenki of Southeastern Siberia.” Arctic. Vol. 44, No. 1: 12-22. - 2006. “Dwellings, Storage and Summer Site Structure among Siberian Orochen Evenkis: Hunter-Gatherer Vernacular Architecture under Post-Socialist Conditions.” Norwegian Archaeological Review. Vol. 39. No.1 Brandisauskas, Donatus. 2007. “Symbolism and Ecological Uses of Fire Among Orochen-Evenki.” Sibirica. Issue. 1. Vol. 6: 95-119. Brunskill, Ronald. 2000. Illustrated Handbook of Vernacular Architecture (4th ed.). London: Faber and Faber China Daily 2003. Reindeer-Evenki on the Move. 1 May 2003. Ermolova, Nadezhda. 2003. “Evenki Reindeer-Herding: A History”. Cultural Survival Quarterly. 27. No. 1 Evans, Christopher and Humphrey, Caroline 2002. “The Afterlives of the Mongolian Yurt: The ‘Archaeology’ of a Chinese Tourist camp’”, Material Culture, 2 (2). Forsyth, James. 1994. A History of the Peoples of Siberia: Russia’s North Asian Colony 1581-1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fraser, Richard. 2010. “Forced Relocation Amongst the Reindeer-Evenki of Inner Mongolia.” Inner Asia. Gladney, Dru. 2004. Dislocating China: Muslims, Minorities, and Other Subaltern Subjects. London: Hurst and Co. Harrell, Stevan. 1994. Cultural Encounters on China’s Ethnic Frontiers. University of Washington Press. Heyne, Franz-Georg. 1999 “The Social Significance of the Shaman Amongst the Chinese Reindeer-Evenki.” Asian Folklore Studies. Vol. 58. No. 2. pp. 377-395. - 2002 “Between the Hinggan Taiga and a Moscow Public Library. Asian Folklore Studies.” Vol. 61. pp. 149-154. Ingold, Tim. 1991 “Becoming Persons: Consciousness and Sociality in Human Evolution.” Cultural Dynamics 4: 355-78. - 2000 The Perception of the Environment: Essays on Livelihood, Dwelling, and Skill. London and New York: Routledge. Lawrence, Denise. and Low, Setha. 1990 “The Built Environment and Spatial Form.” The Annual Review of Anthropology 19:453-506. Low, Setha. and Lawrence-Zuniga, Denise. 2003 The Anthropology of Space and Place: Locating Culture. London. Blackwell Publishing. Nentwig, Ingo. 2003 “Reminiscences About The Reindeer Herders of China.” Cultural Survival Quarterly. Vol. 27. No.1. pp. 36-38. Pedersen, Morten Axel. 2001. “Totemism, Animism and North Asian Indigenous Ontologies.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (N.S.) 7, pp. 411-27. Pikunova, Zinaida Nikolaevna 1999 Kartinnyi Slovar Evenkiis-koga iazyka. Sant-Peterburg, otdelenie izd-va ‘Prosveschenie’. Rapoport, Amos. 1994 “Spatial Organisation and the Built Environment.” Companion Encyclopaedia of Anthropology: Humanity, Culture, and Social Life. Ed. Ingold, T. London: Routledge. Rudofsky, Bernard. 1987 Architecture Without Architects: A Short Introduction to Non-Pedigreed Architecture. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press Shirokogoroff, Sergei Mikhailovich 1929 Social Organisation of the Northern Tungus. Shanghai: The Commercial Press Limited. - 1935 Psychomental Complex of the Tungus. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner and Co. Limited. Ssorin-Chaikov, Nikolai. 2003 The Social Life of the State in Subarctic Siberia. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Suslov, Innokenty 1936. Shamanstvo I borb’a s nim. Sovetskii Sever 3-5, 89-152. Turov, Michail. 1975. ”K probleme proiskhozhdeniia I evoliutsii evenkiiskogo labaza-‘noku’”. Drevniaia istoriia narodov iuga Vostochnoi Sibiri (Irkutsk) 3, 193-209. Vitebsky, Piers. 2005. Reindeer People: Living with Animals and Spirits in Siberia. London: Harper-Collins. PAGE 30