How to Cite
Abstract
This article, situated within the framework of the cognitive turn in the social sciences, presents the findings of a study on the role of nationalities as both a social and cognitive classificatory framework in Dagestan. Conducted between July and August 2024, the study involved 100 biographical interviews across 31 locations throughout the republic. These interviews focused on so-called perceptual-communicative facts—either singular or recurring past events in which nationalities were referenced in communication or used to interpret events. A total of 1,104 perceptual-communicative facts, attributed to the period from the mid-1940s to the present, were extracted from the interviews and subsequently analyzed. The results indicate that nationalities structured perception and interactions in Dagestan and continue to do so today, although their influence has diminished in certain social environments. The study demonstrates how national categories are internalized, tested, and transmitted across generations and identifies the specific domains in which they operate. The persistence and reproduction of these categories are interpreted through a neo-functionalist lens, drawing on the sociology of mechanisms as developed by Jon Elster and Peter Hedström. By identifying the individual-level social and cognitive pragmatics of employing this classificatory framework in various interactions, the study proposes a model of ethnic dynamics at the intersection of sociology, cognitive science, and history. This work contributes to the literature on ethnicity in Dagestan, provides methodological tools for field research within the cognitive turn, and advances a broader theoretical explanation of ethnic processes.
References
Abakarov, R. I. (2013). Interethnic relations in the Republic of Dagestan (based on sociological research materials from 2013). Bulletin of the Dagestan Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 51, 135–138. (In Russian).
Adiev, A. Z. (2011). The land question and ethnopolitical conflicts in Dagestan. North Caucasus Scientific Center of Higher School of the Southern Federal University. (In Russian).
Adiev, A. Z., & Kurbanov, R. Sh. (2016). Distribution of power positions in Dagestan: A study of the political representation of ethnic groups in regional government. Society and Power, 4, 68–74. (In Russian).
Belyi, V. A. (2016). Soviet nationalities policy in the North Caucasus: Deportations as determinants of contemporary ethnic conflicts. State, Society, and the Church in the History of Russia in the 20th–21st Centuries, 2, 9–16. (In Russian).
Brubaker, R., Feischmidt, M., Fox, J., & Grancea, L. (2006). Nationalist Politics and Everyday Ethnicity in a Transylvanian Town. Princeton University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780691187792
Brubaker, R., Loveman, M., & Stamatov, P. (2004). Ethnicity as cognition. Theory and Society, 33(1), 31‑64. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:RYSO.0000021405.18890.63
Buttaeva, A. M. (2012). Interethnic relations in Dagestan: Specifics and current problems. Central Asia and the Caucasus, 15(2), 72–83. (In Russian).
DiMaggio, P. (1997). Culture and Cognition. Annual Review of Sociology, 23(1), 263–287. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.soc.23.1.263
Dobrushina, N. R. (2007). Multilingualism in Dagestan, or why a person needs three languages. Sociological Journal, 1, 103–127. (In Russian).
Dobrushina, N. R. (2011). Multilingualism in Dagestan from the late 19th to the early 21st centuries: An attempt at quantitative assessment. Questions of Linguistics, 4, 61–80. (In Russian).
Elster, J. (2015). Explaining Social Behavior: More Nuts and Bolts for the Social Sciences (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107763111
Gadzhiev, M. M. (2008). National policy in Dagestan: The experience of the 1990s. Proceedings of Higher Educational Institutions. North Caucasus Region. Social Sciences, 2, 63–67. (In Russian).
Gadzhieva, S. Sh. (1985). Family and marriage among the peoples of Dagestan in the 19th‑early 20th centuries. Nauka. (In Russian).
Gasanov, N. N., & Abdurazakova, S. M. (2018). Nationally mixed marriages in Dagestan. Social and Humanitarian Knowledge, 5, 85–97. (In Russian).
Grieshaber, S., & Cannella, G. S. (Eds.). (2001). Embracing Identities in Early Childhood Education: Diversity and Possibilities. Teachers College Press.
Hall, S. G. F. (2015). Dagestan’s Consociational Model?: The Potential for Regional Consociationalism in Russia. European Centre for Minority Issues (ECMI).
Hedström, P. (2005). Dissecting the Social: On the Principles of Analytical Sociology (1st ed.). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511488801
Hedström, P., & Swedberg, R. (1996). Social Mechanisms. Acta Sociologica, 39(3), 281–308. https://doi.org/10.1177/000169939603900302
Hedström, P., & Swedberg, R. (Eds.). (1998). Social Mechanisms: An Analytical Approach to Social Theory (1st ed.). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511663901
Hoffman, A. M. (1974). Reliability and validity in oral history. Today’s Speech, 22(1), 23–27. https://doi.org/10.1080/01463377409369125
Kaimarazova, L. G., & Kaimarazov, G. Sh. (2018). On the establishment of Soviet power in Dagestan and the formation of the Dagestan ASSR. History, Archaeology and Ethnography of the Caucasus, 14(4), 63–77. https://doi.org/10.32653/CH14463-77 (In Russian).
Karpov, Yu. Yu. (2017). Nationalities policy of the Soviet state on the North Caucasus periphery in the 1920s–1930s: Evolution of problems and solutions. Peterburgskoe vostokovedenie. (In Russian).
Karpov, Yu. Yu., & Kapustina, E. L. (2011). Highlanders after the mountains: Migration processes in Dagestan in the 20th–early 21st century, their social and ethnocultural consequences and prospects. Peterburgskoe vostokovedenie. (In Russian).
Kazenin, K. I. (2012). Elements of the Caucasus: Land, power, and ideology in the North Caucasus republics. New Literary Observer. (In Russian).
Kurakin, D. (2023). Cathectic mechanisms of culture. Part 1. Russian Sociological Review, 22(3), 9–52. https://doi.org/10.17323/1728-192x-2023-3-9-52 (In Russian).
Landa, K. G. (2016). The place and role of the State Council in the formation of the power system of the Republic of Dagestan. Power, 24(1), 63–67. (In Russian).
Moscovici, S. (1982). The Coming Era of Representations. In J.-P. Codol & J.-P. Leyens (Eds.), Cognitive Analysis of Social Behavior (pp. 115–150). Springer Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-7612-2_4
Moscovici, S. (1988). Notes towards a description of Social Representations. European Journal of Social Psychology, 18(3), 211–250. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2420180303
Perks, R., & Thomson, A. (Eds.). (2002). The Oral History Reader (0 ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203435960
Peterson, G. (2006). Cultural Theory and Emotions. In J. E. Stets & J. H. Turner (Eds.), Handbook of the Sociology of Emotions (pp. 114–134). Springer US. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-30715-2_6
Ramazanova, D. Sh. (2016). On the political construction of Soviet nationalities and peoples of Dagestan (based on archival research materials). Ethnographic Review, 5, 150–166. (In Russian).
Ramazanova, D. Sh. (2021). The principle of consociationalism in the political life of the Republic of Dagestan in 1994–2006. Historical and Socio-Educational Thought, 13(6), 17–40. https://doi.org/10.17748/2219-6048-2021-13-6-17-40 (In Russian).
Rasulova, A. (2024). What to see in Dagestan when traveling independently: 12 best attractions. Eto Kavkaz. https://etokavkaz.ru/turizm/dagestan-12-glavnykh-dostoprimechatelnostei (In Russian).
Republic of Dagestan. (n.d.). Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation. http://council.gov.ru/structure/regions/DA/ (In Russian).
Ritchie, D. A. (2014). Doing Oral History. Oxford University Press.
Shakhbanova, M. M. (2013). Ethnic identity of the small-numbered peoples of Dagestan under contemporary conditions. Sociological Studies, 10, 88–97. (In Russian).
Shakhbanova, M. M. (2016). Russian identity and the specifics of interethnic interaction among the peoples of Dagestan. Bulletin of the Institute of History, Archaeology and Ethnography, 1, 130–139. (In Russian).
Shakhbanova, M. M. (2017). Interethnic relations in the Republic of Dagestan: State and trends. Bulletin of the Institute of History, Archaeology and Ethnography, 3, 152–163. (In Russian).
Swidler, A. (1986). Culture in Action: Symbols and Strategies. American Sociological Review, 51(2), 273. https://doi.org/10.2307/2095521
Tishkov, V. A., & Kisriev, E. F. (2007). Multiple identities between theory and politics (the case of Dagestan). Ethnographic Review, 5, 96–115. (In Russian).
Umaña-Taylor, A. J., Quintana, S. M., Lee, R. M., Cross, W. E., Rivas-Drake, D., Schwartz, S. J., Syed, M., Yip, T., Seaton, E., & Ethnic and Racial Identity in the 21st Century Study Group. (2014). Ethnic and Racial Identity During Adolescence and Into Young Adulthood: An Integrated Conceptualization. Child Development, 85(1), 21–39. https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.12196
Van Dijk, T. A. (1990). Social Cognition and Discourse. In Handbook of Language and Social Psychology (pp. 163–183). Wiley and Sons.
Van Dijk, T. A. (2017). Socio-Cognitive Discourse Studies. In J. Flowerdew & J. E. Richardson (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Critical Discourse Studies (1st ed., pp. 26–43). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315739342
Van Dijk, T. A. (2018). Discourse and Migration. In R. Zapata-Barrero & E. Yalaz (Eds.), Qualitative Research in European Migration Studies (pp. 227–245). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76861-8_13
Van Dijk, T. A. (2019). Ideologies, Racism, Discourse: Debates on Immigration and Ethnic Issues. In J. Ter Wal & M. Verkuyten (Eds.), Comparative Perspectives on Racism (1st ed., pp. 91–115). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315196374
Varshaver, E. A. (2014). Tarki-Karaman: The mechanism of a land conflict in Dagestan. Monitoring of Public Opinion: Economic and Social Changes, 5, 33–150. https://doi.org/10.14515/monitoring.2014.5.08 (In Russian).
Varshaver, E. A. (2022). In the trap of double irrelevance: The (re)production of ethnicity in interactions between enumerators and respondents during the 2021 All-Russian Census in Dagestan. Monitoring of Public Opinion: Economic and Social Changes, 4, 199–221. https://doi.org/10.14515/monitoring.2022.4.2150 (In Russian).
Varshaver, E. A. (2024a). What exactly is studied when ethnicity is studied? A descriptive model for constructivist studies of ethnicity in the context of the cognitive turn. Russian Sociological Review, 23(3), 94–126. https://doi.org/10.17323/1728-192x-2024-3-94-126 (In Russian).
Varshaver, E. A. (2024b). What exactly is studied when ethnicity is studied? A descriptive model for constructivist studies of ethnicity in the context of the cognitive turn: Article, discussion, and the author’s reply to discussants. Migration and Ethnicity Research Group. (In Russian).
Varshaver, E. A., Gupalova, Yu. V., & Orlova, A. A. (2024). Are there really two “nationalities” living in Moscow—Slavs and “southerners”? Report on the results of a study of vernacular categorizations using elicitation methods. Migration and Ethnicity Research Group. (In Russian).
Varshaver, E. A., Ivanova, N. S., & Egorova, T. D. (2024). Imagining the Russian nation: Who, from the perspective of Russia’s residents, is part of Russian society, and can one become part of it? Bulletin of the Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia. Series: Political Science, 26(2), 306–324. https://doi.org/10.22363/2313-1438-2024-26-2-306-324 (In Russian).
Varshaver, E. A., Ivanova, N. S., Gupalova, Yu. V., & Kuznetsova, S. V. (2024). What role do nationalities play in regulating marital behavior in Dagestan? Journal of Frontier Studies, 9(2), 98–133. https://doi.org/10.46539/jfs.v9i2.566 (In Russian).
Varshaver, E. A., Khabibullin, A. M., Samosudova, A. D., & Shults, A.-V. E. (2024). “By the father” or “by both parents”? Variations of the descent classificatory rule regulating membership in ethnic categories in contemporary Dagestan. Monitoring of Public Opinion: Economic and Social Changes, 1, 176–201. https://doi.org/10.14515/monitoring.2024.1.2472 (In Russian).
Varshaver, E. A., Orlova, A. A., & Shulga, A. E. (2023). Documentary constructivism as a special form of constructivist folk sociology: Evidence from Dagestan. Ethnographic Review, 6, 156–177. https://doi.org/10.31857/S0869541523060106 (In Russian).
Ware, R. B., & Kisriev, E. (2001). Ethnic Parity and Democratic Pluralism in Dagestan: A Consociational Approach. Europe-Asia Studies, 53(1), 105–131. https://doi.org/10.1080/09668130124419
Wimmer, A. (2008). The Making and Unmaking of Ethnic Boundaries: A Multilevel Process Theory. American Journal of Sociology, 113(4), 970–1022. https://doi.org/10.1086/522803
Zerubavel, E. (1999). Social Mindscapes: An Invitation to Cognitive Sociology. Harvard University Press.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.