Kansanomaisuus, kirjallisuus ja merkityskytkennät Neuvosto-Karjalassa

Abstract

My article is a study of Finnish literary activities in Soviet Karelia. I analyze what kinds of meanings were ascribed to the descriptions of localities, folk poetry and oral tradition in the literary discussions in Soviet Karelia from the late 1950s to the 1970s. I also examine the descriptions and interpretations of folk and local traditions that were politically or ideologically authorized and those that were suppressed. Theoretically, this article is connected to the discussion of power relations that exist in writing about people, tradition, and localities. The research material includes prose published in Finnish, the Communist Party’s literary programs, literary reviews and theoretical articles published in literary journals. It also includes materials from the National Archive of the Republic of Karelia. The literary descriptions of folklore and locality appear as areas of competing articulations of meaning. In the literary discussions they were connected to the writers’ own era, the changing present and the ideologically relevant Soviet history. They were also representations of Karelia’s past, its heritage, and local history, all of which were regarded as “inappropriate” interpretations of locality.