THE PERSONALITY OF FIELDWORK RESEARCHER IN “BEIRUT STORIES” BY AHATANHEL KRYMSKYI

Abstract

The article deals with the personality of A. Krymskyi as a fieldwork researcher from the perspective of his fiction book Beirut Stories. The author’s presence in the text is shown not only through the personage of an eccentric muscovite who came to Lebanon to study Arabic, but also through the massive anthropological narrative, which often overshades a plot and personages. The reader can’t get rid the feeling that this narrative is, as a matter of fact, a main hero of the book. It is based on the A. Krymskyi’s experience as a fieldworker who used in his research investigations mainly a method of included observation. The article focuses on the author ‘s usage of onomastic arsenal with the help of which he denotes different identities of Lebanese society through the lenses of anthropology of religion. He works with the official and folk terms: Orthodox, Rums (in the meaning of Orthodox), Greeks (in the same meaning). By the way, the term Greek in the oral speech of Beirut people in the end of 19th century marked also Russians who lived there, and even Orthodox French nuns come from Marseille. Russian expats were also named as Moskobs, Muscovites. Catholics of Beirut were called as Jesuits (in case they are the teachers of the Catholic schools), Franjie, etc. A. Krymskyi as a thoughtful observer noticed that the identity in the Lebanese society of that historical period is situational: depending on context the person could identify him or herself according to the religious, local, social or ethnic identity. The street life in Beirut demonstrates an example of interreligious and interethnic communication and everyday diplomacy, and Ahatanhel Krymskyi methodically incorporated his own observations, communicational experience, oral dialect, folklore to his Beirut Stories.