Being a Woman and Being Tatar: Intersectional Perspectives on Identity and Tradition

Being a Woman and Being Tatar uses ethnographic research to explore the multifaceted and complex identities – such as gender, ethnicity, religion – of Tatar women in Siberia and Estonia.

Focusing on the intersections and interactions of multiple identities and exploring that focus through Tatar women’s own voices, narratives, and subjectivity, this book unfolds women’s stories about what it means to be a woman and to be a Tatar in a post-Soviet situation through narrations of their aspirations, their sexuality, their relationship with relatives, and the dynamics of power and hierarchy they feel themselves within. It explores how identity and tradition are shaped by state politics, and also brings attention to new geographical areas, including the Tyumen region and Estonia.

Being a Woman and Being Tatar will demonstrate to those studying gender studies and cultural anthropology the intricacies of Tatar women’s identities, and invites readers to better understand the Tatar women’s diversity across Eastern Europe and Russia.

Alena Lange (née Shisheliakina) teaches at Champlain College, Vermont, US. She holds a Ph.D. in Ethnology from the University of Tartu, Estonia. Her articles include: “Muslim Women’s Narratives of Veiling and Negotiating Identity in the Post-Soviet Context” and “Nationalism in a Russian Multicultural Region”.