Leaving Footprints in the Taiga

<p> Nowhere have recent environmental and social changes been more pronounced than in post-Soviet Siberia. Donatas Brandišauskas probes the strategies that Orochen reindeer herders of southeastern Siberia have developed to navigate these changes. Catching luck is one such strategy that plays a central role in Orochen cosmology -- luck implies a vernacular theory of causality based on active interactions of humans non-humans material objects and places. Brandišauskas describes in rich details the skills knowledge ritual practices storytelling and movements that enable the Orochen to catch luck (or not sometimes) to navigate times of change and upheaval.</p>