ABSTRACT
Recent climate change research suggests the natural environment is vulnerable and sensitively responsive. Humans exist in this “nature-on-the-move” environment. This line of research alters the conventional view of social science that it is culture/society that changes in contrast to a varied-but-stable nature which acts as a background. Anthropologists should recognize how easily the historically familiar natural environment changes and then reconsider human-environment relationships. One of the primary goals of Siberian anthropology is to explore the cultural history of local peoples’ ecological adaptations in harsh environments. Most studies have been focused on theories that elucidate the practices of hunter-gatherers and reindeer herders. An exception is research on the horse-cattle pastoralism of Sakha people in Eastern Siberia. The role of the permafrost and the alaas (meadow in the forest) environment is key to their adaptation. The boreal forest and permafrost complex is exceptionally expansive in Eastern Siberia and originated through natural historical events rather than through a climate-physical mechanism. The coincidental human-environment interaction has formed the subsistence of Sakha. The interaction of human culture should contain not only ecology but also the material cycle. The perspective of nature-on-the-move would explain the type of adaptation seen in the Sakha and provide reasons for the diversity seen in ecological adaptations in various regions around the world.
