The Theme of Separation in the Song Folklore of the Chuvash Settlers of the Kemerovo Region

Abstract

This paper examines the embodiment of the theme of separation in the song texts recorded in 1951 and 2007 from the Chuvash settlers of the Kemerovo region. This theme is present in guest and recruit songs, in the songs of immigrants created in the process of forced resettlement of the Chuvash to new lands. In aphoristic short-plot songs, the theme of separation often manifests itself in the form of separate words and verbal turns – “signs” that point to it. In guest songs, the theme of separation is conveyed most often through images of memories, distant distances, abandonment, sadness. “Signs” of crying, farewell, big cities, symbolizing the foreign side, prevail precisely in recruit songs; in them, the theme of separation sounds especially dramatic and tense. In the songs of the settlers, the images present in the guest and recruit songs are summed up. In addition, in the songs of the settlers there are detailed descriptions of the move and the harsh living conditions in new places. Probably, such a topic was relevant specifically for the bearers of the tradition in the middle of the 20th century, which is associated with their memories of forced resettlement in Siberia at the beginning of the 20th century, as well as with the memory of the difficult trials of the period of the Great Patriotic War. Despite the absence of song variants in the recordings of different times considered by us, there is a certain continuity in the folklore samples of the local Chuvash tradition of the Kemerovo region. It manifests itself in the similar themes of a number of the considered songs and the features of its expression (general words are “signs” indicating the theme of separation, the principle of two-link figurative parallelism is preserved in many texts).