| Publication |
2011.
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| Summary/Abstract |
Based on anthropological fieldwork between 2006 and 2008, this article compares how people in the Toktogul region of Kyrgyzstan understand and interact with water in three highly significant places: mountain pastures (jailoos), the Toktogul hydroelectric dam that controls the flow of the Naryn and sacred sites (mazars). Sidelining the vast standing waters of Toktogul Reservoir, valley residents instead highlight the positive qualities of flowing water at mazars, pastures and the working dam. Contrasting how metaphors of running water are put to use conceptually by Toktogul residents and social scientists opens up a critique of current academic and policy-oriented descriptions of the world as 'flow'. Attention to a particular kind of movement (flowing water) highlights some of the silent assumptions in current depictions of a mobile world 'in flux'.
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