Paper short abstract:

This paper will use historical records and data from ethnographic fieldwork to explore how weather events in combination with local environmental knowledge affect local livelihood practices, and carry unlike meanings in Kihnu Island, Estonia in different sociopolitical situations.

Paper long abstract:

By emphasising collective experience, sociopolitical situation, and cultural framing, this paper will demonstrate that weather events carry dynamic meanings, affecting local fishing activities in Kihnu Island, Estonia. Kihnu people's perceptions and local environmental knowledge of weather are framed by sociopolitical circumstances and cultural context with which they ascribe meanings and values to weather events. Those meanings and values are not just descriptive models of weather events but also models for any collective action.

Fishers have a peculiar outlook on the weather, partly because it is woven into their everyday experiences of life on sea. In addition, fisher-weather interactions are characterised by political, economical, historical, and cultural contexts. I shall draw upon fishers personal diaries from period of 1965-1978, meteorological records and data from ethnographic fieldwork in Kihnu Island to discuss the dynamic aspect of understanding weather, and different ways how fishers have responded to weather events. For example, as the sociopolitical situation changed, the dangerous sea in Soviet Era has become a sea of opportunity in modern Estonia. Furthermore, sociopolitical forces, historical and cultural context, and collective weather experiences shape Kihnu community vulnerability and abilities to adapt future weather events.

With this I have two aims. First, I suggest that weather events are not merely natural events but interrelated with political, economical, historical, and cultural contexts. Second, that research on historical material, combined with modern ethnography significantly adds to our knowledge about climate change.