Paper short abstract:

This article analyzes the contact zones of various beliefs of the Kyrgyz people in pre-Soviet time and argues that when women give birth inside of a traditional Kyrgyz yurt (bozuy), all beliefs ((totemism, shamanism, fetishism, etc.) used to come together around her.

Paper long abstract:

This article analyzes the contact zones of various beliefs of the Kyrgyz people in pre-Soviet time. Using personal visual materials, the article argues that when women give birth inside of a traditional Kyrgyz yurt (bozuy), all beliefs ((totemism, shamanism, fetishism, etc.) used to come together around her. Because as the fieldwork results show, Kyrgyz people along wıth praying for their believes, they were also using them in their social lives. It means, when a woman gives birth, in the case of pre-Soviet Kyrgyz pastoralists, all their beliefs come together in the yurt to facilitate the woman's childbirth process. The article is based on the results of a six-year field work study conducted by the author between 2005 and 2011 on the Song Kul pasture in Kyrgyzstan. Also, the data obtained from the field research are compared with archival ethnographic materials stored in the Manuscripts Fund of the Kyrgyz Academy of Sciences.