Lev Sternberg
Encyclopedia
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
- August 14, 1927, Dudergof, now Mozhaiskii, Russia) was a Ukrainian ethnographer who from 1889 to 1897 studied the Nivkhs (Gilyaks), Oroks, and Ainu
Ainu people
The , also called Aynu, Aino , and in historical texts Ezo , are indigenous people or groups in Japan and Russia. Historically they spoke the Ainu language and related varieties and lived in Hokkaidō, the Kuril Islands, and much of Sakhalin...
on Sakhalin
Sakhalin
Sakhalin or Saghalien, is a large island in the North Pacific, lying between 45°50' and 54°24' N.It is part of Russia, and is Russia's largest island, and is administered as part of Sakhalin Oblast...
and in Siberia
Siberia
Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...
for the American Museum of Natural History
American Museum of Natural History
The American Museum of Natural History , located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City, United States, is one of the largest and most celebrated museums in the world...
, in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. He was active in Jewish social movements and a devoted Marxist. Sternberg majored in physics and mathematics at Enters Petersburg University. He later majored in law at Enters Novorossiisk University. He was an early Marxist activist joining Narodnaya Volya (The People's Will) and edited the marxist publication Vestnik Narodnoi Voli (The Narodnaya Volya Herald). He was arrested by Russian authorities April 27, 1886 for participation in The People's Will which was labeled an anti-tsarist terrorist organization spending three years in an Odessa
Odessa
Odessa or Odesa is the administrative center of the Odessa Oblast located in southern Ukraine. The city is a major seaport located on the northwest shore of the Black Sea and the fourth largest city in Ukraine with a population of 1,029,000 .The predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement,...
jail. Lev Sternberg was then exiled to the Sakhalin Penal Colony for a ten year prison sentence. He was deported at Odessa on the boat Peterburg on March 19, 1889 arriving in Port Aleksandrovsk, Sakhalin May 19, 1889. Sternberg agitated authorities due to his activism in prisoners' and indigenous peoples rights. Authorities sent him to the remote community of Viakhtu, 100 km north of the Port Aleksandrovsk where he first began his ethnographic fieldwork on the Nivkhs, Oroks, and Ainu
Ainu people
The , also called Aynu, Aino , and in historical texts Ezo , are indigenous people or groups in Japan and Russia. Historically they spoke the Ainu language and related varieties and lived in Hokkaidō, the Kuril Islands, and much of Sakhalin...
. He would return home but be put under house arrest for the first few years. Lev Sternberg was an important Russian figure in the then new field of anthropology
Anthropology
Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...
. Sternberg, with the help of Vladimir Bogoraz
Vladimir Bogoraz
Vladimir Germanovich Bogoraz , best known under literary pseudonym N.A. Tan was a Russian revolutionary, writer and anthropologist, especially known for his studies of the Chukchi people in Siberia....
organized the first Russian ethnography center at Saint Petersburg State University
Saint Petersburg State University
Saint Petersburg State University is a Russian federal state-owned higher education institution based in Saint Petersburg and one of the oldest and largest universities in Russia....
after the 1917 Russian Revolution.