Language and Society in the Caucasus Language and Society in the Caucasus Understanding the Past, Navigating the Present Christofer Berglund, Katrine Gotfredsen, Jean Hudson & Bo Petersson (eds.) Universus Academic Press www.universus.se © 2021 Universus and the authors Published by Universus Press, Lund 2021 Cover: Gabriella Lindgren Cover picture: Revaz Tchantouria Design: Christer Isell, Universus Print: Pozkal, Inowrocław 2021 isbn 978-91-87439-67-4 Table of contents Tabula gratulatoria 6 Christofer Berglund, Katrine Gotfredsen, Jean Hudson & Bo Petersson Preface 9 Oliver Reisner Reflections on the history of Caucasian studies in Tsarist Russia and the early Soviet Union 17 Gerd Carling Caucasian typology and Indo-European reconstruction 47 Manana Kobaidze Recently borrowed English verbs and their morphological accommodation in Georgian 59 Merab Chukhua Paleo-Caucasian semantic dictionary 72 Klas-Göran Karlsson The Armenian genocide. Recent scholarly interpretations 106 Stephen F. Jones The Democratic Republic of Georgia, 1918–21 126 Derek Hutcheson & Bo Petersson Rising from the ashes. The role of Chechnya in contemporary Russian politics 147 Lars Funch Hansen Russification and resistance. Renewed pressure on Circassian identity and new forms of local and transnational resistance in the North Caucasus 167 © 2021 Universus and the authors Lidia S. Zhigunova & Raymond C. Taras Published by Universus Press, Lund 2021 Under the Holy Tree. Circassian activism, indigenous Cover: Gabriella Lindgren cosmologies and decolonizing practices 190 Cover picture: Revaz Tchantouria Design: Christer Isell, Universus Alexandre Kukhianidze Print: Pozkal, Inowrocław 2021 Georgia: Democracy or super mafia? 214 isbn 978-91-87439-67-4 About the authors 238 Published works of Karina Vamling 244 Tabula gratulatoria Sergei Akopov Kristian Gerner Kristian M. Nilsson Michel Anderlini Globala politiska studier, Magnus Nilsson & Anna Andrén Malmö universitet Åsa Ulemark Ann Arika Katrine Gotfredsen Niklas Nilsson Tina Askanius Patrik Hall Tom Nilsson Kazim Azimzade Peter Hallberg Ingmar Oldberg Nick Baigent Lars Funch Hansen Lina Olsson Sofie Bedford Jakob Hedenskog Giorgi Omsarashvili Li Bennich-Björkman Astrid Hedin Laura Pennisi Christofer Berglund & Anders Hellström Hans-Åke Persson Ketevan Bolkvadze Oscar Hemer Bo Petersson Niklas Bernsand Jean Hudson Margareta Popoola Pieter Bevelander Derek Stanford Hutcheson Maja Povrzanovic Markus Bogisch Gisela Håkansson Frykman Guranda Bursulaia Christina Johansson Oliver Reisner Johan Brännmark Stephen F. Jones Per Rudling Gerd Carling Kristin Järvstad Helena Rytövuori-Apunen Nani Chanishvili Klas-Göran Karlsson Birgit N. Schlyter Cecilia Christersson Tamta Khalvashi Tomas Sniegon Merab Chukhua Zaal Kikvidze Mikael Spång Philip Clover Kalle Kniivilä Patricia Staaf Nina Dadalauri Manana Kobaidze Kristian Steiner Tobias Denskus Helen Krag Jan-Olof Svantesson Emil Edenborg Alexandre Kukhianidze & Bobby Svitzer Joakim Ekman Nana Janashia Manana Tabidze Magnus Ericson Rebecka Lettevall Pontus Tallberg Inge Eriksson & My Lilja Ray Taras Cecilia Hansson Bodil Liljefors Persson Ingrid Tersman Astrid Hedin Svetlana L’nyavskiy Maka Tetradze Fakulteten för kultur och Tamar Lomadze Kerstin Tham samhälle vid Malmö Kakhaber Loria Madina Tlostanova universitet Minna Lundgren Teresa Tomašević Christian Fernández Gunnhildur Lily Bela Tsipuria Martin Demant Magnusdottir Tina Tskhovrebadze Frederiksen Hans Magnusson Barbara Törnquist-Plewa Björn Fryklund & Gunilla Håkan Magnusson Carolina Vendil Pallin Pfannenstill Märta-Lisa Magnusson Anders & Berit Wigerfelt Natia Gamkrelidze Kamal Makili-Aliyev Maria Wiktorsson Centrum för akademiskt Anders Melin Ulf Zander lärarskap, Malmö Florian Mühfried Lidia Zhigunova universitet Eleonora Narvselius Festschrift for Karina Vamling Photo: Kristofer Vamling Christofer Berglund, Katrine Gotfredsen, Jean Hudson & Bo Petersson Preface It is a great pleasure to present this volume to Professor Karina Vamling in celebration of her 65th birthday and in recognition of her many achieve- ments in the field of Caucasology. A true humanist, Karina reaches be- yond her own specialization in linguistics to the interests and concerns of the people who speak the languages of the Caucasus, their culture, history, societies, and politics. She crosses borders both geographical and scientific, and has always encouraged her younger colleagues and students to do the same. Highly respected among colleagues in Georgia, Karina has received much acclaim in the region, most notably as early as in 1998 when she was awarded the Arnold Chikobava Prize from the Geor- gian Academy of Sciences “for her contribution to the development of Ibero-Caucasian Linguistics”. Also in 1998 she was elected member of the International Circassian Academy of Sciences. Her latest visit to Georgia, only weeks before the 2020 pandemic, was in December 2019 to receive the Georgian Brand Award “for her contributions to Caucasology and to the advancement of the Georgian language abroad”. We congratulate you, Karina, albeit belatedly, and look forward to working with you for many years to come. Into the Caucasus Karina’s first sight of the Caucasus was in her student years travelling with a friend and her family by car from Sweden to Leningrad, Moscow, Kharkov, Rostov, along the Caucasian Black Sea coast, then to Tbilisi and back via the Georgian Military Highway. She later returned as a tour guide, bringing Swedish visitors to the Caucasus – in Soviet times, this was a popular and somewhat exotic tourist destination. It comes as no surprise, then, that she chose the Georgian language as the focus of 9 her doctoral dissertation in General Linguistics at Lund University.1 In 1987–1988, a scholarship from the Swedish Institute allowed her to do field research for the dissertation in Georgia, where she became affiliated to the Department of Modern Georgian at Tbilisi State University, with Professor Nani Chanishvili as her co-supervisor. Nani remembers fondly: Karina came to Tbilisi State University in the late 80s. She wanted to write her doctoral dissertation in linguistics on Georgian langu- age material. She had read my book on case and verb categories in Georgian2 and asked me to be her supervisor from the Georgian side. I liked her very much. She was so dear, beautiful, very smart, very educated, and made a very interesting investigation. Georgia liked her. Karina became a very close friend and one of the best scientists for the Georgians. After completing her PhD dissertation in 1989, Karina spent over a de- cade at her alma mater, Lund University, moving on to Malmö University in 2002, where the story continues… Caucasus Studies Courses with a major focus on the Caucasus are not found at many universities outside the Caucasus. Karina has been the main driver of developing Caucasus Studies as a discipline at Malmö University, but its roots go all the way back to when Karina was a visiting doctoral student at Tbilisi State University. Together with Nani Chanishvili and other colleagues, Karina had or- ganised a joint Georgian-Swedish seminar to take place in Tbilisi, April 1989. In order for the Swedish visitors to prepare for the event, Karina, together with her husband, Revaz Tchantouria, had created a short introductory course in the Georgian language. The group of Swedish linguists set off for Georgia in early April 1989, but they were stopped in Moscow and not allowed to travel on to Tbilisi. There had been a build- up of anti-Soviet protest in Tbilisi, which culminated in the tragic events of April 9, when the Soviet Army crushed the demonstrations, killing 21 unarmed protestors and injuring many more. The seminar had to be cancelled due to events that became catalysts in the de-legitimization of 1 Vamling, K. 1989. Complementation in Georgian. Lund: Lund University Press. 2 Chanishvili, N. 1981. Padež i glagol’nye kategorii v gruzinskom predloženii [Case and verbal categories in the Georgian sentence]. Moskva: Nauka. 10 Soviet rule and public support for national independence in Georgia. A similar experience awaited Karina, her research colleagues, and her family in August 2008, when they witnessed rapidly escalating Russian– Georgian hostilities while on site in Tbilisi. The research activities that the group had scheduled for the field trip were cancelled and the whole group abruptly evacuated. An all-out, albeit brief, war followed between Russia and Georgia, with devastating consequences for the latter. It is in many ways significant that Karina was an eyewitness to the two events that have perhaps defined the country’s development as a sovereign post- Soviet nation the most. For several years, the course material developed for the 1989 seminar lay dormant, but towards the end of the 1990s an opportunity presented it- self. In close collaboration with, then, guest researcher Manana Kobaidze, Karina developed an online Georgian language course at Lund University. In 2002, Karina was appointed at Malmö University and within a short period Revaz and Manana followed, as did the Georgian online course. On June 17–19, 2005, the first Caucasus Studies conference was held at Malmö University on the topic of Language, History and Cultural Iden- tities in the Caucasus. The organisers were Karina Vamling, Märta-Lisa Magnusson, Jean Hudson and Revaz Tchantouria. Later in 2005, the Center for Caucasus Studies at Øresund University was established on the initiative of Karina and her colleague, Märta-Lisa Magnusson, from Copenhagen