Contested Knowledge

In post-war Europe, European ethnology and folklore studies became entangled with political tensions, ideological control, and competing national narratives. This volume explores how ethnographic knowledge was produced and reshaped in contexts where scholarly autonomy was under pressure.

The case studies span socialist and non-socialist countries, showing how scholars navigated authoritarian governance, Cold War divisions, and disciplinary reforms. The book analyses how ethnological knowledge was steered, politically appropriated, resisted, and transformed within shifting academic and societal frameworks.

Edited by Konrad J. Kuhn, Hanna Snellman, and Lauri Turpeinen, the collection offers a historically grounded perspective on the uses and vulnerabilities of cultural knowledge. It is intended for researchers and graduate students in European ethnology, folklore studies, cultural history, and related fields, as well as for readers interested in the entanglements of scholarship, politics, and knowledge.