Abstract
The article concentrates on the formation and development of ethnological science in Bashkortostan in the pre-Soviet, Soviet, post-Soviet and modern periods. The paper depicts the process of collecting information during the Great Academic expeditions of the second half of the 18th century, as well as the activities of the Imperial Russian Geographical Society members and admirers of folk culture, foreign travelers and researchers. In the Soviet period, systematic ethnographic research began in the 1920s. In 1951, the Bashkir branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences was founded, allowing to bring ethnographic research to the academic level within the Institute of History, Language and Literature. The key role of R.G. Kuzeev, the corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, an outstanding ethnologist, theorist and science facilitator, is highlighted. The paper also covers the coming-into-being of the Museum of Archeology and Ethnography in 1976. In the post-Soviet period – the 1990s, the Center (later the Institute) for Ethnological Research of the Ufa Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences was established; it focused on organizing historical, ethnological and ethnosociological research, including applied research on the development of the State Program “The Peoples of Bashkortostan: Revival and Development.” At that time, ethnological research continued on a systematic basis at the Institute of History, Language and Literature and at universities in the republic. The study also examines the stage of ethnology development in Bashkortostan early in the 21st century. A special feature of modern ethnological science in Bashkortostan is the study of not only Bashkirs and Bashkir diasporas, but also other other numerous peoples (Russians, Tatars, Chuvash, Mari, Mordvins, Udmurts, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Latvians, and Germans), who have traditionally, for over a century, lived in the Southern Urals in interaction with one another and mutual influence. The stage is characterized by the consolidation of academic and university science, as well as cooperation with scientific centers of Tatarstan, Udmurtia, Chuvashia, Mordovia, Orenburg, Chelyabinsk regions and other regions of Russia and abroad.