Social Isolation-One Family's Story

You have a belief system and way of life that makes you distrust outsiders due to a political purge.  You live a harsh life in the forest and scavenge daily to feed yourself and your family of 5.  Without hunting or building equipment, you figure out how to create a "home" and hunt barefoot in the snow but mostly eat grasses, berries and bark.  The only people you've seen for 40 years are your family members.  How do you react to strangers and the new innovations they bring?  Would you embrace or reject the things and ideas they brought?

A student sent me a link to this article today.  It's from Smithsonian Magazine about a family in remote Russia that was so far removed from society for over 40 years that they were not even aware that World War II had occurred.  I will not attempt to do the story justice here, just check out the article.  There is also a link to a Russian documentary about their lives at the end of the article.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/For-40-Years-This-Russian-Family-Was-Cut-Off-From-Human-Contact-Unaware-of-World-War-II-188843001.html



posted by Chuck Schallhorn

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