Under Fedchenko’s teeth: knowing glaciers in the Pamir Mountains

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• Professor Christine Bichsel ( Department of Geosciences, University of Fribourg)
• Thursday 09 October 2025, 10:30-12:00
• Scott Polar Research Institute, Seminar Room.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Ben Weissenbach.

This talk presents results from a two-week fieldwork in the Pamir Mountains of Tajikistan in summer 2025. The aim of the fieldwork was to explore the oral history and local knowledge of glaciers in Poi Mazor, a village in Vanj Valley. The people of Poi Mazor live in proximity of two surge glaciers: Bear Glacier and Hanging Ice Glacier. In local understandings, these two glaciers are “teeth” of the Fedchenko Glacier – one of the largest glaciers outside the polar and circumpolar areas – that remains hidden from sight behind the towering Academy of Science Range. The talk will focus on how these two glaciers are embedded in a geography shaped by vibrant historical, spiritual and mythical imaginations, however explicitly outside such interpretations. It will discuss this finding in relation to a Eurocentric history, colonial encounters and exoticising narratives of glaciers.

This talk is part of the The Living Cryosphere Lab series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• AUB_Cambridge Seminars
• Department of Geography
• Scott Polar Research Institute, Seminar Room

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