05.10.2023

Funding Research of Incantations and the Finnic Kinship

Author: The Kalevala Society Foundation

The Kalevala Society Foundation awards research and general grants, organises events, and seeks new ways of interpreting the Kalevala and cultural heritage.

The Kalevala Society Foundation

To celebrate the European Day of Foundations and Donors, we interviewed Dr. Siria Kohonen and MA Takehiro Okabe, both from the Universty of Helsinki, about their research interests. Both received our research grants in March 2023.

Dr. Siria Kohonen’s speciality is the area of magic and incantations, and in her future research she will learn more about the bodily aspects of incantations. She finds the human tendency towards ritualistic behavior fascinating.

MA Takehiro Okabe was intrigued to find that although the Kalevala is the national epic of Finland, the Soviet Union also claimed the Kalevala as their own. He will study this more closely in his post doctoral research ”The Kalevala and the Finnic Kinship for the Soviet Union and the Socialist Bloc, 1948–1962”.