104 Sophie Roche
Notes
1. Franz J. Dahlkamp, Uranium Deposits of the World: Asia (Heidelberg: Springer, 2009).
2. Dahlkamp, Uranium Deposits of the World: Asia; The primarily Persian speaking
cities Bukhara and Samarkand came to be located in the Uzbek SSR. The Tajik
SSR had no urban center until Khujand was transferred from the Uzbek SSR to
the Tajik SSR.
3. Gabrielle Hecht, Being Nuclear: Africans and the Global Uranium Trade (Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press, 2012).
4. P. Stegnar et al., “Assessment of the Radiological Impact of Gamma and Radon
Dose Rates at Former U Mining Sites in Central Asia,” Journal of Environmental
Radioactivity 123 (2013): 3–13; G. Strømman et al., “U Isotope Ratio in Water
and Fish from Pit Lakes in Kurday, Kazakhstan and Taboshar, Tajikistan,” Journal of Environmental Radioactivity 123 (2012); L. Skipperud et al., “Environmental
Impact Assessment of Radionuclide and Metal Contamination at the former U
Sites Taboshar and Digmai, Tajikistan,” Journal of Environmental Radioactivity 123
(2013): 50–62: Lespukh et al., “Assessment of the Radiological Impact of Gamma
and Radon Dose Rates at former U Mining Sites in Tajikistan,” Journal of Environmental Radioactivity 126 (2013): 147–155: Interestingly, the test sites in these studies are limited to the main fields of mining and tailing dumps in Taboshar and
Digmai but do not include tailing dumps near to the habitations of Khujand and
Chkalovsk. Only the next expeditions of 2015 were able to assess more tailing
dumps. The results of these studies suggest that “a low to relatively low radiological
risk […] within the range expected for such environment,” Lespukh et al., 154. Yet
these studies are limited and help little in understanding how people engaged with
the substances during work (even today) and in their spare time.
5. P. Zoriya et al., “Monitoring of Uranium Concentrations in Water Samples Collected Near Potentially Hazardous Objects in North-West Tajikistan,” Journal of
Environmental Radioactivity 181 (2018): 109–117.
6. Until very recently, the principal ontological border of nuclearity for health
purposes was the notion of the “permissible dose”: the idea that below a certain
threshold, health effects of radiation exposure are statistically negligible. Always
controversial, this notion now seems conclusively refuted. A National Research
Council report released in June 2005 concludes that there is “no threshold of
exposure below which low levels of ionizing radiation can be demonstrated to be
harmless or beneficial.” Gabrielle Hecht, “Nuclear Ontologies,” Constellations 13/3
(2006): 328.
7. The exclusion of uranium ore from the category of “source material”, that is
nuclear, took place in 1972, Cf., Gabrielle Hecht, “Nuclear Ontologies”; Declaring
uranium ore as natural made it a commodity that could be sold for peaceful use,
which was one of the main interests of the IAEA, as Gabriele Hecht has shown.
8. Usually workers in uranium enrichment facilities face higher exposure levels than
miners (Hecht, Nuclear Ontologies, 322).
9. Olga Kuchinskaya, The Politics of Invisibility: Public Knowledge about Radiation Health
Effects after Chernobyl, (Cambridge, MA et al.: The MIT Press, 2014).
10. Hecht, Being Nuclear; Hecht, Nuclear Ontologies.
11. See the interviews I conducted in the region between 2013 and 2015.
12. Farangis Najibullah, “Tajikistan: Limiting Exposure of Citizens, Terrorists to Radioactive Waste A Struggle,” RFL April 07, 2003, https://www.rferl.org/a/1102841.html.
13. Edward Bruner, “The Opening Up of Anthropology,” in Text, Play and Story: The
Construction and Reconstruction of Self and Society, ed. E.M. Bruner, (Washington,
DC: American Ethnological Society, 1984) 7; ibid. “Experience and its Expression” in The Anthropology of Experience, ed. V. Turner and E. Bruner (Urbana,
Chicago, IL: University of Illinois, 1986) 6.
Notes
1. Franz J. Dahlkamp, Uranium Deposits of the World: Asia (Heidelberg: Springer, 2009).
2. Dahlkamp, Uranium Deposits of the World: Asia; The primarily Persian speaking
cities Bukhara and Samarkand came to be located in the Uzbek SSR. The Tajik
SSR had no urban center until Khujand was transferred from the Uzbek SSR to
the Tajik SSR.
3. Gabrielle Hecht, Being Nuclear: Africans and the Global Uranium Trade (Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press, 2012).
4. P. Stegnar et al., “Assessment of the Radiological Impact of Gamma and Radon
Dose Rates at Former U Mining Sites in Central Asia,” Journal of Environmental
Radioactivity 123 (2013): 3–13; G. Strømman et al., “U Isotope Ratio in Water
and Fish from Pit Lakes in Kurday, Kazakhstan and Taboshar, Tajikistan,” Journal of Environmental Radioactivity 123 (2012); L. Skipperud et al., “Environmental
Impact Assessment of Radionuclide and Metal Contamination at the former U
Sites Taboshar and Digmai, Tajikistan,” Journal of Environmental Radioactivity 123
(2013): 50–62: Lespukh et al., “Assessment of the Radiological Impact of Gamma
and Radon Dose Rates at former U Mining Sites in Tajikistan,” Journal of Environmental Radioactivity 126 (2013): 147–155: Interestingly, the test sites in these studies are limited to the main fields of mining and tailing dumps in Taboshar and
Digmai but do not include tailing dumps near to the habitations of Khujand and
Chkalovsk. Only the next expeditions of 2015 were able to assess more tailing
dumps. The results of these studies suggest that “a low to relatively low radiological
risk […] within the range expected for such environment,” Lespukh et al., 154. Yet
these studies are limited and help little in understanding how people engaged with
the substances during work (even today) and in their spare time.
5. P. Zoriya et al., “Monitoring of Uranium Concentrations in Water Samples Collected Near Potentially Hazardous Objects in North-West Tajikistan,” Journal of
Environmental Radioactivity 181 (2018): 109–117.
6. Until very recently, the principal ontological border of nuclearity for health
purposes was the notion of the “permissible dose”: the idea that below a certain
threshold, health effects of radiation exposure are statistically negligible. Always
controversial, this notion now seems conclusively refuted. A National Research
Council report released in June 2005 concludes that there is “no threshold of
exposure below which low levels of ionizing radiation can be demonstrated to be
harmless or beneficial.” Gabrielle Hecht, “Nuclear Ontologies,” Constellations 13/3
(2006): 328.
7. The exclusion of uranium ore from the category of “source material”, that is
nuclear, took place in 1972, Cf., Gabrielle Hecht, “Nuclear Ontologies”; Declaring
uranium ore as natural made it a commodity that could be sold for peaceful use,
which was one of the main interests of the IAEA, as Gabriele Hecht has shown.
8. Usually workers in uranium enrichment facilities face higher exposure levels than
miners (Hecht, Nuclear Ontologies, 322).
9. Olga Kuchinskaya, The Politics of Invisibility: Public Knowledge about Radiation Health
Effects after Chernobyl, (Cambridge, MA et al.: The MIT Press, 2014).
10. Hecht, Being Nuclear; Hecht, Nuclear Ontologies.
11. See the interviews I conducted in the region between 2013 and 2015.
12. Farangis Najibullah, “Tajikistan: Limiting Exposure of Citizens, Terrorists to Radioactive Waste A Struggle,” RFL April 07, 2003, https://www.rferl.org/a/1102841.html.
13. Edward Bruner, “The Opening Up of Anthropology,” in Text, Play and Story: The
Construction and Reconstruction of Self and Society, ed. E.M. Bruner, (Washington,
DC: American Ethnological Society, 1984) 7; ibid. “Experience and its Expression” in The Anthropology of Experience, ed. V. Turner and E. Bruner (Urbana,
Chicago, IL: University of Illinois, 1986) 6.