Editing S. An-sky (section)

==Ethnographic work==
[[File:An-ski 1910.jpg|thumb|S. An-sky, 1910]]
Under the influence of the Russian [[narodniki]] movement, An-sky became interested in [[ethnography]], as well as socialism, and became a political activist. Between 1912 and 1913, An-sky headed the [[Jewish Ethnographic Expedition]], financed by Baron Vladimir Günzburg and named in honor of his father [[Horace Günzburg]], which traveled through [[Podolia]] and [[Volhynia]] in the [[Pale of Settlement]]. They documented the oral traditions and customs of the native Jews, whose culture was slowly disintegrating under the pressure of modernity. According to his assistant Samuel Schreier-Shrira, An-sky was particularly impressed by the stories he heard in [[Myropil (urban-type settlement)|Miropol]] of a local sage, the [[Rebbe|hasidic rebbe]] Samuel of Kaminka-Miropol (1778 – May 10, 1843), who was reputed to have been a master exorcist of ''[[dybbuk]]'' spirits. Samuel served as the prototype for the character Azriel, who is also said to reside in that town.{{sfn|Deutsch|2011|pp=47-48}} Historian [[Nathaniel Deutsch]] suggested he also drew inspiration for ''The Dybbuk'' from the [[Maiden of Ludmir]], who was also rumored to have been possessed, thus explaining her perceived inappropriate manly behavior.{{sfn|Deutsch|2003|pp=9, 15-16}} He composed a detailed ethnographic questionnaire of 2,087 questions.{{sfn|Deutsch|2011|pp=11-14}}

An-sky's ethnographic collections were locked away in Soviet vaults for years, but some material has come to light since the 1990s.{{sfn|Avrutin|2009}} The State Ethnographic Museum at St. Petersburg holds a good deal of it.<ref name=Tracing>Tracing An-sky: Jewish Collections from the State Ethnographic Museum in St. Petersburg, Amsterdam 1992</ref> Some of his vast collection of cylinder recordings made on these expeditions were digitized by the [[Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine]], which holds the collection.<ref name=Wax>Materials of J. Engel Ethnographic Expedition 1912 (The Historic Collection of Jewish Music 1912-1947, vol. 1) (Kiev:  National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine;  Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine; Institute for Information Recording, 2001)</ref> Deutsch compares the An-sky's expedition materials to [[genizah]], particularly to the [[Cairo genizah]].{{sfn|Deutsch|2011|pp=11-14}}

His ethnographic report of the deliberate destruction of Jewish communities by the Russian army in the First World War, ''Khurbn Galitsiye'' (The Destruction of Galicia), has become a major source in the historiography of the war's impact on civilian populations.{{sfn|Ansky|2003|p=253}}