The relational plant: Spiraea <i>Söösken</i> among the Tyva Pastoralists

This paper explores Indigenous knowledge about plants among nomadic pastoralists in the Tyva Republic, North Asia. It focuses on the Rosaceae family's genus Spiraea which is represented by several species in Tyva and corresponds with the taxon söösken in the folk nomenclature. The study reveals factors that inform the Tyva pastoralists’ relationship with söösken, its uses for different purposes, and challenges in correlation of the folk taxon söösken with different genera and species in linguistic and ethnographic sources. This paper investigates how the pastoralists’ understandings of söösken are embedded in their relationship with sentient and superordinate homelands.