Within indigenous ontologies of the Finno-Ugric communities, space, and time are conceptualised in a way that renders them positive or destructive. In this context, perhaps the most natural human instinct comprises of the need of people to arrange everything around themselves and construct the world around them in culturally approved, secure ways. When accomplished, such spatial and temporal arrangements contribute to the feeling of comfort and security. In every instance in which a person arranges their personal space has its own properties. But sometimes, it happens that even when one’s personal space is perfectly constructed, contradictions and oppositions exist which upend the contrived, secure order.

This leads to the questions of why such contradictions occur? How do objects or phenomenon that have at least two opposing, binary aspects (dependant on the location, or space) interact and/or manifest their inherent properties? More specifically, all objects and phenomenon are poly-semantic entities and this implies an inherent contradiction: binaries that obviously refer to the collaborating phenomenon or object. Thus, day includes into itself the presence of night; a man exists in relation to a woman and so on. They are unseen, physical or concrete, and they exist in the psychological unconsciousness of the community. Certain peculiarities existent in the construction of space among the Finno-Ugrians are woven into the temporal dimensions. They are clearly manifested if the contradictions are meant between the sacred and profane spaces and in exactly the same way between the sacral and everyday time. Contradictions saturate and thereby enrich the qualitative characteristics of space and time.

In the context of such perspectives of space and time, presentations are invited to explore the implications of such conceptualising of phenomenon and the meanings which they have for the community they exist in.