Even the shadows on the wall constitute definite tribes and have their own country, where they live in huts and subsist by hunting.

Some Chukchi have attained university degrees, becoming poets, writers, politicians, teachers and doctors.

In current times, there continue to be some elements of subsistence hunting, including that of polar bears,[14] seals, walruses, whales, and reindeer.

[15] Beginning in the 1920s, the Soviets organized the economic activities of both coastal and inland Chukchi and eventually established 28 collectively run, state-owned enterprises in Chukotka.

All of these were based on reindeer herding, with the addition of sea mammal hunting and walrus ivory carving in the coastal areas.

Chukchi were educated in Soviet schools and today are almost 100% literate and fluent in the Russian language.

Only a portion of them today work directly in reindeer herding or sea mammal hunting, and continue to live a nomadic lifestyle in yaranga tents.

[citation needed] The Chukchi were generally ignored for the next fifty years because they were warlike and did not provide furs or other valuable commodities to tax.

Armed skirmishes flared up around 1700 when the Russians began operating in the Kamchatka Peninsula and needed to protect their communications from the Chukchi and Koryak.

Other expeditions were sent out in 1708, 1709 and 1711 with considerable bloodshed but little success and unable to eliminate the local population on the large territory.

Command passed to Major Dmitry Pavlutsky, who adopted very destructive tactics, burning, driving off reindeer, killing men and capturing women and children.

This trade declined in the late 19th century when American whalers and others began landing goods on the coast.

As the annual trade fairs where goods were exchanged continued, a common language between the two peoples was spoken.

After 1990 and the fall of the Soviet Union, there was a major exodus of Russians from the area because of the underfunding of the local industry.