In the
formal sense of the word, colonial times in Greenland lasted eight to nine
generations. Although basically self-reliant in their livelihood, and never
bereft of their language or physically oppressed, the greenlanders have been
heavily influenced by the authoritarian mode of decision-making
characteristic of any colonial regime. Greenlanders remain under that
influence till this day, albeit for the most unconsciously.
One
important tool to understand the predicament of the greenlanders is to view
the situation through Paolo Freire’s renowned analysis of the psychology of
oppression, seeing the present home rule situation through the lense of
center and periphery, or, in Freire’s terminology, “metropolis and
satellites”. It appears that - to some extent at least - the Home Rule
has fallen into the trap of authoritarianism unconsciously inherited from
the colonial times, one example being the lack of public interest in free
and independent radio and TV broadcasting.
Most
poignantly, maybe, the problem is felt - and is going to be felt - in
the conflict zone that inevitably will arise between environmental policy
concerns and the interests vested in mineral exploitation.
Hence, for
the future of Greenlandic society - the importance of a politically free
university with no direct government influence on curriculum and
administration.
ICC
Greenland President, Aqqaluk Lynge, will aim his talk directly to
scientists, recognizing that they have made significant strides over the
past decade on involving indigenous peoples, and sometimes also their
traditional knowledge. Mr. Lynge will, however, point to additional ways in
which the indigenous peoples of the Arctic can make even more positive
impact, alongside the scientific community, on solving the many Arctic
challenges through research. By drawing upon his experience this year as a
visiting fellow at Dartmouth College, Mr. Lynge will call on scientists to
do even more, especially increasing their partnerships with indigenous
peoples, and fostering meaningful dialogue with local populations.
See PPT Slides.
Climate change is a
recognized reality, and change in accessibility of the Arctic region and its
resources is an obvious consequence. But the question is how to manage this
new situation.
It has been emphasized that
“The Law of the Sea” already exists as a legal framework for solution of
potential conflicts in the Arctic, but the situation may not be that simple.
There may still be reasons to look into how Arctic governance systems may be
structured to minimize problems arising from gaps and potential overlaps
with other already existing governance systems in the region. The fact that
there are problem areas in the North Atlantic and North Pacific indicates
that there are still problems within the existing laws and regulations when
it comes to resolving specific conflicts.
The key question in the
Arctic, however, is that UNCLOS is based on the recognition of rights of
states, but not on rights of people. Inherited in the present situation,
therefore, is the option at the national level of reaching agreements that
might violate the rights of peoples in the Arctic! Classic notions of state
sovereignty, therefore, cannot adequately address the issue of sovereignty
of peoples! Instead the principle of subsidiarity may be providing a
conceptual tool to mediate polarity of pluralism and the common good in a
globalized world by providing a tool in making sense in relation to future
management of Arctic resources.
There is an obvious need of
ensuring peoples of the Arctic by means of regional arrangements to be
granted a voice through the establishing of a comprehensive regime – as some
have suggested, a constitutional contract – treating the Arctic as a
distinct region in international society.
View Presentation.
In summer
2004, at ICASS-5 in Fairbanks and in the following weeks, IASSA made what in
hindsight was a historic decision to join the preparations for IPY
2007–2008. During that summer of 2004, IASSA argued on behalf of Arctic
social scientists and polar residents for a legitimate place for
social/human research in a new IPY, based upon the crucial role that studies
of northern communities and cultures play in today’s scholarly and public
approach to the Earth’s polar regions. This paper is a tribute to IASSA’s
successful effort to raise the profile of social research and the humanities
in the mainstream polar science. It reviews the planning and implementation
of IPY 2007–2008 as a ‘once-in-fifty years’ opportunity for social
scientists and Arctic residents, as well as for IASSA. It covers, in
particular, the history of the origination of IPY 2007–2008 from several
independent and often competing proposals in 2000–2002; the role that IASSA
played in building its socio-cultural agenda; the current status of
social/human research in IPY; and the future of that legacy after IPY
2007–2008 is officially completed in spring 2009. It is hard to
underestimate the transition between ICASS-5 in 2004 and ICASS-6 in 2008 in
the way the wider polar research community views the value of social and
human sciences. IASSA’s efforts also opened the door to a new level of
engagement of Arctic residents and indigenous people in research, science
planning, and education through many activities under IPY 2007–2008, as well
as other major ventures of the past years.
View Presentation.
Gearheard,
Shari and Kielsen Holm,
Lene
On this IPY
Day, we offer a celebration of the human relationships and personal
connections that can develop over the course of research. Many projects
depend on and acknowledge human relationships to be key to their research,
but we rarely have the opportunity to hear more about these interactions or
get a chance to meet the individuals involved. Who are the people in these
research relationships? How exactly are these relationships formed and
nurtured? How are those connections that lead to trust and respect
established? How do human relationships benefit research and how are the
individuals involved affected?
Drawing on
our own experience with the international Siku-Inuit-Hila (Sea
Ice-People-Weather) Project, we look at research relationships at the level
of, and from the perspective of, the individual. At the finest human scale,
we explore what terms like “participation”, “community involvement”, and
“collaboration” can really mean.
Rowe,
Elana W., Centre for Russian Studies at the Norwegian
Institute of International Affairs (NUPI)
Wilson,
Emma, Business and Sustainable Development; Sustainable Markets Group,
United Kingdom
Abstract
The
effects of climate change, the development of new technologies and the
increasing value of many natural resources (i.e. oil, gas, minerals) found
in the Arctic all contribute to an increasing pressure from extractive
industry on indigenous peoples’ lands and waters. In this panel, we will
critically review a variety of governance measures, such as impact benefit
agreements, environmental impact assessments/expertiza, ‘development plans’
and co-management boards, used to facilitate and monitor natural resource
extraction in the Circumpolar North. Looking at case studies from around
the North, this panel’s presentations will focus on three key questions:
What are the existing arrangements for preventing/facilitating and
subsequently monitoring natural resource extraction in the indigenous North?
If and how can/do these governance structures contribute to or hinder
power-sharing and profit-sharing between local and regional governments,
industry and indigenous peoples? Are there any ‘best practices’ that could
be shared across the Arctic? The panel’s concluding discussion will focus
primarily on the last question posed. At present, it is quite common for
northern actors facing new large-scale development (for example in northern
Norway and Russia) to draw rather uncritically on the experiences of
northern Canadians and Alaskans. Using the paper presentations as a point
of departure, all participants will then debate the appropriateness and
possibility of such transfer of North American governance institutions to
new locations in the North during a discussion/question-answer period.
Extractive
industry development has historically led to loss of lands, livelihoods and
community cohesion for indigenous and local communities living close to the
industrial activity. At the same time, these industries have also
contributed to local socio-economic development in these regions. The
effectiveness and sustainability of local development in the context of such
projects depends on the minimization and mitigation of negative
environmental and social impacts; the equitable distribution of project
benefits; the opportunities for meaningful participation of local
communities in decision-making; and the extent to which local expectations
are managed and satisfied. Public involvement can be hampered by people’s
lack of awareness of their rights to participate in the development process.
This article explores the ways that international legal processes and
corporate self-regulation initiatives can inform the development of
relations between indigenous and local communities and extractive companies
in Russia. The analysis has particular relevance for the oil and gas
industry and the nomadic reindeer herding communities of the Russian North,
Siberia and the Russian Far East.
View Presentation.
Sakhalin Indigenous People and New Reality in the
Life
Sakhalin
Island has been the place of new economic development of multinational
projects for more than the last 10 years. Field research demonstrated that
the Sakhalin 1 and Sakhalin II oil and gas projects have had both a direct
and an indirect impact on the populations and settlements of several
northern districts. Monitoring data was collected in 2002- 2005, based on
questionnaire administration with native communities in Nogliki, Tymovsk and
Poronaysk districts which are likely to be affected by construction. The
main impact is on domestic reindeer spring and summer pastures (pipeline and
access roads), the environment at river crossings in several districts, and
small native communities in the bays and at cultural sites. People are
concerned about the unusual smell and size of salmon, the decrease in
populations of salmon and other marine resources and river pollution. Other
questions connected to Molikpag and Sakhalin I and Sakhalin II projects were
concerns about drilling waste pollution. These were new realities in the
life of local communities. These projects have special benefit programmes
for social and cultural questions of the Indigenous People. But people are
troubled about environmental questions connected with oil projects on the
shelf zone of Okhotsk Sea. This new landscape required companies to make
“ethnologicheskaya expertiza” all projects. After social conflict with the
first IP strike action, “green line” in 2004, over the Sakhalin -2 project,
the Regional Government and Sakhalin IP Association started a new
development plan for IP Communities (IPDP). Political activity is another
new reality in the IP life for the last decade. The author will focus on the
influence of these projects and several changes of IP life and the common
situation in Sakhalin.
The National Aboriginal Health Organization (NAHO) is an
Aboriginal-designed and –controlled organization dedicated to improving the
well-being of Aboriginal Peoples. NAHO recognizes that non-renewable
resource extractive development is an essential ingredient to Canada’s
northern economy, and that Aboriginal communities are positioned to benefit
from the non-renewable resources in their territories. These activities can
offer positive outcomes, such as increased employment opportunities and
revenue for local development initiatives. They can also affect community
cohesion and exacerbate existing socio-economic challenges, affecting the
well-being of individuals, families and communities living on or near
resource extraction sites. Over the past three years, NAHO’s has carried out
activities focused on the social, economic, political and cultural effects
of non-renewable resource extractive development on northern Aboriginal
communities. This has included the developing a discussion paper on the
impacts of resource extraction development on Inuit communities; conducting
an environmental scan of interventions to mitigate the social impacts of
development; and, convening a roundtable of representatives from northern
Aboriginal and community-based organizations, social service agencies and
academia, for a discussion to identify community-based strategies aimed at
maximizing the opportunities and mitigating the impacts of extractive
activities. Careful preparations, including interventions at the policy
level, can be effective to minimize the impacts of development and to ensure
that Aboriginal Peoples achieve maximum benefit from development. This
presentation will highlight the outcomes from NAHO’s work, and speak to the
challenges of ensuring the First Nations, Inuit and Métis community voice is
represented at national and international discussions on resource
development.
Social
Anthropological research within an interdisciplinary project with reindeer
herders and industry-workers shows the importance of level and scale when
evaluating the socio-cultural impacts of industrialisation on local
communities. The paper argues that restricting impact
analysis to quantitatively measurable impacts means missing the essence,
although this forms the basis of negotiations and compensations by
companies. Research revealed both positive and negative consequences of
industrialization, the positive ones being even harder to quantify. One of
the important results is that coexistence between industry and reindeer
herding is the expressed goal on both sides, and maximizing benefits
alongside limiting the negative impacts guides the interaction of both sides
on the ground, where we found in most cases long-established and well
functioning working relations among industry workers and reindeer herders.
Relations on high political or economic levels are often characterized by
more tensions. Lack of information about each other's needs was identified
as hampering coexistence. Ecological and social damage to herders may happen
because nobody told oil workers of reindeer nomads' needs, while on the
other side the tundra population would be in a better position to adapt to
changes if they were included into the planning of industrial development at
earlier stages. This need for more exchange has also potential
socio-cultural consequences, as it might make sense to share confidential
information. A set of basic requirements exchanged between both sides would
be a step forward in using the good working relations on the ground.
View Presentation.
Although the Swedish industrialization has been studied
from a number of historical perspectives, there is still a void to fill
regarding its relation to the Sami indigenous population. The paper
discusses the initial findings of a study addressing a case study of
hydropower exploitation in Sapmi in the 20th century. The study itself aims
at identifying experiences by the local inhabitants with a special focus on
Sami women connected to reindeer herding. The reindeer herding is considered
as a cultural activity with specific relation to the Sami indigenous
population, containing specific knowledge of water and land resources, and
as an important trade for a large number of people.
With this
in mind, different viewpoints and perspectives are identified, as well as
opposition and protests that have arisen alongside the hydropower
exploitation. Questions asked are: what viewpoints were/are forwarded by
whom and to whom? What knowledge was/is taken account of in regard to
damming and continuous water regulations? Time period in focus is
1950s-1980s, considering traces and consequences of today. Primarily a
historical study, the hope is also that it will be useful for discussions on
the relation between the Swedish state, ideas on modernity, technological
and industrial expansion on the one hand and indigenous people inside and
outside of Sweden on the other, including issues of local knowledge, natural
resources and sustainable development.
View Presentation.
A common
myth about globalization is that ideas and knowledge, like money, can now
circulate freely. This is not always the case. Knowledge and ideas are
embedded in particular places and societies and do not lend themselves
straightforwardly to export. At the same time, globalization and
region-building efforts in the North certainly have created an unprecedented
level of opportunity for sharing innovative solutions to shared Arctic
problems, such as northern natural resource management and economic
development. In this presentation, I describe both opportunities for and
challenges to the transfer of governance knowledge across northern borders
through a case study of a development project designed to promote
Canadian-style natural resource management and economic development models
in the Russian North. This project, one of many cooperative endeavours
involving Arctic indigenous peoples and governments, was based in the belief
that relevant knowledge should be shared across the state boundaries that
transect the Circumpolar North. Drawing upon over thirty qualitative
interviews and my participation in the project itself, I point to the
important role played by the notion of an Arctic region in developing and
carrying out this development project and also to ways in which fundamental
national differences (historical, economic, and social) between
Canada and Russia reduced the applicability of Canadian northern knowledge
to new Russian contexts.
View Presentation.
Slowey,
Gabrielle A., York
University, Department of Political Science
Hoogensen, Gunhild, University of
Tromsø
Abstract
Over
centuries, Arctic peoples have learned to adapt and thrive in an uncertain,
harsh environment. Today, change is occurring at an unprecedented rate.
Local peoples' capacity to cope and adapt is under pressure. Occurring
amidst a changing climate, oil and gas activity poses critical challenges to
peoples in Arctic communities. It affects local economies, traditional
livelihoods and identities, health, food and the environment. However,
while there is enormous strain on the factors that affect human well-being
in the Arctic, it is essential to recognize that Arctic peoples have a
capacity to determine what is needed for their well-being as well as the
capability of developing resilience based on local knowledge. This session
aims to bring together papers on these topics of critical importance to the
Arctic that explore the effects of oil and gas activity, and its interaction
with climate change, on the human security of Arctic peoples. Participation
by indigenous people and from across circumpolar regions is greatly
encouraged.
My paper will examine the relationships between the
increasingly popular "energy" security concept, the varying evolutions of
the "environmental security" concept, and human security. Traditional
security perspectives (protection of the state and its borders, sovereignty)
are competing for political attention in the Arctic. The environment and
human relationships to the environment are taking more of the centre stage.
Energy security, largely rooted in a traditional security discourse,
dominates much of the security discussion pertaining to security and the
environment. Energy security focuses upon the reliable supply of energy
sources at an affordable price (roughly speaking) and is most often
articulated at the national or state level. Some lip-service is paid to the
implications of a national strategy to secure energy sources at a reasonable
price might have at the community/individual level and on the environment
(including climate change issues), but these implications have been rarely
explored nor theorized upon within the security discourses that exist today.
Important connections need to be made between different environmental
security perspectives which are impacted themselves by developments in the
energy industry, not least in oil and gas. What are the links between the
discourses of energy, environmental and human security in the oil and gas
context? In what ways, if any, does the security of one impact the
in/security of the other (in other words - does energy negatively or
positively impact human security? environmental security?) And how can these
both illuminate and inform a wider security policy?
Concepts
within political science tends to express the needs and views from a state-
or organisational level and although they can express ideals for universal
rights or be fruitful in analyzing state relations, they often mask the
social, cultural and personal consequences of global trends and large scale
development on an individual and/ or small group-level. Thus, there is a
need for a renewed methodology within the research area of Human security –
one which takes into account the personal and diverse experiences of
content, meaning and consequences of such a concept.
If
political scientists have been methodical and concrete in their
identification of human security – aspects, social anthropologists have for
decades studied local responses to and adaptations to (and of) global
trends. The anthropological methodology discourse has often taken into
consideration the complex relation between the need for generalization and
utilization of abstract concepts and the necessity for precise and thorough
depictions of specifics to be able to thoroughly understand local life.
In this
presentation, I want to show how qualitative research methods like
participatory fieldwork and focus-group interviews can be very fruitful in
order to achieve a more thorough understanding of the understanding of the
concept of human security on the ground, and how what is learned from this
bottom-up perspective may serve to strengthen the legitimacy and analytical
strength of the concept in question.
Keywords:
Human security, Methodology, participatory fieldwork, anthropology,
globalization, local knowledge.
With its
focus on the individual and the context in which security is experienced,
the concept of human security addresses security in people’s life-world. In
this life-world, people can be agents of their own security as choices that
affect human security are made also amid severe life-conditions. This
concern with people’s agency in regard to human security directs critical
attention to the constraints and capabilities to act. When thinking with
Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of practice, this space is defined by the positions
of security agents in the field and by internalized dispositions. The
question addressed in this paper is what does a Bourdieuian approach
contribute to the concept of human security in context of oil- and gas
development? It is argued that this approach directs attention both to
material and immaterial structuring forces that confine subjects’ space of
manoeuvring in the field of security. An analytical concern with Arctic
people’s practices of security attempts to broaden the understanding of
theory and practice of human security from a non-dominant, bottom-up
perspective. This perspective addresses material structures (e.g.
distribution of economic power, control of legislation, etc.) that affect
agent’s ability to address security concerns relevant to their life-world.
It also directs attention to immaterial aspects, inter-subjective beliefs
that also constitute forces structuring agents’ space of manoeuvring.
Tundra ecosystems are considered vulnerable in the face of
large-scale petroleum development, in part because even small-scale,
low-intensity disturbances can affect vegetation, permafrost soils, and
wildlife out of proportion to their spatial extent. Scaling up to include
human residents, tightly integrated arctic social-ecological systems are
believed similarly susceptible to industrial impacts, as well as climate
change. In contrast to northern Alaska and Canada, virtually all terrestrial
and aquatic components of YNAO gas & oil fields are seasonally exploited by
migratory herders, hunters, fishers and domesticated reindeer (Rangifer
tarandus). Here we emphasize the Yamal-Nenets ecosystem. Despite
anthropogenic fragmentation and transformation of a large proportion of the
environment, socio-economic upheaval over the past 2-3 decades, and
pronounced climate warming, we find the Yamal-Nenets social-ecological
system resilient according to a few key measures. We synthesize data showing
the remarkable extent to which the system has successfully reorganized in
response to recent shocks. Our analytical approach combines quantitative
methods with indigenous knowledge to more fully understand the cumulative
effects of rapid land use and climate change at the level of the entire
Yamal system. We find that institutional constraints and drivers are as
important as the documented ecological changes and so offer positive lessons
to manage for resilience.
View Presentation.
Does
self-government make a difference? Based on fieldwork findings conducted in
the fall of 2007, the authors reveal the answer to this question as provided
by community members and leaders in Tuktoyaktuk (NWT) and Old Crow (Yukon).
In this paper, the authors examine the ways in which self-government and
economic development policies interact with land claims and resource
development in the study communities.
More
specifically this project (a) identifies the extent to which First Nation
communities are, in a post land claims era, better able to meet the
socio-economic demands of their constituents (b) explores why some First
Nations groups, in areas where there is the potential for oil and gas
development, have decided to center their development strategies on oil and
gas while others have not; and (c) highlights community concerns related to
the impacts of oil and gas activity on community health, traditional
livelihoods, local economy, ecosystem sustainability, and food security. By
studying the impacts of oil and gas, we can better examine the risks,
threats and opportunities that oil and gas activity presents to human
security in the Arctic.
View Presentation.
The
proposed Mackenzie Gas Project is expected to stimulate economic growth, as
well as have other impacts, throughout the Northwest Territories (NWT). One
area of social concern is housing and homelessness, a condition that must be
addressed if all Northerners are to share in the benefits of economic
growth.
The
primary objective of my doctoral research is to understand how economic
growth relates to housing insecurity and, in turn, to issues of
homelessness. This project thus addresses four critical and underdeveloped
gaps in current research: 1) to explore the meaning of ‘housing
(in)security’ in the study communities; 2) to illustrate the relationship
between economic growth and emerging housing (in)security; 3) to assess the
role housing security plays in the (re)production of homelessness in the
communities; and, 4) to examine how government policy and regulations
related to housing and economic development serve to fuel vulnerability to
housing (in)security and homelessness and among whom.
In this
paper, I examine the ways in which housing and economic development policies
interact with economic growth in the creation of housing insecurity and
homelessness in the study communities. Moreover, I explore the historical
and contemporary patterns which shape these dynamics and provide the context
for present socio-economic change. View
Presentation.
Across the circumpolar north, socio-economic change is
taking place at an extraordinary rate. Nowhere is this more evident than in
Canada’s Northwest Territories (NWT), where accelerated natural resource
extraction is occurring alongside significant shifts in the social,
cultural, environmental and political landscape.
While many developments taking place in the region are
beneficial to residents, there are widespread public
concerns over a perceived
increase in community mental health and addictions issues. In this
graduate research project, I explore how long-serving mental health and
addictions workers view the effects of rapid socio-economic change in
relation to their professional practice. Moreover, I aim to capture their
perspectives on the future of mental health and addictions service delivery
in the region.
In this paper, I present an
overview of my thesis research, including the themes which emerged from
in-depth interviews with mental health and
addictions workers in the NWT. This study
is taking place as part of the multi-disciplinary
International Polar Year project: “The impacts of oil and gas activity on
peoples in the Arctic using a multiple securities perspective (GAPS)”. Thus,
I will also discuss how a securities framework might facilitate policy
development related to the impacts of rapid change on community health
service providers. Together with the other GAPS project team members, I will
comment on the collaborative measures taken to ensure
local priorities are reflected in the wider multi-disciplinary,
multi-country research initiative.
View Presentation.
Nuttall, Mark
XE "Nuttall, Mark"
, University of Alberta
Mason, Arthur
XE "Mason, Arthur"
, University of California Berkeley
Abstract
There are so many changes occurring now in the Arctic
and, fortunately or unfortunately, the broader context of these changes lie
beyond the reach of local insight, but not necessarily control. Discussion
of Arctic natural gas development, for example, focuses on building
multi-billion dollar pipelines to deliver energy to markets in
mid-continental United States, Europe, and Asia. Such pipelines will travel
south across indigenous communities, lands, and territories. Members of
these communities will also want access to this natural gas, and to the
benefits from its production. But to gain access, they must involve
themselves in the discussions over how these projects move forward. This
requires learning new ideas about technology, economics, and regulation. And
because of the 20 year life-span of these projects, everyone involved must
be thinking about the future.
As
anthropologists, we see a real need for focused research on how these local
and transnational visions come to play a part in defining these projects. We
are concerned by the way economic and technical details often define a realm
of thought concerning development. Such arguments over the best location of
energy infrastructure, for example, can conflict with arguments about the
identity of places, and their environmental and aesthetic quality, or be
used to undermine the claims of local communities on choices about local
access to natural gas.
This
session addresses the cultural shifts brought forth by recent proposals to
develop Arctic natural gas. We consider regional and federal policy on
Alaskan and Canadian Arctic natural gas development, institutional
commitments to economic principles of a newly restructured industry, and how
the interplay between these different forces contributes to establishing a
global natural gas energy market. We also place this discussion within
broader circumpolar context by discussing northern European and Russian
issues. The intellectual merit of the research relates to the practical
aspect through which Arctic gas is shaped into the object of an image of
global gas development. Like other anthropological attempts to frame the
present, our concern is the conduct of institutions and the practices
through which these proposals are brought to bear on the subjectivity of
individuals. The broader context relates to studies of globalization that
require a reconceptualizing of power that identifies the nation-state as the
fundamental horizon of communal life. The work investigates the changing
role of state control and governance by considering the emergence of a new
global dynamics that is replacing social systems as central units of
analyses in favor of the concept of flows and networks.
This
session is part of a larger collaborative proposal that seeks funding
through the National Science Foundation IPY among other sources, and has
been submitted to the IPY committee for official recognition.
In this
paper, I argue that quantifiable matter is integral to an ethnography of
time, space and anticipatory knowledge in Arctic natural gas development.
Quantifiable matter is linguistically coded economic values and political
relations—the establishment of socially recognized standards of measurement.
Prospects for Alaska natural gas development are often expressed through the
interplay of quantifiable qualities, measurable units and quantities
expressed as value. A veritable avalanche of numbers surround such things as
pipeline capacities, ownership percentages, pipeline
diameters, construction costs, timing of events, and
amounts of available gas reserves. For the uninitiated, the ubiquity of
these numbers, names and acronyms appear as a vulgar surplus. The full
significance of these units, their relation to a structured energy market,
its interrelated parts, cannot be perceived. Still, for select government
officials, energy consultants and various stakeholders, this
ethno-hydrocarbony of quantification provides insight into historical
change, decay, as well as speculative potential. Such quantitative build-ups
serve as the means through which otherwise inexpressible psychic states can
be immediately expressed. Importantly, quantifiable matter provides a means
to propel one’s thoughts into the future, achieve a sense of decay
surrounding the aura or future events and even contribute to the destruction
of the present. View
Presentation.
In 1993
Aboriginal people in the Central Mackenzie Valley signed a comprehensive
land claim agreement providing
the Sahtu Dene and
Métis with fee simple title to 41,437 km of settlements lands, some (22.5%)
of which include subsurface rights. The Sahtu Dene and Métis Comprehensive
Land Claim Agreement has radically altered governance structures in the
region, replacing Chief and Council with the Land Corporation as the primary
decision-making authority pertaining to lands and resources. The current
role of the Land Corporation has required a broad transformation in how
Sahtu Dene and Métis communities engage outside interests looking to conduct
work on Sahtu lands. Land Corporation Presidents, along with their
management boards, are
engaged
in sophisticated strategies for the negotiation of agreements and
partnerships to increase social and economic profits. These negotiations
include the establishment of strategic networks, the learning of new
terminology and skills, and the implementation of novel means of
decision-making. At the same time, shifting community dynamics as a result
of changing governance structures can bring about internal conflict and
fracture, particularly when there are multiple and conflicting governance
institutions operating in the same arenas. This paper will examine the
conduct of Land Corporations in decisions related to oil and gas exploration
in the Sahtu region of the Northwest Territories. In addition to
considering strategies employed by Land Corporation Presidents and boards, I
will examine the role of the Land Corporation within wider contexts of Sahtu
Dene and Métis norms of governance and decision-making practices.
During the
summer of 2007, the High Arctic re-entered the global geopolitical
imagination as Russia, Denmark and Canada initiated scientific missions to
investigate hydrocarbon potential in the region of the Lomonosov Ridge and
the northern coast of Greenland. Climatic changes, specifically unpredicted
decreases in mean annual sea ice extent and thickness, had reconfigured
Arctic geography at the very moment that hydrocarbon prices continued
towards unfrequented global highs. Energy security, climatic changes, and
nationalistic scientific practices formed a new assemblage in
techno-politics. Inspired by recent writings by Timothy Mitchell, I term
this precarious settlement ‘High Arctic petropolitics’.
This paper
embarks upon on a critical investigation of these emergent geographies.
Drawing from science and technology studies, I begin to decipher the
cartographies of arctic energy by examining the socio-cultural dimensions of
environmental and technical knowledges. As a number of states begin to
source future energy security upon the basis of this precarious settlement
in the region, the northern encroachment of petropolitics becomes of global
significance. Through investigations of these practices, the paper
contributes to nascent interdisciplinary attempts to retheorize the social
dimensions of Arctic resource extraction.
Resource
development, territorial integrity and scientific inquiry are historically
dynamic and constitutive processes of a larger narrative of nation
state-building and moreover the construction of the Westphalian political
system. These interconnected processes have structured and been structured
by changing intellectual modes of thought concerning changing definitions of
progress and development. Since its inception, the Westphalian system has
permeated the globe, dividing territory through the making of sovereign
states “each capable of defining its own goals and cultural mission”. The
legal parameters of Westphalian sovereignty evolved interdependently
consisting of two dominant stratums, the domestic and the international.
Internationally, Westphalian sovereignty is marked by indifference to
national politics thereby creating a disjuncture between the national and
the international. Domestic sovereignty in this system is based on land
ownership or territorial integrity which was then legitimated through
international law. Westphalia, as such, has come to determine the limits
and domain of sovereign political space and within this the ownership of
resource exploration, development and utilization.
Of late,
global processes have begun to unseat this long standing political and
economic order. Events in the 1960s and 1970s internationally and in the
1970s more particularly in the Arctic, began to call to question Westphalian
assumptions regarding two specific yet interrelated aspects of sovereignty1)
Internationally: states are the sole governing authorities in global
politics and 2) Domestically: territorial integrity (natural resource
development as the sole prerogative of the state). Several harbingers have
been central to this shift; namely 1) Scientific findings which expose the
transnational nature of environmental problems and 2) the expansion of
rights based policies including many Arctic indigenous land claims
agreements. Combined, these realities affect the global politics of
development and provide a concrete space upon which to recognize how and
where the Westphalian system is coming.
As such, the
focus of this paper is to examine these processes as they come to bear on
oil and gas development and policy change in the Arctic. As political
reality has begun to expand the dialogue of resource exploration to include
multiple stakeholders with ownership and/or rights to resource development
and utilization, questions which this paper address include: What
obligations and what rights do oil companies operating in the Arctic have
under international law, through Arctic policy and within indigenous
settlement areas? What mechanisms exist to create compliance with these
rights and obligations? What stakeholders are involved? Who decides what
constitutes a legitimate stakeholder? Given the most recent environmental
turn to global climate change how are stakeholders living and operating in
the Arctic affected by and responding to increased scientific knowledge
regarding climate change and subsequent policy measures? Who are the
designated climate change science ‘experts’? And what constitutes an
‘expert’? Essentially, the central question of this research: Who governs
the intellectual sovereignty of Arctic oil and gas development and how and
where do these processes play out?
Indigenous
people represent a group of stakeholders which are characteristic for the
Arctic, and inherently it makes the business environment more intricate than
in other parts of the World. Indigenous and corporate values have
traditionally been seen as polarized perspectives in the Arctic where the
“debate” has been regarded as the Frontier versus Homeland. In short, on the
one hand the Arctic is seen as the last frontier or the last storehouse of
resources. Supporters of this perspective feel it natural and necessarily to
subdue the land and develop the resources. On the other hand, the Arctic is
a homeland for many different indigenous people with over 40 different
languages. The indigenous people living in the Arctic say the North is their
homeland. They have lived there for thousands of years. They claim it is
their land, and they believe they have a right to say what its future ought
to be. The Arctic is now again a hot topic on the political agenda,
expressed, for example, in Norway’s High North Strategy (2006), where
harmonization of economic and indigenous people values is highly relevant.
The
investigation primarily addresses the following research question: What are
the challenges for oil and gas industries working in the Arctic for
attaining coexistence with Arctic’s indigenous people? and Are there any
opportunities for attaining coexistence between these stakeholder groups? I
will throw light on the challenges by using secondary data regarding
indigenous people rights, laws, society and Arctic environmental issues.
Wandel, Johanna, University of Guelph, Global Environmental Change
Group, Department of Geography
Hovelsrud, Grete, CICERO
Smit, Barry E., University of Guelph, Department of Geography
Abstract
CAVIAR consists of case studies undertaken in Arctic
communities by an interdisciplinary international team during the IPY. The
case studies a) address how communities are vulnerable in the context of
broad social, economic, environmental and political change; b) in what ways
communities cope with hazards, and what determines relative adaptive
capacities; and c) how can knowledge of adaptive capacities contribute, in a
practical way, to improving the ability of communities to deal with
conditions that may be exacerbated by changes in climate and other
conditions. This session presents the underlying rationale and methodology
for the CAVIAR case study approach followed by a series of case studies from
across the circumpolar north. The last presentation summarizes the case
studies, with a focus on comparison and integration of insights.
This paper
presents the underlying framework and methodology for the CAVIAR case study
approach. CAVIAR an International Polar Year 2007-2008 Consortium consists
of case studies undertaken in a number of Arctic communities across the
circumpolar region. The case studies address how communities are vulnerable
in the context of broad social, economic, environmental and political
change, and seek to understand what determines, and how to improve the
adaptive capacity of a community. CAVIAR is fundamentally interdisciplinary
and conceptualizes vulnerability as a function of exposure-sensitivity and
adaptive capacity to a complex set of interactive changes. Vulnerability is
assessed by analyzing data and information gathered from community members
(including local and traditional knowledge) as well as from
regional/national institutional representatives, scientific research, and
instrumental record. The CAVIAR approach to vulnerability is distinct in
that it begins with an examination of which conditions (climatic and
otherwise) are relevant for the community of interest
(exposure-sensitivities) and how these have been managed in the past and are
currently dealt with (adaptive strategies). Once this baseline of
exposure-sensitivities and adaptive strategies is established, the approach
focuses on what future exposure-sensitivities are expected, and what
adaptive capacities exist, or can be built, to deal with these in the
future. CAVIAR contributes, in a practical way, to identifying strategies
which decrease future vulnerabilities.
View Presentation.
Multiple-use Forests in Sweden: A Case Study
of the Effect of Resource Conflict on Adaptive Capacity
Forest systems in Sweden are
often used for multiple purposes, for instance forestry, reindeer herding,
environmental protection, tourism and local recreation such as hunting and
berry picking. This means that a number of different stakeholders with
different interests are interacting on the basis of different land use
rights. Forest owners hold ownership rights, while reindeer herders act on
the basis of traditional use rights. In Sweden, local use is protected
through the right of the common, which is providing public access to forests
for activities such as berry and mushroom picking. As a result of this
interaction between diverse interests, conflicts often manifest between
different uses, for instance, in the case of logging which may result in
limited land use possibilities for other interests. Such conflicts severely
impact the potential for concerted adaptation in the communities to
longer-term challenges such as climate change, for which planning and
pro-active adaptation may be limited due to the focus on resource use
conflicts that are perceived to be more immediate. This paper presents an
interview-based case study from northernmost Sweden, focused on interaction
between these diverse interests and their perceived sensitivities and
adaptive capacity. The paper in particular highlights the institutional
context to resource use, where a local conflict and scope for adaptation may
depend to a large extent on national legislation and regulation. The paper
illustrates that the prospect of community adaptation must be seen in the
context of governance and power relations on scale levels from the local to
the national and even international.
View Presentation.
Global climate changes are
recorded in the Russian Arctic regions in the end of the Twentieth century.
Its impact on the indigenous communities in the Northern regions is not well
known. The rapid changes of environmental conditions influence different
aspects of northern economies and societies. Case studies of the current
exposure-sensitivities of the aboriginal population were conducted in Nenetz
communities of the Nenetz Autonomous Region, located in the North-European
part of Russia. The research took place in the Nenetz settlements Shoina and
Nes, situated in the Arctic coast of the Barents Sea, in the Kanin
Peninsula. Three hundred inhabitants live in Shoina, and 1500 - in Nes. The
members of Nenetz community deal with pasture reindeering. Climate warming
in this region becomes apparent in spring. Break-up of ice on the rivers and
lakes occurs earlier creating problems for reindeer migration. Warming in
winter and spring causes increased precipitation, such as rain and wet snow,
catastrophic flooding, and coastal erosion. Significant temperature changes
cause formation of thin ice crust on the snow surface. These phenomena
damage traditional crafts and have essential implications for ecosystems and
livelihoods in Nenetz communities. Development of industrial infrastructure
such as construction of roads, factories, gas pipelines, oil extraction
induces certain harm for indigenous population. The investigation of
vulnerability and adaptive capacity of Arctic communities, assessment of
climatic and social risks in the modern changing environmental conditions
are important tasks of contemporary science.
View Presentation.
Matthews, Ralph
, Sydneysmith, Robin, and Vadeboncouer,
Nathan
Mitigation activities are an important response to climate change at all
levels of society; nevertheless managing changes already underway and
responding to future impacts is unavoidable. Management and other forms of
response to the impacts of climate change, collectively known as adaptation,
are a function of interacting social attributes and features. Thus,
understanding the adaptive capacity of local communities and regions is
important if we are to seek effective respite from the impacts of climate
change. Adaptive capacity can be examined on multiple levels; however, the
capacity to be adaptive, while occurring through the actions of individuals,
is primarily a social process. Capacity, in this usage means not only the
ability, knowledge and resources to act but the social conditions that make
a response possible and likely. Adaptive capacity at the social level is
about barriers and facilitators of community action. In this project we
seek to understand and explain how these processes operate through the
linked use of two explanatory conceptual frameworks: ‘new’ institutionalism
and social capital. ‘New’ Institutional Analysis (NIA) is used as a
framework to uncover societal patterns of operation that channel human
action, i.e., the rules, practices, and cultural expectations that guide
responses and action. In particular, the framework focuses on the extent to
which institutional patterns of governance, including the uneven
distribution of power, serve to facilitate or block adaptive responses to
climate change vulnerabilities. Social capital analysis helps to
deepen our understanding of the link between agency and social process and
the way in which networked behaviour may influence processes of adaptive
capacity and resilience. Through a case study of the institutional capacity
of Whitehorse we explore governance and policy processes within the City as
well as institutionalized patterns of relationship between Whitehorse and
other governance bodies such as the Yukon Territorial Government and
adjacent First Nations. The goal is twofold: to develop knowledge of the
processes of community adaptive capacity to climate change and to work
with the community to apply such knowledge to enhance both adaptive
capacity and the long-term resilience. Keywords: new institutionalism,
adaptive capacity, social capital, resilience, adaptation, climate change,
governance. View
Presentation.
Ford, James D., Goldhar, Christina
and Grønvold,
Ulloriaq
Climate
data from the Arctic Station in the community of Qeqertarsuaq on Disko
Island indicate significant warming and reduced sea ice cover in the last
decade. Inuit community members likewise describe a pattern of changing
climatic conditions with implications for subsistence-based harvesting
activities and commercial fishing. While not necessarily indicative of human
induced climate change – the climate of western Greenland displays
significant variability – climatic conditions in recent years are consistent
with projections of anthropogenic climate change. This paper characterizes
vulnerability to climatic variability, extremes, and change in Qeqertarsuaq,
Greenland, using the approach adopted by the CAVIAR IPY project. Emphasis in
this approach is placed on the resource use options and risk management
strategies employed by local households, businesses, and the municipality
(past and today) to manage climatic conditions and changes, and those
characteristics of the human system which influence the ability to do so.
Past and present responses are instructive; how communities experience and
manage future climate change will be facilitated and constrained by similar
processes and conditions which have determined the efficacy, availability,
and success of past and present adaptations.
View Presentation.
The
Municipality of Inari (Ánar) in Finnish Lapland covers an area of 17,321
sq.km.. It is the largest municipality in Finland, though the population
density is only 0.46 inhabitants per sq.km., the total population is 6,960.
Inari is the only quidrilingual municipality in Finland. The languages are
Finnish, Northern Sami, Inari Sami and Skolt Sami. Thirty percent of the
whole population is Sami. The most common livelihoods are based on nature
such as tourism, forestry, reindeer management and small scale fishing.
Tourism has come to be the most significant branch of trade. In 2005 there
was a high risk of losing the main village (3,380 inhabitants) under the
Ivalo River flood. By recapturing the past situation we build up a picture
of practical engagement, conflict and co-operation in the context of natural
hazards and exposure-sensitivity. The possible thread brought to light
different knowledge systems as well as weaknesses and strengths of the whole
community in the context of climatic change and future prospects. On this
paper we analyze the perceptions and actions of different ethnic groups and
practitioners e.g. reindeer herders, local inhabitants and administrative
level on adaptation and vulnerability by using the framework and concepts
the Caviar project. In the concluding remarks we look at these
different agents as a part of the whole community system in the perspective
of future changes. View
Presentation.
The paper
presents results of a case study within the CAVIAR project from a high-risk
location in the coastal area of the Kara Sea. On the way to the summer
pastures a group of reindeer herders with herds of several thousand animals
and households including women and children migrates over the sea ice for
circumventing an open river. Since ice on the sea lasts longer than ice on
the river, reindeer herders use these natural conditions for organising
their annual migration cycle. With melting sea ice, this practice is due to
be discontinued in the closer future. In addition to climate-related
changes, another sensitivity is gas and infrastructure development in the
area
The paper
focuses on the analysis of consequences of and responses to direct pressures
from both climatic and anthropogenic changes. What are the possible
strategies of the community dealing with the changing natural and social
environment? Will the combination of stresses and pressures from both human
and climatic sources will push Nenets society to find successful adaptation
in their economy and way of life or will it lead to destabilising and
destructive changes? How can we conceptualise tundra Nenets agency to adapt
to current exposures? This paper attempts an analysis of the adaptive
capacities of nomads, while also identifying the limits beyond which
adaptation will be impossible.
View Presentation.
Community-based research in Tuktoyaktuk, an Inuvialuit community in the
western Canadian Arctic, will be used to (1) demonstrate how Inuvialuit
communities are affected by, and dealing with, impacts from climate change,
(2) provide insights from adaptation processes, and (3) demonstrate how
policies related to climate change adaptation must be mainstreamed within
existing decision-making processes.
While
Tuktoyaktuk residents are witnessing unprecedented environmental changes,
the ways that they are affected by these changes is influenced by culture,
livelihoods, employment opportunities, education, and governance. Impacts
associated with climate change in the Tuktoyaktuk area include threats to
infrastructure from erosion and permafrost degradation, decline in the
quality and availability of wildlife that are important for subsistence and
culture, increased risks associated with travel on land and sea ice, and
increasing pressure for resource extraction by industry. Whereas the
capacity of some individuals and families to adjust to these stresses is
facilitated by their ability to take advantage of opportunities in both
subsistence harvesting and the wage economy, others are constrained by
substance abuse, inadequate housing, emotional issues stemming from
residential schools, insufficient education, or a lack of experience and
skills required for subsistence harvesting. In order to effectively address
the impacts of climate change, local decision-making bodies (government and
Inuvialuit institutions) must develop policies and programs that alleviate
these constraints. Programs that aim to build skills for both employment and
subsistence harvesting are necessary for ensuring that residents of
Tuktoyaktuk are able to face future challenges.
View Presentation.
Amundsen,
Helene, Hovelsrud, Grete K.
and West, Jennifer
In this
paper we present preliminary results from the Norwegian portion of the
CAVIAR project. Our case study sites, Hammerfest, Kjøllefjord, and Nesseby
are three coastal communities in Finnmark county. In each the focus is on
understanding and documenting community adaptation and vulnerability to
climate change by exploring important linkages between the community,
natural resources, and other relevant social, economic, institutional, and
other factors that might facilitate or constrain adaptive capacity locally.
For Hammerfest a major increase in economic activity due to recent offshore
gas activities poses challenges to the social cohesiveness and environmental
sustainability. Uncertainties over changes in sea level, wave height, storm
surges and ocean currents – and the implications for pollution, whether in
the harbour, along the coastline or within fish stocks, represent additional
challenges. For Kjøllefjord changes in ocean temperature, sea ice extent,
and surface temperatures in the Barents Sea region have been linked to
changes in the distribution and migration of key commercial fish stocks, and
have an impact on vulnerability and adaptation in the coastal fisheries. For
Nesseby a variety of possible climate triggered events have been registered.
Increasing Autumnal Moth (Epirrita autumnata) attacks are destroying vast
areas of birch wood and berry plants, and the ecosystem in the Varanger
Fjord is changing, transforming the resource base for local fishers. We will
discuss these current exposures and sensitivities to change that have been
identified as important and relevant to livelihoods by the local
stakeholders, as well as how the communities are responding to these
exposure-sensitivities.
View Presentation.
We
present an in-progress research project comparing the resilience and
vulnerabilities of coastal and interior communities in Alaska to the
combined effects of climate change and off- and on-shore oil and gas
development. The project involves three communities and an interdisciplinary
team of researchers. We report preliminary finding from the first phase of
the study involving residents of one interior and one North Slope village
who report on changes in ecosystem services and their implications to
subsistence traditions. The use of an ecosystem services framework and
social network analysis are explored as alternative and complementary
methods for assessing community vulnerabilities. This discussion highlights
the underlying tension between instrumental and reciprocal views of
human-environment relations.
View Presentation.
Irvine, Melanie, Bell, Trevor and Smith, I.R.
Harsh
climates, characterized by strong seasonal contrasts in temperature, wind,
and precipitation are inherent to communities in the Arctic. Changes in
these climate variables can result in landscape instability, such as the
thawing of ice-rich permafrost, causing uneven ground subsidence and damage
to infrastructure. Under climate warming projections, hazards in the Arctic
will likely increase. Planning effective community adaptation strategies
requires an augmentation in our understanding of hazards and a proper
assessment of the capacity of communities to cope (Berkes and Jolly 2001).
The main objectives of this presentation are to (1) to identify and
categorize landscape hazards in Clyde River (Kangiktugaapik), Nunavut, based
on their potential risk, and (2) to identify coping mechanisms. As such, a
multilayer community-scale GIS hazard map, classifying areas based on their
susceptibility to hazards is being created. Source data comprises aerial
photos, satellite imagery, ground-truthing, field surveying, thaw depth
analysis, radiocarbon dating and sediment cores. An assessment of
vulnerability combines the level of risk that hazards pose and the
community’s ability to cope (Dolan and Walker 2004, Ford and Smit 2004), my
study will include an examination of behavioral modifications that people
can make at the individual, community and technological levels to best deal
with identified hazards. In addition, factors hindering or enhancing the
resilience of the community will be assessed.
View Presentation.
This
paper summarizes the findings from the case studies (presented in the CAVIAR
Sessions) as they relate to the core components of the CAVIAR framework. It
provides a preliminary comparison of exposures and adaptive strategies
across the regions and communities presented earlier. this paper provides an
introduction to the group’s discussion on vulnerability and adaptation to
changing environmental conditions across the circumpolar north.
Krupnik, Igor,
Smithsonian Institution, Arctic Studies Center
Kielsen Holm, Lene
Laidler, Gita
Abstract
During
the past few years, several major new initiatives have been launched in the
documentation of local ecological knowledge and local observations of
environmental and climate change by Arctic indigenous experts. Those
projects make an important contribution to the International Polar Year
(IPY) 2007–2008 science program and to the ongoing research activities of
individual polar nations. Major work is being focused on the changing sea
ice, snow, temperature, and wildlife regimes, and on the various ways Arctic
indigenous communities are coping with the rapid shifts in their environment
and usable resources. The papers in this session will cover wide range of
issues, including changes in sea ice knowledge and use; transmission of
ecological knowledge among generations; transitions in subsistence skills,
orientation and navigation practices; local ecological terminologies under
the new climate and sea ice patterns; local interpretations of environmental
changes and people’s views on their impacts and causes. Several papers will
be co-authored with indigenous experts from northern communities, who act as
critical partners and science advisers to science and documentation
projects.
The
SIKU project (its official title is ‘Sea Ice
Knowledge and Use:
Assessing Arctic Environmental and Social
Change, IPY #166) was endorsed by the Joint
Committee for IPY in 2005, as a part of the International Polar Year
2007–2008 science program. The project’s acronym, SIKU is the most
common word for sea ice (siku) in all Eskimo languages from Bering
Strait to Greenland, both Inuit and Yupik. The SIKU project has two
major goals: to strengthen the contribution of Arctic indigenous residents
to scholarly studies of modern climate change in IPY 2007–2008; and to
document local ecological knowledge and use of the sea ice environment,
traditional practices for ice and weather observation, so that it may be
preserved for future generations. SIKU project team includes
scientists and indigenous experts from five nations: Canada, U.S.,
Greenland/Denmark, Russia, and France. SIKU, like many IPY 2007-2008
initiatives, is organized as a consortium of local and national projects
supported by grants from various funding agencies. Major work is being
focused on the changes in sea ice, weather, and marine wildlife regimes, and
on the various ways Arctic indigenous communities are coping with the rapid
shifts in their environment and usable resources. The papers in the session
will cover major activities under the SIKU project with the wide
range of issues. Several presentations are co-authored with the experts from
northern communities, who act as crucial partners and advisers to various
SIKU efforts.
The paper
introduces a new initiative in social/human sciences under the International
Polar Year (IPY) 2007–2008 program. The project was started in 2006 and it
is now being carried out from Bering Strait to Greenland by research teams
from five nations, U.S., Canada, Greenland/Denmark, Russia, and France. The
key goal of the SIKU project (IPY #166) is to document indigenous
people’s knowledge about the recent changes in polar sea ice, as well as in
the daily use of ice-covered marine environment under the impact of climate
warming. Indigenous experts from twenty northern communities participate in
various SIKU activities that include local ice and weather
monitoring; interviewing of elders and experienced hunters; preparation of
dictionaries (‘lexicons’) of local sea ice terms in indigenous languages;
documentation of people’s perspectives on the impacts of climate and sea ice
change in their areas. These and other activities will fulfill the critical
mission of the SIKU project, namely, to advance northern people’s
participation in IPY 2007–2008 and to secure the value of their knowledge
and observations for future generations. Individual SIKU teams are
exploring the use of new technologies that can be introduced to Inuit
communities to enhance local weather and ice monitoring, ice navigation,
preservation of elders’ knowledge, and public education. The paper describes
major activities undertaken by the SIKU project teams, with a special
emphasis on research in indigenous communities in Alaska and Russian
Chukotka.
Inuit Sea Ice Use and Occupancy Project
Laidler, Gita
, Aporta, Claudio and Gearheard,
Shari
The Inuit Sea Ice
Use and Occupancy Project (ISIUOP) is the Canadian International Polar Year
(IPY)-funded contingent contributing to the International IPY project “Sea
Ice Knowledge and Use (SIKU): Assessing Arctic Environmental and Social
Change.” ISIUOP builds on previous sea ice research in Nunavut and Nunavik
communities (for the past 4 – 8 years), and aims to further document and map
local sea ice expertise. Conventional maps show terrestrial variations and
features in great detail, while water bodies are outlined and left “blank.”
Therefore, ISIUOP is undertaking collaborative investigations to document
and map sea ice knowledge and use around several Inuit communities,
including: i) a characterization of seasonal sea ice conditions; ii) the
extent and areas of sea ice use; iii) the nature and location of notable sea
ice hazards; iv) key harvesting areas; v) traditional and current ice
routes; vi) Inuktitut toponyms (placenames) or terminology associated with
sea ice; and, vii) shifts in patterns of sea ice use due to social and/or
climatic change. This research includes the development of new technologies
or protocols for: i) community-based sea ice monitoring related to Global
Positioning Systems (GPS), satellite imagery, and local ice/weather
indicators to improve forecasting services; and, ii) new northern-focused
multi-media educational tools through the development of an online,
interactive atlas framework. This presentation will provide an overview of
ISIUOP teams, and progress to date, in our efforts to provide a new map
conception where the dynamic nature, use, and importance of seasonal sea ice
cover is portrayed according to current Inuit practices, and perspectives,
based upon the rich local knowledge base and oral history.
The Inuit Circumpolar
Council, ICC-Greenland and Kalaallit Nunaanni Aalisartut Piniartullu
Kattuffiat (KNAPK), and The Association of Fishermen and Hunters in
Greenland, are collaborators in the Sila–Inuk project. Sila-Inuk
started its work by going to the southern most part of Greenland. From the
14th of August to the 22nd of September 2006,
field-interviews were conducted from Arsuk to Aappilattoq. Thirteen
settlements were visited and 33 persons, including hunters, fishermen,
sheep-farmers and other persons, men and women, old and young who have been
observing the weather, were interviewed. The interviews provided
information about the changing environment, for example, the animals, the
winds, the streams, the seasons, humidity, ice conditions, etc.
This presentation of the Sila-Inuk
project will focus on what kinds of changes the informants from South
Greenland have observed and will summarize the challenges that these
residents are facing.
Qeqertaq (population 180) is
a hunting community located on a small island in the northeast section of
the Disko Bay, North Greenland. The island is usually surrounded by the
shore-fast ice during six to eight months of the year. Qeqertamiut are
highly dependent on sea ice to maintain their traditional subsistence
knowledge and economy based on extensive use of the ice-dominated marine
environment. Traveling on ice by dog-sleds used to be the only way to go
hunting, fishing, and to connect with other nearby communities. Ice is also
a place to share knowledge, train young hunters, and to have community
events and games (dog-sledge races, soccer, and children’s games). In
1987-1988, the author stayed in Qeqertaq conducting meteorological
observations and studying the impact of weather variability on sea ice
extent, thickness, and quality. Since 1987, the average annual temperature
in this area has increased by more than 3 °C, with the major resulting
impact on local sea-ice regime. In 2008, the author revisited the community
to document how the Qeqertamiut continue to use the sea ice today, under a
much warmer climate and higher weather variability.
Born, Erik W.,
Kielsen Holm, Lene, Heilman, Anna and Laidre, Kristin
Sea ice has diminished in
the Baffin Bay region during the last 10-15 years. During the same period
the subsistence catch of polar bears has increased in NW Greenland. However,
the reduction in sea ice has made hunting and traveling using traditional
means such as dog sleds increasingly difficult. In order to get the “local”
perspective on how the climate changes have influenced the occurrence of
polar bears and the hunt, 72 experienced polar bear
hunters living in Northwest Greenland were interviewed about climate change
and the effect of these changes on the polar bears and the catch. During
recent years, perhaps beginning in the 1990s, the hunters noted marked
environmental changes. Most pronounced and of greatest importance to hunting
was the decrease in sea ice. The sea ice formed later in the fall and broke
up earlier in the spring – and has also become thinner. Furthermore, the
weather has become warmer and more unpredictable, with frequent storms and
rain during winter. The glaciers have retreated and parts of the edge of the
Inland Ice Cap have recessed. These changes have influenced both travelling
and hunting activities in NW Greenland, and in particular in the
municipality of Qaanaaq, where previous routes along glaciers and sea ice
can no longer be used. In contrast, the boating season has been extended
with more open water, resulting in an increase in the fraction of polar
bears caught from a boat (versus sled). This change, most pronounced in the
southern parts of the Upernavik municipality, was mentioned by some of the
informants as an additional reason for the increased catch of bears since
the early 1990s. The majority of the informants noted an increased
occurrence of bears closer to the coast. About 31% of the answers specified
that the reason for this change was an increase in the number of polar
bears, whereas 16% of the answers specified it was due to a decrease in sea
ice cover.
Climate Change in Nunavik (Canada):
Adaptation Strategies Developed for a Safe Ice Access.
Tremblay, Martin, Furgal, Christopher, Angiyou, Eli , Annanack, Tuumasi, Niviaxie, Jack
and Barrett, Michael
Nunavik communities are recently reporting warmer and shorter winters, which
have implications for the ice season and, consequently, on the access to
local territories and resources by members of these communities. These
climatic shifts are resulting in increased risks for travel during the
winter season associated with less stable and thinner ice. An integrated
community-based monitoring (ICBM) program was developed in Nunavik to
generate adaptation tools to support safe access to land and resources and
to enhance local adaptive capacity through participation in community-based
monitoring activities. The Nunavik ICBM approach brings together partners
(northern communities, organizations and Canadian universities) having
various perspectives on the issues surrounding land and resources in
Nunavik. The ICBM project also brings together traditional knowledge and
scientific knowledge, linking data collected through semi-structured
interviews, local ethno-cartographic interviews, ice monitoring activities,
Radarsat-1 satellite data and data gathered at weather stations. The
partnership-based Nunavik ICBM program dealing with territory and resource
access is an example of how communities and scientists can work together to
further understand the issues of climate change impacts in the North, their
importance for Aboriginal people and how local adaptive capacity can be
developed through an integrated, cooperative research process.
Mapping Inuit Sea Ice Knowledge and Use
Laidler, Gita, Elee, Pootoogoo, Ikummaq, Theo
and Joamie, Eric
As one of the sub-projects within the Inuit Sea Ice Use
and Occupancy Project (ISIUOP), this project on Mapping Inuit Sea Ice
Knowledge and Use (SIKU) expands on previous research that characterized the
importance of sea ice processes, use, and change around three Nunavut
communities. This component of ISIUOP focuses on developing innovative ways
of representing previously documented Inuit knowledge of sea ice (e.g. floe
edge position, tidal cracks, polynyas, travel routes, dangerous areas,
changing ice conditions, safety indicators, and Inuktitut terminology) to
develop educational materials that can be used by a variety of audiences.
Additional local sea ice monitoring and group work also aims to help
determine effective strategies for including such information in school
curriculum, educational materials, sea ice safety awareness, and assessments
of environmental change impacts and adaptation. Finally, the Polar View
Floe Edge Service (satellite imagery of sea ice conditions) has recently be
implemented in each community, so we will present some preliminary results
regarding how the products are being used, what kinds of information the
service provides, and how the service could be better tailored to meet
community needs.
Gearheard, Shari,
Aipellee, Gary, Apak, Apiusie, Iqaqrialu, David, O’Keefe, Kyle, Palluq, Jakurassie, Palluq,
Liemikie and Panipak,
Jacopie
The
Igliniit Project in Clyde River, Nunavut, brings together Inuit knowledge
with cutting edge GPS technology. “Igliniit” in Inuktitut refers to trails
routinely travelled by members of a community. The location, use, condition,
and changes in igliniit can help us understand a great deal about the
environment and Inuit-environment relationships. In the Igliniit Project,
geomatics engineers and Inuit hunters are working together to design and
implement a new integrated GPS system that is easily and affordably mounted
on a snow machine or dog sled, the regular modes of travel used by Inuit
hunters who log thousands of kilometres per year. The Igliniit system
automatically logs the location of the hunter every thirty seconds. It also
logs weather conditions (temperature, humidity, pressure) and the
observations of hunters (such as animals, ice features, and placenames)
entered through a customized, icon-driven interface that operates in
Inuktitut or English. The data logged is then used to produce various maps.
These maps integrate the collected data, showing travel routes, along with
the geo-referenced observations of the hunters and weather conditions. When
the maps of different individuals are overlayed, and combined with expert
interviews and the hand-drawn work of hunters and Elders on hard-copy maps,
the result is a valuable picture of Inuit-land-sea ice use over time and
space that combines both quantitative data and Inuit knowledge. For the
community, the Igliniit system also has important applications for land use
planning and search and rescue activities. This presentation will highlight
Igliniit project activities, applications, and results to date, including a
discussion of project challenges and breakthroughs.
Taylor, D. R. F., Pulsifer, Peter, Hayes, Amos, Fiset, Jean-Pierre
Since
2002 the authors have been contributing to the establishment of a
community-driven view of spatial information infrastructure for the South
Polar Region. This infrastructure has been used to support the development
of a prototype Cybercartographic Atlas of Antarctica.
Cybercartography is a new paradigm which creates new forms of atlases.
These bear little resemblance to traditional atlases and are really a
metaphor for all kinds of qualitative and quantitative information presented
in multimedia and multi-sensory formats. This paper will describe the
application of cybercartography to the creation of an Online
Cybercartography Atlas of Sea Ice building on our earlier experience in
Antarctica. It will also include a description of the innovative
Cybercartographic Atlas Framework including the Nunaliit software which
enables communities with limited knowledge of geographic information
processing to create their own atlas modules. These community centred
narratives give quite different ontological perspectives from those of
scientists and governments and cybercartographic atlases are marked by their
ability to present a variety of perspectives on different topics.
For the
Inuit sea ice is an enabling environment with many features. For some
non-Inuit the sea ice is considered a barrier to their activities. This
different perspective is illustrated by the fact that the official map
makers of Canada portray sea ice as a solid blue featureless space on the
map. Cybercartographic atlases are revolutionizing cartography and giving a
voice to communities which previously had no voice.
For Inuit
of the eastern Canadian Arctic, sea ice, in the context of warming, becomes
a window into the social, economic and political forces that define how
climate change is documented, perceived and portrayed at the local and
regional level. At the local level, sea ice greatly influences travel and
mobility. Its concentration on a seasonal basis has direct links with the
distribution of marine mammals and sea birds on which Inuit and many Arctic
groups depend for their cultural livelihood and to meet their socioeconomic
needs. The impacts of shorter sea ice seasons and unpredictable conditions
vary and individuals and communities are coping with these changes using a
variety of strategies. At the
regional level, a melting environment underscores the political dimensions
that climate change holds for Inuit in an age of empowerment. Inuit are also
working at the national and international level to highlight the threats
that climate change holds for them. At the same time Inuit are positioning
themselves to take advantage of the economic development opportunities that
a reduced sea ice environment will offer.
In this
paper, I explore the human dimensions of climate change relative to sea ice,
a key indicator of warming that represents critical habitat not just for
polar bears but for people.
Using the results from the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (2005) and
related studies in concert with my own climate change research amongst Inuit
living on southwest Baffin Island, Nunavut, I explore how these issues
manifest themselves in the context of social science research.
With this background I discuss the important role that anthropology
should continue to play in building community-based research models that
foster collaboration between scientists and indigenous people, groups both
concerned with the growing effects of climate change in the Arctic.
The
Nelson Island Natural and Cultural History Project
The
Nelson Island Natural and Cultural History Project
originated in the deep desire of Yup'ik elders to document and to share
their history with their younger generation. To do so, they invited
non-Native scientists to join them in village gatherings as well as on a
three-week circumnavigation of Nelson Island, during which elders reflected
on changes in sea ice conditions, weather patterns, animal migration
patterns, and related harvesting activities. To date, a defining feature of
our conversations has been the integrated way in which information is shared
and elders' reticence to distinguish between human impacts on the
environment and the "natural" effects of climate change.
In
collaboration with SIKU, Nicole Stuckenberger visited the Bering Strait
Inupiat community of Shaktoolik in the late summer of 2007. Together with
Simon Bekoalok's (IRA president) and Clara Mae Sagoonick (author of daily
weather observations), Stuckenberger discussed the local implementation of
SIKU and conducted a pilot study on local understandings of environmental
change. The gathered data suggest that the documentation of indigenous
knowledge on weather and ice is not only of great relevance for the
preservation of traditional knowledge and practices, but is also perceived
to be an important tool for systematic observation and dealing with actual
changes in the environment.
Whaling Trails on
Landfast Sea Ice at Barrow, Alaska
At Barrow, Alaska, local Iñupiat whaling crews annually
construct a network of semi-permanent trails through the landfast ice during
the spring hunting season. These trails originate at predictable locations
along the coast and pass through (or circumnavigate) a range of diverse ice
features before terminating at the landfast ice edge where whaling camps are
established. Barrow hunters monitor the development of the landfast ice
throughout the preceding months and possess a holistic perspective on how
environmental variables contribute to ice stability. In addition, individual
and community assessments of ice conditions and associated risks, customary
traditions and knowledge, and personal preference determine trail placement.
Partnering with local Barrow whalers , the authors analyze eight years worth
of whaling trail data, starting from 2001 (GPS-based and hand-drawn maps,
interviews, and written records), alongside a geophysical record of changing
landfast ice conditions. The sea ice near Barrow has been extensively
studied in recent years using satellite imagery, coastal radar, mass-balance
and sea-level monitoring, and multiple techniques for assessing ice
thickness. The paper also presents results of more thorough mapping of
trails in spring 2007 and 2008. Preliminary data suggest that a multi-year
documentation of whaling trails analyzed alongside a comprehensive set of
geophysical observations may provide insight into (1) how community-based
monitoring generates user-relevant data during the ice season, and (2) how
expressions of human use of the ice environment contribute to observations
of arctic environmental change and adaptation.
In the community of Wales, Alaska, over eighty words have been
documented for sigu (sea ice) in the local Inupiaq dialect in
2007–2008 for the ‘Wales Inupiaq Sea Ice Dictionary’ (Kingikmi Sigum
Qanuq Ilitaavut) prepared under the SIKU (IPY #166) project. Many
of the Inupiaq terms explain ice conditions that may pose hazards or are
dangerous to hunters. Years ago, the commonality of Inupiaq usage meant that
all hunters, young and old, knew of, or would readily learn about, these
dangerous conditions. Today, because English is the prime language, it is
more difficult for Elders and older hunters to pass information. Young
people use mainly English to tell about their hunt and what they have seen
on their hunting trips. That, in its way, is a very different way of
learning hunting safety. It is our hope that the collected Kingikmi words
for sea ice, numerous illustrations of ice forms, and explanations can help
young hunters supplement what they have learned in English about ice in the
Wales area. They may begin to understand the changing ice conditions as they
are affected by weather, winds, and currents. The Kingikmi ice ‘dictionary’
can be viewed as a link between the way the Elders communicated in the past
and today’s way of communicating. This book can also be seen as praise for
the youth who continue the Kingikmi way of life. The dictionary may help
preserve parts of it for generations to come.
Aslaksen,
Iulie, Statistics Norway, Research Department
Glomsrød,
Solveig, Statistics
Norway, Research Department
Abstract
The
purpose of this session is to gather and present papers with diverse
interdisciplinary approaches to the impacts of climate change and other
environmental problems on Arctic economy and livelihood, taking into account
environmental and social resilience, addressing precautionary approaches to
the environmental uncertainty and its consequences, and providing conceptual
and empirical approaches to sustainability and measurement of
sustainability. Diverse information bases are required to reflect how Arctic
livelihood relies on the intertwined nature of the market economy and the
subsistence economy. Precautionary perspectives are required to balance the
economic, environmental, social and ethical values of the economic
activities in the Arctic, in order to protect biological, environmental and
cultural diversity. This requires processes for stakeholder participation,
recognition of ethical values, integration of scientific and indigenous
knowledge, multi-criteria approaches to valuation of nature, and integrated
knowledge bases for evaluating sustainability.
Our
starting point is that the precautionary principle is a key issue within the
sustainable development framework. The purpose of the precautionary
principle is to provide guidelines for evaluating emerging technologies and
new economic activities in situations with uncertainty. We argue that to
deal properly with uncertainty there is a need to take into account both the
quality and the quantity of the present understanding. Traditionally,
quantitative methods, such as statistical measures and prediction error, are
most commonly used to characterise uncertainty. However, there is a growing
awareness that quantitative methods might not cover all aspects of
uncertainty. There is a great need for models and tools that can be used for
analyses of the qualitative and quantitative aspects of uncertainty that are
inherent in complex environmental and health issues. Such approaches, as for
instance the Walker & Harremöes (W&H) framework can be used to enable a
conceptual basis for the systematic evaluation of uncertainty, and to
stimulate communication between the scientists, regulators and other
stakeholders in identification of areas for further research and in decision
making. Another issue is that the harms that need to be avoided in a
sustainable context are often considered very broad. Hence we emphasises
that interpretation of the uncertainties involved, is partly a scientific
and partly a normative question. This implies that there is a need to
identify normative preferences; this will also help to guide the choice of
the precautionary measure to be taken. Identification of normative aspects
may be facilitated by approaches that take into account the multiple
perspectives of the scientists, the regulators and the public involved. We
suggest that multicriteria mapping can be used to supply framework for
policy analysis since this type of evaluation processes can be very
effective since it accomplishes the goals of being interdisciplinary,
participatory and transparent.
View Presentation.
Reindeer pastoralism is an
indigenous circumpolar livelihood involving more than 20 different
indigenous peoples around the entire circumpolar north. The livelihood
involves approximately 100,000 people and 2.5 million semi-domesticated
reindeer.
Comparative investigations of
the social organisation of reindeer pastoralists were conducted in two
regions: Western Finnmark in Northern Norway, and Yamal Peninsula of West
Siberia. Yamal Peninsula, home of Nentsy reindeer pastoralists, holds
around 200,000 reindeer, 20 % of the total number of semi-domesticated
reindeer in Russia, making Yamal area the largest reindeer herding region in
the world. The peninsula is inhabited by 15,000 people, of which 5,000 are
involved in reindeer pastoralism.
Western Finnmark is a central
Sámi reindeer pastoralism area holding around 80,000 reindeer, based in the
municipality of Guovdageaidnu on spring, autumn and winter pastures, while
migrating to coastal areas of Finnmark and North Troms during the summer.
Guovdageaidnu municipality has around 3,000 inhabitants, 1,300 of who are
involved in reindeer pastoralism.
Annual
mean temperatures are generally lower while snow depth is greater in Yamal
than in West Finnmark. On the other hand, variation in annual snow depths
and annual mean temperatures is considerably greater in Finnmark.
Despite
climatic differences, social organisation of Nentsy and Sámi reindeer
pastoralists show strong structural similarities, an organisation allowing
herders the freedom to determine the structure and size of the herd
according to available natural resources, to determine the best strategy for
migration. The flexibility of this system is therefore an important factor
in ensuring resilience for the livelihood.
View Presentation.
Aslaksen, Iulie, Glomsrød, Solveig
and Myhr, Anne I.
Diverse
and interdisciplinary information is required to reflect how Arctic
indigenous people rely on the intertwined nature of the market and
subsistence economy and how they are impacted by climate change.
Precautionary perspectives on adaptation and sustainability are required to
balance the economic, environmental, and ethical values of Arctic
communities, in order to protect biological, environmental and cultural
diversity. We survey different sources of knowledge
about indigenous people on the interface between subsistence and market
participation, and how they are impacted by climate change and economic
development. The role of production by indigenous households in terms of
hunting, harvesting and own production is only partly assessed by using
market values and ignoring costs of own production. These biases represent
shortcomings and failure to understand the real incentives underlying
decisions of indigenous people. Hence, there is insufficient capacity to
foresee the impact of economic development and climate change on their
livelihood. Within anthropological literature there is a substantial amount
of data that can be used for a more complete value assessment. Most
important is the documentation of time use (subjective labor costs) in
various production activities. Our survey of the components of both the
production and consumption side of indigenous livelihood will help to build
more integrated knowledge. We will draw on our contact with Saami University
College in Kautokeino to focus on Saami subsistence living, their
interaction with market economy and adaptation to climate change, and
compare with case studies of other indigenous people in the Arctic.
View Presentation.
Coastal
communities in Northern Norway are faced with a number of social, economic
and environmental sustainability challenges in addition to climate change.
Many communities are closely connected to, and depend upon, access to and
sustainable use of natural resources such as fisheries, oil and gas
activities, reindeer herding and the production and consumption of country
foods, and are sensitive to changes that disrupt these resources. In this
paper we discuss findings from case studies undertaken within the
IPY-endorsed EU 6th Framework programme DAMOCLES (Developing
Arctic Monitoring and Observing Capabilities for Long-term Environmental
Studies) project. The case studies, in Hammerfest, Western Finnmark County,
and Lebesby, Eastern Finnmark County, document past, current and potential
future human responses to climate and biophysical variability in the Barents
Sea region, with a particular focus on community vulnerability and
adaptation in the coastal fisheries sector. The research applies a coupled
social-ecological approach to investigate how the interactions between
natural, social, economic, political and institutional systems play out in
the two communities. Using a combination of methods, including community
consultations, socio-ecological modeling, and analyses of marine biological,
statistical, and archival data, we explore how the particular combination
of characteristics associated with the two communities, such as geographic
location, mix of economic opportunities, sustainability of the resources,
community perceptions, and demographic trends, interact with past, current
and projected climate and environmental changes and changes in coupled
systems at higher levels to create specific place-based vulnerabilities and
adaptation options. View
Presentation.
This paper
focuses on agricultural production in Iceland while making the arguments
that intensification and diversification of farming activities within the
last 15 years are playing a most critical positive role in sustainable
economic development and community viability, and that these processes
should be observed closely and figure prominently in the collective
discussion on sustainable Arctic livelihoods in view of climate change that
may be advancing the potential for Arctic crop production while declining
the conditions for overall global food production.
After
enduring a multifaceted crisis in recent decades, farming within Iceland has
emerged, in part due to strong state-support, as diverse modes of
subsistence and market production, including increasingly efficient
production of beef, pork and poultry; greenhouse cultivation of vegetables
and aquaculture; forest cultivation and soil conservation; and activities
connected with tourism, craft-production and education.
This paper
takes issues with the view (notably expresses by many economists) that state
support to Icelandic farmers has decreased the well-being of society,
compared to what it would be if Icelanders relied more heavily on imported
agricultural products. The paper delivers arguments premised on a
precautionary approach to show how state support for agriculture helps
sustains high employment rates and rural community viability; provides the
population with safer and better-preferred foods; has made agriculture and
other farm-related activities increasingly sustainable; and is an investment
guaranty against the most serious effects of potential future crises in
fisheries, of an increasing reliance on the severe exploitation of the
cheapest labor power in an uncertain world, and of the predicted future
reduction in world-wide agricultural production due to climate change.
View Presentation.
This presentation is a
synopsis of my Ph.D theses. In 1995 the discussion of climatic change was
not yet so widespread in media or among Northernes as it is today. However,
already during that time the Inari and Teno river Sami dwellers in Finland
had noticed a wide range of different environmental and climatic changes
around themselves. What has happened during the past 13 years in Inari
region? The climatic change has become to be a common topic in the
discussions of Arctic areas among the local adaminstratives, politicians
and scientists. Most of the conclutions of the scientific research projects
indicate the simalar results to those ones, which the local Sami pointed out
as early as 1990´s .
Therefore, one could
conclude, that nothing comes to the East-Sápmi without people seeing it -
in other words, these changes are not sudden or suprising. In this paper I
define the concepts of Sami learning and gaing skills under the various
weather conditions during the past 100 years on the individual and community
level. By the help of these concepts, I can describe the current situation
and the present solutions in rendeerherding management for the future
survival.
Reindeer
herding is a climate-dependant traditional economy undergoing rapid change.
Travelling from the Barents Sea (70º21' N; 31º07' E) on dogsleds over a
distance of 1,480 kilometres to the Atlantic (68º10' N, 19º33' E), the five
members of Finnmark-2007 have been conducting fieldwork with Sámi
reindeer-herders and government wildlife rangers (Utmarksoppsyn),
identifying observable patterns of change as seen by local resource users.
The proposed paper presents the most significant assessments, encounters,
and cultural landscapes drawn from this IPY journey. Through a
centre-periphery analysis it presents the political dimensions of climate
change where government is perceived as the main driver of change. Finally,
the paper compares the reindeer-herding situation in Finnmark with the one
in other tundra parts of the Barents Region and stresses the Flyt Sámi's
role within the global system.
View Presentation.
Determining whether climate is changing and to what extent humans may be
contributing requires vast knowledge in glaciology, climatology, physics,
etc. Such knowledge production ends up creating a place where global warming
is especially measurable – Greenland is reduced to being a source of data.
Geographer Robert Sack writes that to achieve true progress in making the
world a better place, we must study it in a way that increases the variety
and complexity of the world itself. Environmental knowledge generated by
living in Greenland and relying upon its resources for survival interwoven
with environmental knowledge formed from scientific fieldwork provides a
richer understanding of the reality of global climate change. Promoting
dialog between the different methods of coming to know the world ensures
awareness and allows for the possibility of a collaborative form of
experiencing and knowing the world. I will present preliminary results from
participant observation, interviews, and archival work conducted in
Greenland from May to July, 2008.
Meek,
Chanda L., University of Alaska,
Dept. of Natural Resources Management
Abstract
Arctic
coastal communities share a close relationship with their environment
(termed here as a social-ecological system) consisting of the communities,
their environments and the social institutions developed to sustain the
system. Marine mammals constitute a large portion of the subsistence diet
for these communities, and as such represent key ecological services
provided by the system. At the same time, marine mammals have gained iconic
status for climate change in the North. A tension results between the
demands of balancing on the one hand good policy optics consistent with
national and international norms and, on the other hand, flexible, adaptive
institutions able to take on the task of managing in a dynamic, changing
North. This tension and associated policy solutions such as co-management
are explored in a series of papers focusing on marine mammal management
dilemmas and policy practices around the circumpolar North.
This paper
examines to what extent American federal polar bear policy “fits” with
social-ecological system dynamics in Northern Alaska. “Fit” is a metric
focused on how well institutional characteristics match the system
characteristics they seek to address[1].
Rapid social and ecological (SES) changes in the North make fit a
particularly important factor for addressing the conservation of
ice-dependent species as the Northern seas become warmer. Over the past
thirty years, polar bear management in Alaska has developed from a state
management regime focusing on sport hunting to a cross-scale co-management
regime focused on subsistence hunting. In the present time, local community
needs have changed so that polar bear co-management now includes strategies
to minimize human/bear interactions, defense of life and property takes, and
hunting for cultural use. While the SES dynamics have changed, the de jure
federal polar bear regime has essentially continued to use the same tools
for managing the subsistence hunt. Through ethnographic fieldwork, analysis
of government documents, and interviews, we answer the following questions:
Do existing and proposed polar bear policy tools address key drivers of
polar bear mortality, survivorship, and human uses? Do current and proposed
policies exist at an appropriate scale? What are the effects of political
influences on decision-making in this issue? The Alaskan case study answers
these questions primarily through a qualitative policy implementation
analysis, but will also include a social network analysis of
self-organization among local hunters and their articulation to federal
policy mandates. The results inform not only U.S. but circumpolar
management of ice-dependent species.
View Presentation.
This paper
focuses on a dilemma that emerged when the grey seal population in the
Baltic Sea recovered after a few decades of stagnation. The seals now cause
substantial economic losses to coastal fisheries that had technologically
and geographically adapted to an environment with few seals.
The paper
analyzes attempts to ease fishermen's problems in a situation, in which a
marine mammal species that is a top predator with high conservation value,
causes economic losses to a fishery that was already economically stagnating
before the seal population recovered. The seals once were an economic corner
stone of coastal livelihood in some regions in Finland, which adds a further
layer on the problem dynamics. Several initiatives in forms of hunting of
seals, technical development and economic compensations have been
introduced. The paper asks what kind of problem framings the initiatives
perform and in what respects they can support sustainability of
socio-ecological system built around a coastal fishery that is necessarily
linked to the faith of the grey seals.
View Presentation.
Increasingly, academics and practitioners working in the field of resource
and environmental management, and related areas, are coming to recognize
change as a defining characteristic of social-ecological systems. This
being the case, adaptive capacity – the capacity to alter institutions,
policies, and plans to better reflect knowledge, as it evolves - is emerging
as a central goal of coastal and marine management initiatives worldwide.
Adaptive co-management, in particular, links the iterative learning
dimension of adaptive management with the linkages/networks dimension of
collaborative management, and may be particularly appropriate in Arctic
contexts – which are typically characterized by rapid change and the
convergence of multiple perspectives.
Working in
the context of narwhal co-management in Arctic Bay, Nunavut, this paper
explores how goals of adaptive management and collaborative management may
be simultaneously achieved, and the policies which facilitate or impede the
realization of these goals. Although the Nunavut Final Agreement has
provided a legislative framework for shared decision-making, effectively
integrating scientific knowledge and Inuit knowledge of narwhal remains a
significant challenge, and this limits adaptive capacity. The paper
suggests that some areas of narwhal management are flexible (e.g., quota
allocation), and should remain so, while other areas are more rigid than has
been recognized (e.g., quota). Understanding how these features of
management impede collaboration and the development of adaptive capacity is
relevant to policy development and a better understanding of the human
dimensions of marine mammal management in the Arctic.
The Arctic
has drawn the considerable attentions of global climate change
“enthusiasts”, not least because the polar bear (Ursus maritimus)
usefully serves as an icon of the worst environmental case: the extinction
of this apex predator because of loss of habitat as the Arctic Ocean becomes
increasingly ice free. One of the strategies for moderating the bear’s
situation is to constrain the consumptive use of the species, specifically
by placing regulatory constraints on the harvesting of polar bears for
sport.
This paper
looks at the potential effects of these efforts on Inuit subsistence economy
and culture, of which nanuq as been a traditional part, in the
Nunavut Territory of Canada. In so doing, it relates the emergence of the
sport hunt as an aspect of the Inuit subsistence system as an outcome of
external efforts to protect an earlier icon, seals, and then examines the
contribution of polar bear sport hunting to the overall flow of traditional
foods in the Inuit community of Clyde River. In so doing, it is suggested
that trophy hunting by wealthy non-Inuit has a systemic role within Inuit
subsistence that has been ignored as governments and environmental
organizations rush to mitigate the “polar bear crisis”.
The management of beluga
whales in Nunavik, northern Quebec, continues to be one of the most
contentious conservation issues in the Canadian Arctic. Since the mid-1980s,
the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has sought to increase
beluga whale numbers on the east coast of Hudson Bay and Ungava Bay,
following population decline due to commercial whaling in previous
centuries. These populations of belugas continue to play cultural, economic
and nutritional roles in the lives of Nunavik Inuit. Since 2002, the
management of belugas has become increasingly regulated, with attempted
enforcement of hunting quotas, open hunting seasons, and rules regarding the
conduct of the hunt, with resulting economic and social implications for
Inuit communities. While DFO regards the management of belugas as one of
biological conservation, Inuit situate the management of whales within
narratives of cultural imperialism. The current beluga situation is compared
to the slaughter of sled dogs, the relocation of Inuit, and the residential
school system of previous decades. DFO can be forgiven for not being aware
of these sensibilities. While its attention remains focused on the recovery
of whales, Inuit feel increasingly aggrieved. To ensure greater involvement
of Inuit in the formulation of policy, governments at all levels must become
aware of the broader historical and political processes that Inuit perceive
to be at the root of current management practices. Only by dispelling
concerns about cultural imperialism and developing trust can DFO and Inuit
meaningfully work together to ensure the vitality of beluga populations.
Dana,
Leo, Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and
Places in the Global Economy
Abstract
Throughout the Arctic, Rangifer tarandus has been central to the survival of
man. This species has been herded by 20 different Arctic peoples. Until the
latter part of the 20th century, a self-employed Sámi could subsist on 250
reindeer. Human existence reflected the needs of herds, and rather than
manage their reindeer, herders read their queues and followed the herds.
Non-breeding male reindeer were useful in that they helped females find food
in winter. When an animal was slaughtered, care was taken to minimise pain
and to avoid waste; every part of a reindeer was used. Today, snowmobiles,
GPS technology, helicopters, and increased regulation are transforming the
sector; many Sámi have already been pushed into other jobs. Will herding be
reduced to an element of the food industry? If so, how will this change the
essence and efficiency of their community-based entrepreneurship will be
undermined?
The “Voices
of the Caribou People” is a video-based project to document the knowledge of
Indigenous Peoples who traditionally have a close relationship with caribou
(Rangifer tarandus, known as reindeer in Eurasia). The objective of
the project is to document major local and global challenges being faced by
the caribou people, as they view them. The project gathers perspectives from
different communities of the caribou people and communicates them to other
Indigenous Peoples, scientists, and the general public. We visit 5-6
indigenous high-latitude communities in the summer of 2008. We work with
local organizations within these communities to document local impressions
of people’s relationship with the caribou, their perceived changes about
caribou as well as caribou hunting and uses, and concerns regarding people’s
way of life and future. This is used to create short video-sketches of 15-20
minutes durations for each participating community. A community leader, an
elder, a youth and an active caribou hunter are interviewed about the
changes and how the community is responding to those changes. The final
product will be a consolidated report and a set of documentary films, to be
hosted on CARMA (Circum-Arctic Rangifer Monitoring and Assessment) Network
website for free viewing. The information gathered provides an opportunity
to compare and contrast circumpolar perspectives about Human-Caribou Systems
by Caribou People during the International Polar Year.
View Presentation.
The break-up
of the Soviet Union in 1991 had a substantial impact on reindeer pastoral
societies across the former territories of the USSR. The effect of the
upheaval, however, was curiously asymmetrical. In parts of the east (e.g.,
Chukotka, Evenkia, and eastern and southern Yakutia), the number of
semi-domesticated reindeer declined by as much as 50-90% within 8 years of
the dissolution of the former regime; in the west, by contrast, numbers
remained largely unchanged or even increased. This divergent pattern
developed despite broadly similar socio-economic and political developments
across the Russian North. A number of ad-hoc regional explanations exist,
however, they can neither be applied to other regions nor solve the
conundrum. Based on a combination of anthropological field material and
existing published and archival sources, we have discovered a link between
the extent to which Soviet policies transformed the socio-technological
systems of various reindeer herding peoples and the subsequent decline in
the number of semi-domesticated reindeer following the break-up of the
Soviet State. Indeed, our findings suggest that it is the modification of
herding systems, many becoming reliant on Soviet inputs (e.g.,
transportation, subsidies for materials), that rendered them vulnerable to
post-socialist change. It would appear that those systems that were most
modified witnessed the greatest decline.
View Presentation.
The Reindeer
Portal (www.reindeerportal.org) is a project of the International Centre for
Reindeer Husbandry , which is a Norwegian organization based in Kautokeino,
Norway, which also acts as the secretariat of the Association of World
Reindeer Herders. Kautokeino is in the heart of the largest area of reindeer
husbandry in the Sami region. The goal of the Reindeer Portal is that it
becomes an authoritative source of information about all aspects of reindeer
husbandry. Where the Reindeer Portal intends to be unique is that it is
built from within areas of reindeer husbandry using an open source content
management platform and hosted by the Arctic Portal, an Icelandic Arctic
Council project. With minimal training, multiple authors in multiple sites
are able to provide information, content and insight into the world of
reindeer husbandry from within the community, and from scientific and
administrative perspective. This speaks to two important goals of the
Reindeer Portal: building competence locally and creating avenues for local
knowledge production. The Reindeer Portal is also intended as a pedagogical
tool for students within reindeer husbandry and as it develops, a tool for
students outside reindeer husbandry who are interested in the background,
themes and challenges facing reindeer husbandry. The Reindeer Portal also
hosts relevant webcasts, seminars and documents related to reindeer
husbandry. The Portal is operated and produced in English, Russian and Sami.
The paper will highlight the features of the Reindeer Portal and discuss the
challenges that arise from multiple authorship and means of engaging
community participation.
Ogilvie, Astrid E.J.,
Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research,
University of Colorado
Abstract
With a firm basis in issues pertinent to the
International Polar Year of 2007-2008, this session is based around themes
central to three separate projects led by Astrid Ogilvie. These are: i)
Human and Social Dynamics in Mývatnssveit, Northern Iceland, from the
Settlement to the Present; ii) Northern Narratives: Social and Geographical
Accounts from Norway, Iceland and Canada (NORSAGA); and iii) Syntheses of
Sea-Ice, Climate and Human Systems in the Arctic and Subarctic (SYNICE). All
three projects have an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approach and
seek to synthesize elements from both the natural and social sciences. Data
are drawn from such diverse areas as historical records, meteorological
observations, and traditional ecological knowledge. The major emphasis of
the session will be on a theme common to all three projects: the impact of
climatic changes on environments dominated by water (both coastal and
inland). The coastal communities to be discussed (in presentations by Gaston
Demarée, Brian Hill, Níels Einarsson, Ingibjörg Jónsdóttir, Maxine Van Eye
and Anna Heilman) concern changes primarily in sea-ice cover or related
issues. The inland communities to be considered (in presentations by Brown,
Nordli and Ogilvie) involve changes that are in some ways less direct and
immediate but which are also far-reaching. The context for all the
presentations lies in the social change of recent times, as well as the
rapid climate change which is currently underway particularly in Arctic
regions. Records of increasing temperatures, melting glaciers, reductions in
extent and thickness of sea ice, thawing permafrost, and rising sea level
all highlight the recent warming in the Arctic and Subarctic. Evidence for
these changes has now become overwhelming (as documented in the recent IPCC
Working Group I report) and covers many scientific disciplines spanning
climatology and sea-ice studies as well as the documentation provided by the
traditional knowledge of elders and hunters from all regions of the
circumpolar north. One change that has become increasingly evident is the
rate at which Arctic sea ice is melting. Very recent research suggests that,
in fact, the observed changes are even more rapid than predicted by climate
models (see
http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2007/seaice.shtml). This
endorses the concerns voiced by indigenous populations regarding the threat
of diminishing sea ice to their traditional ways of life and what is
occurring with sila – the Inuktitut word that means “climate and all things
that surround human beings”. The changes are not limited to Polar ocean and
coastal regions, but also affect other areas presently covered by ice and
snow. Thus, for example, rivers fed by mountain glaciers could run dry or
change their course. Clearly, human and animal populations are impacted
across the Arctic. Using a synthesis of different types of evidence, this
session will examine the nature of these changes.
View Presentation.
The focus of
this presentation is recent environmental and social changes in Valdres in
the Oppland district in southeastern Norway. This area stretches from broad
farmlands in the south to the Rondane, Dovre and Jotunheimen mountain ranges
in the north. The total population of Oppland is 184,000 (compare with
Labrador’s 27,860 and Iceland’s total population of just over 300,000). The
area includes high mountain terrain as well as tracts of forests and also
agricultural landscapes with a focus on sheep and cattle as the main farming
activities. Other important economic practices are forestry, and the
production of rakfisk, preserved trout. Fish in lakes and streams
provided an important supplement to the diet in the past, and continue to do
so today. The area has a rich cultural heritage, and archaeological findings
show a large and well-organized community in existence 3000 years ago. It
thus forms a long-established farming community where many traditional
practices are still maintained. One in particular is stølsbruk
(transhumance) which involves bringing livestock up to the lush mountain
pastures for the summer months. This particular type of summer farming has
been crucial for the development of agriculture in Norway and has been in
place for at least a thousand years, perhaps much longer. The presentation
will discuss the origins and forms of this practice as well as the reasons
why it is dying out. As in Iceland and Labrador, such traditional economic
practices are being replaced by tourism.
View Presentation.
The history
of instrumental meteorological observations in Labrador/Nunatsiavut, Canada,
began in August 1771 when the Unitas Fratrum, also known as the “Moravian
Brethren”, established a mission among the Inuit on the Labrador coast. The
Brethren named this place “Nain” after a city mentioned in the New Testament
of the Bible. The missionaries included learned men, trained in the field of
natural sciences, and in October of 1771 they began to undertake
instrumental meteorological observations. These observations have been
continued, in one form or another, to the present day.
The authors
of this paper are researching the climatic history of the
Labrador/Nunatsiavut region by tracing the records and publications of the
meteorological observations of the Moravian missionaries to be found in
scientific publications of the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth
centuries.
This paper
will deal with climate impacts and sea-ice changes as evidenced in the
observations of the Moravian missionaries in Labrador/Nunatsiavut. It seeks
to elucidate knowledge of these old records by placing them in the context
of the research field of historical climatology and climate change and, at
the same time, to honour the Moravian missionary observers for their
valuable contribution to knowledge of climatic change.
View Presentation.
Annual
sea-ice extent and distribution for the past 200 years has been derived for
the east coast of Canada off Newfoundland and Labrador over the Grand Banks,
and also for the Gulf of St. Lawrence area to the west and southwest of
Newfoundland extending to the east coast of Nova Scotia. The historical ice
extent was based on observations from transiting vessels and from
shore-based light stations which were recorded by a number of sources but
primarily from marine related newspapers and publications. More recently,
sea-ice extent has been assessed by the Canadian Ice Service. The
International Ice Patrol (IIP) has also been recording ice information,
particularly the number of icebergs south of 48°N each year, since the time
of the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, and they have an estimate of the
annual number of bergs back to 1910. Recently unearthed U.S. Hydrographic
Office publications, presently being transcribed, will enhance the IIP
estimate for these early years, and will, together with other source
material, permit iceberg numbers to be derived at least as far back as 1870.
The combination of sea ice and iceberg information for the east coast for
the last 100 to 200 years will serve as a strong indicator of the strength
of the Labrador Current and of forcing by the North Atlantic Oscillation
(NAO). This presentation will consider trends in the sea-ice records in
comparison with the NAO as well as with other regional sea-ice records.
View Presentation.
Birch
(Betula pubescens) is a key tree species in the reforestation plans for
Iceland where only five percent of the original forests present in the time
of the settlement of the island remain. Birch is also a key species in terms
of cultural symbolism and national identity and is preferred before plants
branded as non-native, foreign and imported species in the Icelandic
ecosystem. The fly in the ointment is that birch pollen is a very powerful
allergen and thousands of Icelanders already suffer every year the symptoms
related to birch pollen allergy. This ranges from discomfort to more serious
infections and asthma. The symptoms affect people's ability to live normal
everyday lives and poses for some serious problems, including being away
from work, which also may have considerable and negative impacts on the
national economy. With large scale plans for reforestation together with,
for birch, more favourable climatic conditions, we can expect significantly
increased birch pollen in the atmosphere in Iceland with concomitant impacts
on public health. This paper discusses the interplay between cultural
attitudes to trees, reforestation plans, and the complex, cumulative and
sometimes unexpected issues involved in the discourse on Arctic climate
change.
Climate
reconstructions back to the 18th century will be presented based on data
from Norwegian farmers’ diaries. The data are the timing of grain harvest (a
proxy for mean spring-summer temperature) and ice break-up on lakes (a proxy
for late winter-early spring temperature).
The
reconstructions of spring-summer temperature describe a changing climate
from the Little Ice Age to present. There are positive trends in all
reconstructions giving a general picture of increasing temperature, but they
also show substantial variations on different time scales.
The
reconstructions of late winter early spring temperatures also show a
significant trend towards milder climate. The mild winters in the 1990s and
early 21st century are unprecedented during the whole series. The lowest
temperatures in the series are seen in the period of the Dalton Sunspot
Minimum in the early 19th century.
Examples of
narratives taken from the diaries will also be presented, showing the
farmers’ situation in extremely cold periods.
In the past Alaska’s rural
communities have expressed their resilient nature to changing patterns of
social and economic change. With colonization opportunities for monetary
income such as the now century old Bristol Bay fishery were adapted within
the seasonal pattern of resource gathering and out of this came a new mixed
economic system of wage labor supporting the traditional subsistence
economy. However, in recent years rural communities are undergoing more
rapid social and cultural changes. In Southwest Alaska recent studies
documenting the subsistence economy and traditional ecological knowledge
have centered on the communities that inhabit the Kvichak Watershed, which
is comprised of Iliamna Lake and Lake Clark. Some of these studies are
partially due to a proposed copper and gold mine. Residents during these
studies have expressed concern that social and cultural changes are also
happening in an environment where they are also seeing rapid ecological
changes. These changes included climate variability and unpredictable
weather. This creates an environment that is difficult to plan for
subsistence hunting and fishing while continuing to take into consideration
a work schedule, the money from which provides the means and materials for
engaging in subsistence. This paper will examine factors of change and ask
the question of whether we can assess the impacts of climate variability and
change on rural communities in Southwest Alaska without also trying to
understand cultural and social sustainability within the larger dynamic
context in which these changes are occurring.
View Presentation.
This project
seeks to advance knowledge through partnering with Viliui Sakha communities,
Turkic-speaking horse and cattle agropastoralists of northeastern Siberia,
Russia, to explore ways to effectively address the local issues of climate
change. The four-village, three-year study is a collaborative effort
involving the active participation of village inhabitants, native
specialists and field assistants, an in-country research community and
international collaboration. The project is founded on the PI’s fifteen
years of ongoing research and work with Viliui Sakha communities and on her
fluency in both the Sakha and Russian languages. The project objectives are
to: 1) Develop community-levels rosters of past and present knowledge of and
adaptation to climate change; 2) Operationalize those roster data to develop
measures and gauge the resilience and adaptive capacity of households and
communities facing GCC; 3) Document local elders’ knowledge about climate
change that is both applicable and pragmatic for use in contemporary
village-level adaptive schemes; 4) Survey the relevant western science on
GCC (beginning in-country and moving to international) in order to fill the
gaps in local knowledge to facilitate community-level adaptation and
understanding; 5) Appraise policy efforts at the local, regional, Republic
and national levels for their utility and make recommendations accordingly.
Methods to be employed include: focus groups, semi-structured interviews,
surveys and secondary data analysis. This paper provides a general overview
and context for the project and includes some of the research team’s
preliminary findings of their first summer field season, 2008.
Seasonality
of temperature, the difference between summer and winter temperatures, is
one of the most important characteristics of climate and plays a significant
role in determining the surface characteristics of the ocean. Reconstructing
seasonality on a regional scale is vital for gaining a better understanding
of the climate dynamics of the past including the extent and rate of change
of natural climate variability. Focusing on regions that are sensitive to
forcing mechanisms and that influence large-scale atmospheric and oceanic
circulation patterns will further enhance the understanding of past climate.
The north Icelandic shelf is one such region - it is situated between
opposing atmospheric/oceanic fronts, making it particularly sensitive to
changes in North Atlantic climate regimes.
d18O values
derived from micromilled mollusks recovered from near-shore marine cores in
northwest Iceland quantify significant seasonal temperature variability over
the period 360 BC to AD 1660. Notable cold periods (360 BC to 240 BC; AD
410; and AD 1380 to 1420) and warm periods (230 BC to AD 140 and AD 640 to
760) are resolved in terms of maximum and minimum annual sea temperatures
and seasonal temperature variability. Comparison with historical records
such as the Viking Sagas and population data of Iceland and Greenland
demonstrates the significant impact of seasonal variations of climate on the
establishment and evolution of societies in the North Atlantic.
View Presentation.
In recent years, sea-ice extent has decreased dramatically
in the Northern hemisphere and record low was reached in September 2007.
Mild ice conditions, especially in the summer months, are likely to result
in increased ship traffic in these regions. Whilst this development can
offer great opportunities for communities in the North, people are also
concerned about navigational safety. Sea ice and icebergs will still be
present in these waters for a big part of the year and careful monitoring of
the conditions will become more important, not least if the annual
variability is great. The consequences of a ship colliding with ice could be
devastating for people and the environment, especially in the case of big
oil tankers or tourist ships.
The varying
extent of sea ice, and in particular severe sea-ice years, had detrimental
effects on the Icelandic society in the past. The sea ice was the only
phenomena that could at the same time affect all means of survival in the
country: Prevent fishing off the coasts, ruin the harvest for farmers, and
hinder transport to other countries. In the most severe years, sea ice
blocked more than half of the coast line, and caused intense cooling of the
climate. In the worst cases, this resulted in a famine.
Various
historical sources have been analyzed to study the sea-ice history of
Iceland in the past, and recent trends and dialogue are studied in order to
predict future impacts of sea ice in Iceland.
View Presentation.
The colonization of the western Atlantic islands took a
prominent place in Medieval history thanks to the exceptional accounts
inscribed in the Medieval old-Icelandic sagas, which describe people
determined in their heroic attempts to establish new homes in distant lands.
Traditionally, the blame for the later depopulation of the Greenlandic
outpost was laid on the worsening climatic conditions, which at the end of
the Middle Ages led to the co called “Little Ice Age”. However, researchers
dealing with this story have also started to point rather to the concurrence
of cultural constraints which contributed to the final failure of the first
European attempt to colonize the western Atlantic coast. Nowadays,
paradigmatic contrasting of nature with culture is regarded as a
methodological weakness, which hinders us to perceive a vast complexity of
causes and effects. But, perhaps, the issue should be looked upon from a
totally different point of view? Perhaps our belief in the extinction of the
Greenland colony is only a myth, attractive by its mysteriousness. This way
we lose the juxtaposition of “success” and “failure”, undoubtedly attractive
from a storyteller’s perspective, and move our attention to the different
strategies of adaptation. Whatever the case: in the 15th century,
after ca 500 years of belonging to European civilization, Greenland
“returned” to the sphere of cultures whose members had specialized for
millennia in the exploitation of the circum-arctic areas.
The
underlying factors of species fluctuating population dynamics has been the
dominant focus of attention in population ecology throughout much of this
century. In arctic regions where a severe climate with high seasonal and
annual variability and simplistic ecosystems prevail, species of fish, birds
and mammals display distinct population fluctuations of varying temporal and
spatial scale. In Greenland, historical records, archaeological findings and
oral accounts passed on from Inuit elders all document that the presence of
wildlife species and their population sizes have undergone pronounced
fluctuations throughout recordable historical time. The most detailed
accounts are found for the species that were harvested or had economical
value. While several recent studies from northern latitudes have shown the
relative roles of climate, the exogenous and endogenous environment of
species and man as factors driving species population dynamics, the relative
contributions and potential interactions among these factors remains
unsolved. In Greenland, these fluctuations in the harvests of individual
species are believed to be related to changes in climate, as well as
variations in hunting pressure. Dating back 200 years, these hunting records
therefore represent a unique time series for retrospective modelling of
annual and decadal fluctuations in relation to long-term climatic data,
environmental factors and temporal variations in social and demographic
parameters in the existing society. The results of this study model future
predictions of wildlife populations under changing climate variables and
human hunting pressure.
View Presentation.
Churikova, Victoria, Novosibirsk State University
Abstract
In this session "Challenges in tourism today: ethno- and
ecotourism in Kamchatka" we are going to talk about new realities of life
and tourism in Kamchatka. Vladimir Sevostyanov will present his report
"Specially protected territories (reserves, refugees, parks) and aboriginal
units as an effective structure to conserve biodiversity; development of
ecological tourism, game-preserves and demonstration of principles of
sustainable development in Kamchatka". Peter Bekkerov, the head of the Union
of Itelmen Families, will talk about creation of the real ethno- tourist
ground near Elizovo, Kamchatka. And Victoria Churikova will cover all the
other activities and examples in this field in Kamchatka.
McCollum, Daniel W., Ostergren, David, Watson,
Alan, Kruger, Linda and Fix, Peter
The
Kamchatka Peninsula is emerging as a nature-based recreation destination
within Russia. Federal and regional protected areas, including several
“World Heritage Sites,” attract visitors from other areas of Russia and from
around the world. Activities include: camping, hiking, hunting, fishing,
bear watching, rafting, skiing, and hot springs use, among others.
Knowledge regarding those visitors is only anecdotal. Research is underway
to document and begin to understand who those visitors are, where they go,
and what they do. This paper looks at summer and fall season visitors to
Kamchatka, and considers their spending patterns and amounts. Similarities
and differences in spending between different types of visitors will be
explored and reported.
View Overview
Presentation. View
Presentation.
Itelmen
community “Pimchakh” is a tribal community existing now in Elizovo
region, Kamchatka, Russia. In this paper we investigate its history briefly
and compare its organization with the norms declared in the Federal Law of
Russia № 104-FL. The purpose of this work is to characterize the experience
of “Pimchakh” community and to give an assessment of its utility for other
communities of indigenous people.
We are
briefly characterizing the history of the Itelmen people and this certain
community. We specially emphasize the existence of the “School of revival
of Itelmen traditions” where children of Itelmens are studying Itelmen
language (which is considered to be practically lost) and are also learning
how to make wooden, bone and other crafts in a traditional way.
In 2000, the
community started to build the “Museum under the open sky”, 7 kilometers
from the Settlement Sosnovka, at the bottom of the hill Ostraya, which is
considered to be a sacred one. The members of the community tried to
recreate the ancient view of the Itelmen village on the basis of
archeological research. Nowadays the Museum includes several summer and
winter dwellings with the inner decorations.
Keeping the
Museum is expensive. That is why the community works in contact with the
local tourist firms, using its Museum as a tourist object. The members of
the community dance, sing and cook there in a traditional way. The community
also organizes festivals and receives support from the local authorities for
this purpose. This helps members of the community to earn some money and
survive on the general background of unemployment among indigenous people.
This experience seems to be very positive and may be regarded as an example
for other communities of Kamchatka and Russia.
We will
accompany our presentation with a video show and are planning to organize an
exhibition of pictures and crafts of Itelmen community.
View Presentation.
Living in
Kamchatka for all my life and being the head of the indigenous Union of
Itelmen Families from 1990, I and my colleagues decided to establish the
hunting grounds for our community only recently. We are going to develop
different kinds of international tourism on these lands, build the original
Itelmen dwellings and develop the traditional mode of life there.
But we meet
with extreme difficulties, such as lack of infrastructure, absence of norms
and regulations in this sphere, and very poor support from the local
authorities. Being present at the international congress of this scale, I
am going to exchange information and find some support on the exchange
basis. View Presentation.
Challenges
in tourism today: ethno- and ecotourism in Kamchatka which is going to be
united with Daniela Tommasini ‘s session Arctic Tourism: Resources and
Development under the common name Challenges in tourism to day in Kamchatka
and Greenland.
In this
paper I will show the modern situation of economical development and tourism
in Kamchatka. At the moment Kamchatka hosts 5-7 thousand tourists a year
which is ridiculously low to compare it with Alaska. This number could
increase to 1 million people. We are going to talk about the obstacles to
the normal development process and the ways to achieve good results. We are
going to focus on ethno-and ecological tourism as we involve the
representatives of the indigenous communities and have personal experience
in this field.
Colleagues
from the Universities and Agencies within Russia and the United States
together with the World Wilderness Congress and the UNDP Kamchatka Protected
Area Project are also involved.
View Presentation.
Southcott, Chris, Lakehead University
Abele, Frances
Natcher, David C.
Abstract
Communities in the Circumpolar North are currently facing
substantial social and economic challenges, and it is plain that these will
grow in the short and medium term. The impacts of climate change intensified
international pressure on northern non-renewable resources, and the
substantial demands on human energy and ingenuity that will be required to
realize the dreams embodied in the modern treaties and new forms of
self-government will bring ever greater pressures to bear on the small
populations and small governments of the region. In Canada, the federal
government has recently funded a new research consortium focused on northern
community development. The research project, which is just beginning, is
based upon a holistic analysis of the contemporary northern political
economy. It intends to explore the potential in civil society and in public
policy for building upon the strengths of what has been called ‘the social
economy’ to provide northerners with a means for responding successfully to
the massive challenges they now face.
Although
this term social economy is not widely used in the Circumpolar North, the
ideas and relationships that are the foundation of what others are now
referring to as social economy are prevalent throughout the region and are
often referred to as community economic development. The central notion of
both these terms is that they include economic activities that are not
state-driven and not profit-driven. They include a large “third sector” that
is often ignored. In the North, it can be argued that the traditional
economy of indigenous societies can be considered part of the social economy
in that much of its pre-capitalist values still play an important role in
the region and act in contradiction to the profit-seeking values of
contemporary “affluent” society.
The
proposed session will discuss some of the early findings of the Canadian
project and examine similar issues in other areas of the Circumpolar North.
While there
have been indications that the social economy forms an important part of
communities in Northern Canada, there has yet to be any systematic analysis
of this belief. This paper will present a portrait of the social economy in
Northern Canada. It is based on the initial portraiture survey of the Social
Economy Research Network in Northern Canada. It will point out several
distinctive aspects of the social economy such as its relative importance,
its main characteristics, and regional variations.
Most
academic research on northern economic development has focused on federal
policy and programs or, separately, upon the dynamics of mixed community
economies. Most policy research by territorial governments has addressed,
very naturally, development and diversification opportunities. Both strands
of work have made important contributions to our understanding of the
northern political economy. This paper will identify analytical issues that
arise in the effort to understand how federal and territorial policies and
programs have affected the social economies of the diverse northern
communities –be they the mixed community economies of the smaller
settlements or the predominantly wage centres that are found in every
territory. Some early findings from the Northern Social Economy research
project will be presented, in the form of tentative propositions in need of
further investigation.
View Presentation.
For well
over a half century, Canada’s northern economy has been characterized as
functioning between ‘formal’ and ‘informal’ spheres. Fueled by theoretical
and empirical analyses, this dichotomy has been central to the collection
and interpretation of statistical data, the formation and implementation of
public policy, and program and service delivery. However, by characterizing
the formal and informal sectors in oppositional terms - structured verses
unstructured, simple verses complex, irregular verses predictable - policy
interventions have often proven detrimental to northern peoples and the
maintenance of mutually supportive economic sectors. In this paper, a call
is made for a re-conceptualization of Canada’s northern economy that goes
beyond misplaced dualism and encourages greater recognition of the complex
continuum inherent in Canada’s northern economy. Based on collaborative
research with the Nunatsiavut Government in Labrador, it will be argued that
this necessarily involves a more nuanced social economy approach that better
reflects local realities.
This paper
presents a preliminary discussion of the potential future impacts of global
change in the North Atlantic region – Greenland, Iceland, Faroe Islands -
with a focus on the economic vulnerability of the region and its capacity
for adaptation to change. Comparisons are made within the region and to
other parts of the Arctic. Adaptive capabilities in the Arctic are often
compromised due to limitations with respect to technology, wealth,
institutions, infrastructure, human resources, information and skills, or an
unequal income distribution. Economies in the North Atlantic region also
face constraints on adaptive capacity, although significant variation
exists. While global change can be expected to alter
the composition and stock and flow of resources, the nature and extent of
this is highly uncertain. Local as well as
regional economies, whether market or subsistence based, may feel the
impacts of change, with smaller and more remote
communities - Greenland in particular - being more impacted where adaptive
capabilities may already be severely compromised. The future of many coastal
communities may depend not only on their ability to adapt to increased
competition, liberalization of the markets, and central government policy,
but also on the accessibility of fishing and other resources for local
production and subsistence.
View Presentation.
For the
Inuit of Greenland, an exercise of self-determination through
self-government, has been effectively limited by international externalities
which have set parameters on the extent to which economic development policy
is internally defined.
I intend to
establish the link between self-determination and the ability to define the
measure of one’s own development by referring to the argument made for self
government as being a medium to provide the Inuit rightful stewardship over
their own development.
I will then
draw attention to how externalities limit the ability of Greenland to
internally and autonomously define development policy.
While it is
more detailed in the paper, I will here use the small yet poignant example
of the circumstances surrounding the implementation of stricter harvesting
quotas in Greenland. The introduction of stricter harvesting quotas for
Inuit hunters introduced in the Nature Protection Act in 2003, was following
a long international campaign against sealing and whaling in Greenland by
the international media. The introduction of regulatory hunting contradicted
the previous government stance which maintained that unhindered harvesting
was not only a right for Greenlandic Inuit, but also a pillar of a
sustainable economy as Inuit culture was inherently connected to sustainable
use of these resources. The government maintained the position that wildlife
harvesting by its population was sustainable until the health of Greenland’s
tourism looked to be effected from the bad publicity. Strict quotas were
then placed upon Inuit hunters in order to protect wildlife populations
government statistics just one year prior had reported to be in healthy
numbers. This situation exemplifies how an interntional externality
effectively set the limit to which internally defined policy could be
pursued.
As
subsistence activities, food production systems such as hunting and
gathering, horticulture, pastoralism, and agriculture have been used to
classify and characterize human societies in cultural anthropology. In this
paper, the author first discusses several meanings of the concept of
“subsistence” or “subsistence activity” and the development of
anthropological approaches to hunting and gathering as a subsistence
activity. Then, he proposes a model of Inuit subsistence through the
examination of characteristics of subsistence activities of arctic
hunter-gatherers, including beluga whale hunting. In this model of Inuit
subsistence activities, there are a series of activities such as harvesting,
processing, sharing/distribution, consumption and disposal, and various
types of ritual or ceremonialism corresponding to these activities. These
activities are strongly associated with behavioral rules, social
relationships, technology and tools/equipment, world views, and
environmental knowledge. That is, subsistence activities are economic
systems consisting of several cultural, social and material elements
associated with them. This definition or model of a subsistence activity can
be useful in conducting research on hunting and gathering activities in a
particular social context and in comparative studies of hunting and
gathering activities in human societies.
The economic
safety of the rural population in the Far North of the Sakha Republic
(Yakutia) is a very real economic problem nowadays. Today we clearly see a
sharp decrease of the quality and the level of life, especially of the rural
population in the Northern parts of Russia . At the present time almost all
representatives of indigenous people of the North in Russian Federation live
in the territory of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia). That is why a scientific
investigation of this problem has a great fundamental consequence.
I want to
define the features of economic safety of rural population of the Far North,
and investigate social and economic aspects of its main problems and the
direction of the future development in my work.
The economic
safety of the rural population of the North depends on many aspects, such as
business and unemployment; the income and consumption; mortality; the level
of education, culture and recreation; the level of scientific development;
the condition of medical aid. The situation in the North of our Republic is
very dramatic. According to 2005 statistics 78,3 thousand people out of 339
thousand had a monthly income lower than a living wage- 2700 rubles or 130
USD. An average size of pension remains very low- two times lower than
physiological living wage. Moreover, the tuberculosis epidemic is pervading
dynamically in the region.
I want to
cover all the aforementioned subjects in my work and determine the ways of
improvement the situation in the North.
In two
different research projects, it has been investigated if beekeeping with
honeybees and harvest and production of seaweed could be new ways of income
for seep farmers and fishermen. In the beekeeping project bee colonies were
imported from Denmark and it was demonstrated that beekeeping was possible
and potentially could create a higher income for many of the smallest sheep
farming families. The project was part of the work for protecting the last
Nordic honey bees/the Black bees. The seaweed project investigated the
biomass production and distribution of the most valued spices of Greenland
seaweed. It was investigated if it could be harvested in a both economically
and ecologically sustainable way. Production of seaweed on lines was part of
the project and took place in the Faroe Islands. Both harvest and growing
seem to have an economic potential as supplement or in exchange of fishery -
especially on the smaller settlements. The conditions should be both
economical and ecological sustainable.
Dana,
Leo, Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and
Places in the Global Economy
Abstract
Much
business theory applies well to mainstream society residing in a robust
environment, but not necessarily to Aboriginal people in remote communities
of the Arctic. Empirical research suggests that traditionally the people of
the Arctic identified more with the land and with sharing its resources,
than with Western-style mainstream entrepreneurship; their activities are
often forms of informal and subsistence self-employment, such as hunting
caribou, polar bears and seals for food and for pelts. How will oil & gas
exploration change this? How is technology causing change? Will
entrepreneurship become universal as suggested by many? Or will
entrepreneurship in the Arctic continue to be different in form and
substance from the commonly accepted model?
Self-employment and small business proclivity in the remote North Canada’s
most recent Territory, Nunavut, is facing and is expected to continue to see
increasing economic opportunity come its way in the near future. A very real
question is to what degree Nunavut’s inhabitants (Nunavummiut) are ready to
take advantage of this? This research seeks to assess the ability of
residents of Nunavut to harness prospects for economic prosperity. In
particular, entrepreneurial aptitude and entrepreneurial activity are
examined. Entrepreneurial behaviour represents the foundation for economic
growth (Schumpeter 1950). Whether value-creating activities take place in a
small business or a large multinational enterprise (e.g., mining company)
both lead to job creation and generate wealth. However, evidence across time
and space suggests that economies – whether small town, or continent such as
Europe, Africa, or North America – experience the greatest benefit from
capitalist acts that take place at a fundamental level. Small businesses
generate the majority of jobs and wealth (Birch 1979, Haltiwanger 2006).
Business ownership leads to self-determination, esteem, and impacts other
indicators of social welfare, including health and a stable, cohesive
community. Our research agenda unfolds in two parts. In Study 1,
entrepreneurial aptitude is assessed. This will involve voluntary
participation of Nunavummiut to take a standard test to gauge predisposition
toward self-employment. In Study 2, specific instances of entrepreneurship
will be recorded in detail through face-to-face interview. These actual
small business owners’ experiences (e.g., successes, failures, and
challenges) will give depth to our understanding. NSERC-SSHRC (2000: 17)
states “Young people in the North need to be provided with new, varied, and
ongoing opportunities.” With a burgeoning young population, the Nunavut
Economic Development Strategy (2003: 27) isolates “economic development for
our youth” as a priority.
View Presentation.
This paper
reports results from multi-method research describing business patterns in
rural Alaska (survey), analyzing the community factors that predict numbers
and types of businesses (regression of business license data on community
characteristics, and identifying entrepreneurial strategies for business
success in remote communities (case study interviews).
View Presentation.
Free trade agreements and the decrease of barriers to trade
have facilitated international business in many parts of the world.
Simultaneously, globalization has been beneficial for many. For Sámi people,
there have been two sides of globalization; while globalization has brought
an increase in technology and consumer goods, there has also been an
increased need for cash, pulling people from traditional self-employment.
Furthermore, the man-made boundaries, that today define nation-states, have
ignored the traditional movements of Sámi people. European Union legislation
is disrupting traditional trade routes while globalization is altering
traditional lifestyles. Based on in-depth interviews, our research shows
that globalization is changing the nature of Sámi self-employment. Among the
external causes of change are new requirements for meat processing; these
are insensitive to local traditions and reported as being less efficient.
Herding activities are becoming increasingly mechanical as globalization
pushes the reindeer economy to become a meat production business. Relating
to the literature, the modernization and dependency perspectives present
incompatible views of the relationship between the Sámi people and the
developed world; the modernization prescription is mismatched with Sámi
objectives relating to their traditions, culture and values and the role
that these are to play in development.
Churikova, Victoria
In
cooperation with The Kamchatka Regional Center of Ecological Research and
Education we are creating now in Kamchatka, Elizovskiy district, the complex
enterprise, the ETHNOGRAPHIC and ECO-EDUCATIONAL, TOURIST enterprise
designed on the basis of the NATIVE COMMUNITY of ITELMEN.“THOI VITA”. It is
essential to create such enterprises in Far East regions where Native people
live in small communities in unique natural complexes. Creating such a
tourist centre opens the possibility for minority peoples not only to be
employed, but to realize themselves in the best way.
It will
allow these people to have prosperity equivalent to that found in a modern
society of people of the Russian Federation (material well-being,
preservation of the cultural traditions, traditional methods of wildlife
management, and worthy education of rising generation!). This kind of
enterprise can serve as an alternative direction for effective development
of the economy. It reduces the negative influence on the unique nature of
regions which arises from expansion of large-scale projects of oil
extraction and intensification of the fishery trade.
We are sure
that it may give both possibilities of modern entrepreneurship and ancient
traditional occupations.
View Presentation.
Russell, Peter H., University of Toronto, Department of Political
Science
Loukacheva, Natalia, University of Akureyri, Polar Ice Program
Abstract
In an attempt to open a new perspective on the concept of
effective governance arrangements in the Arctic and on the efficiency of
existing and developing models of Northern justice, this session aims to
bring together people engaged in policy-making and research involving the
questions: to what extent are governance arrangements in the North
sustainable? How may the justice system be made more accessible and
responsive to the citizens of the North as well as providing greater
legitimacy among indigenous groups which are still struggling with the
consequences of decolonization and legal acculturation? How much and what
kind of autonomy and economic self-sufficiency are possible and desirable
for Arctic peoples?
Topics
that might be addressed in this session include the evaluation of various
constitutional agreements that secure a measure of self-governance for
indigenous groups and other Northerners, challenges in bringing justice to
the Northern communities (Indigenous legal ways versus the mainstream legal
systems), issues of economic/legal sustainability of governance models and
their transformations.
The
objective of this session is to establish a comprehensive dialogue and
sharing a learning experience from the circumpolar regions.
Uncertainty and change shape arctic environments and pose challenges for
sustainable governance of natural resources. Failures in current approaches
to managing sustainability have led to the recognition that new styles of
management are needed. Adaptive management is one promising avenue for
developing more sustainable forms of governing the resources. Adaptive
management highlights continuous learning, experimentation,
self-organisation, polycentric institutional arrangements and flexible
place-specific solutions. This presentation examines adaptive management in
the context of a forest dispute which took place in the municipality of
Muonio, Northern Finland. The primary data for the article was gathered by
thematic interviews in 2007 and 2005. The parties of the dispute were the
Finnish state’s forestry enterprise Metsähallitus and a local coalition
consisting of representatives of reindeer herders, the municipality, a local
environmental NGO, a game association, and tourism entrepreneurs. The
dispute triggered a policy innovation: Metsähallitus rented the forests for
ten years to tourism entrepreneurs and the municipality. To enhance
adaptability and sustainability, place-specific solutions should be
possible, as in Muonio. Secondly, self-organisation of resource users should
be enhanced, for example, by building networks and by fostering trust
between various stakeholders. Thirdly, matching the scale of the issues
considered in participatory processes and the real world problems at hand is
essential for making participation possible. Fourthly, knowledge
distribution concerning planned change should be open and transparent.
Lastly, collaboration and power-sharing should be fostered, for example, by
mutual gestures in contrast to power-plays and polarized and
over-exaggerated claims.
The paper presents an anthropological study that has been
conducted in northern Finnish Lapland during 1999-2006. The main objective
of the study focused on nature conservation and land-use management issues.
One of the main goals is to find tools for integrating different livelihoods
and nature-use patterns, for example reindeer herding, forestry, nature
conservation and tourism.
The
research material consists of personal interviews, survey questionnaires and
appealed writings on the issue studied. The target group of the study is
local people living in the northernmost part of Finland. Some of the
informants are indigenous Saami and some are non-indigenous Finns. In the
background, are a few environmental and land claim conflicts, which the area
and its people have gone through in recent years and decades.
Nature
conservation can raise much hostility if it is implemented and considered as
an “imported good”. Local people of Lapland are very sensitive about ideas
and ambitions that are recognised as non-local and “from the south”.
However, large conservation areas of Lapland are unusually widely accepted
because they support subsistence use and traditional activities. In paradox,
people when asked, do not like nature conservation and especially not
conservationists. The reason is that these entities carry the stamp
“imported”.
Time
itself plays an important role. Northern Lapland has gone through the most
rapid cultural and economical change in continental Europe and appreciated
things and aims are the ones that are anchored on tradition. In contrary,
people seek new solutions and businesses for modern income demands. For
socio-culturally sustainable land-use management, the challenge is to
integrate local and global objectives within the widespread timescape that
people live by. View
Presentation.
The Chukotka
State Body on Indigenous Affairs was first established at the beginning of
this century after the election of Governor R. Abramovich. Later the Council
of Indigenous Representatives was formed under the State Body on Indigenous
Affairs. In spite of this, the problem of indigenous representation and with
it the protection of indigenous rights at the regional and local
administration levels is critical. For example, there are only 2
representatives at the Chukotka government. Meanwhile in the Soviet times
there were indigenous representatives practically at every regional and
local administration. According to the researchers, the problem of legal
indigenous representation in legislative bodies has been caused by the
undeveloping mechanisms for its implementation, and also by the low level of
indigenous peoples’ knowledge of their own rights. The case-study is
directed to the design acceptable devices for legal indigenous
representation at the state structures and practical recommendations for
Chukotka indigenous organizations.
My
presentation will analyze the 2005 Norwegian Finnmark Act from the point of
view of Saami rights. It will focus on the issues of the compatibility of
this Act with international obligations of Norway deriving from the 1989 ILO
169 Convention Concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Independent
Countries (in particular Articles 14 and 15, i.e. the right to land and the
right to natural resources) and the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights (in particular Articles 1 and 27, i.e. the right to
self-determination).
The Finnmark
Act (Finnmarksloven, the
Act) is founded upon the principle that almost all land in Finnmark (i.e. 95
percent), will be under the common administrative regime, so-called
Finnamarkseiendommen /Finnmárkkuopmodat) i.e. the Finnmark
Estate. Prior to the Act coming into force, all land was registered as
property of Statskog SF. Registered title to State land in Finnmark
was transferred from Statskog to the Finnmark Estate (Section 1).
The Act will apply to real property, watercourses and natural resources in
the county of Finnmark. On the shoreline, the Act will apply as far out to
sea as the private right of ownership extends (Section 2). The Finnmark
Estate is in principle a private landowner. There is, however, an exception
to this rule as its legal position can be changed by subsequent legislation
(Section 20).
The Act does not distinguish between ethnicity–i.e.; individual rights are
not dependent on the participation in any ethnic group. The Act is
ethnically neutral.
The
indigenous people of Scandinavia – the Saami-people – are building up a new
political system in Europe. It is a system, which is not bounded by the
borders of the national-state. This process is a pioneer political project
in builidng of border-crossing institutions. The aim of this political
project is a common Sami Parliament for all Samis around the Euro-Arctic
area. This would be an innovation. A people without state, living in
different national-states, is establishing a common popular elected
trans-national Parliament.
In this
sense, the institutional building is a widening acceptance of a perticualar
set of rules for a particular game, until the rules are internalized by
individuals to become part of their community’s identity and
self-definition. That is, the main point building of institutions is to work
up legitimacy for changed rules; including changes in distribution of power,
and changes in relation of power.
My aim in
the presentation is to analyze the relation between the political power and
the culture as it will be realized in negotiations between the State and a
non-State. In other words, the topic is to do an analysis of how a
negotiations process works out from a perspective with State centering.
Focus in the presentation is the case of the Saami parliament in Sweden and
its role as a parliamentary represent of a non-State.
During the
last decades, a new paradigm for nature conservation has emerged. Visions
and goals of international environmental politics have emphasized the
societal dimensions of area protection and the need to perceive and resolve
use-conservation conflicts within a sociological and economical context. At
the same time as the Norwegian and Russian environmental authorities and
institutions are highly different, it is likely that area conservation in
Northern Norway and North-West Russia is complimentary in ecological and
sociological terms. A large number of protected areas are present in both
territories, and entrepreneurial activities, like Ecotourism and Geotourism
seem to emerge in the adjacent areas of national parks in the region. This
makes protected areas a profitable resource for local communities. Also,
indigenous groups, including reindeer herders, welcome area protection, as
fragmentation and technical installation threaten their pastures. The
project aims at exploring the institutional, ecological and sociological
conditions for sustainable use of protected land in these areas. Also, the
potential for exchange of knowledge and experiences between the two
countries will be emphasized.
This paper
will elaborate on quantitative and qualitative methodological issues when
conducting bilateral research on Norwegian and Russian area management. Also
the chosen case areas (three Norwegian and three Russian protected areas)
will be described according to economical activity, conservation objectives
and brief history.
View Presentation.
Sustainable
governance in the circumpolar region requires sustainable justice systems.
To be sustainable, a justice system needs to meet three conditions. First,
is it practical? Is it effective in resolving issues that disturb the peace
of communities. Second, is it accessible? Can those who need it use it
quickly and without having to travel great distances? Third, does it have
legitimacy? Do the people it is supposed to serve respect it and regard it
as just? My paper will apply these criteria of a sustainable justice system
to the experience of justice in Nunavut.
In an
attempt to open a new perspective on the concept of effective governance
arrangements in the Arctic and on the efficiency of existing and developing
models of Northern justice, this session aims to bring together people
engaged in policy-making and research involving the questions: to what
extent are governance arrangements in the North sustainable? How may the
justice system be made more accessible and responsive to the citizens of the
North as well as providing greater legitimacy among indigenous groups which
are still struggling with the consequences of decolonization and legal
acculturation? How much and what kind of autonomy and economic
self-sufficiency are possible and desirable for Arctic peoples?
Topics that
might be addressed in this session include the evaluation of various
constitutional agreements that secure a measure of self-governance for
indigenous groups and other Northerners, challenges in bringing justice to
the Northern communities (Indigenous legal ways versus the mainstream legal
systems), issues of economic/legal sustainability of governance models and
their transformations.
The
objective of this session is to establish a comprehensive dialogue and
sharing a learning experience from the circumpolar regions.
Abele, Frances
Hicks, Jack
White, Graham, University
of Toronto
Abstract
The Arctic now has several decades of experience with the
implementation of the ‘regional agreements’ which restructured the
relationships between indigenous peoples and the states they find themselves
a part of. These agreements have resulted in a range of political
arrangements -everything from the ‘effective self-government by public
government’ of Greenland’s Home Rule Act to the ‘ethnic self-government’ of
the Tłįchǫ and Nunatsiavut land claim agreements - and some
also include co-management regimes.
This
session will focus on the relationships between political institutions, the
political environment and the economy under various regional agreements.
Special emphasis will be placed on the effects that the agreements have had
on critical issues such as the management of both renewable and
non-renewable resources, the employment of indigenous peoples, and ‘economic
development’ generally.
We are
also interested in theoretical reflections on how national/regional
specificities shaped the various agreements and regimes as well as in
theoretical analyses of their contents.
The
session organizers encourage potential participants to contact them in
advance so that a dialogue can be initiated in advance of ICASS VI.
Starting with the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of
1971 until the Nunavik Inuit Land Claim Agreement of 2006 in Canada, the
Inuit in the Circumpolar region, with the exception of the Russian Yup’ik,
negotiated some of the most extensive land claim and self-government
agreements in the Arctic region, opening up a variety of development chances
for the beneficiaries of these “regional agreements”. This paper will look
in particular at the efforts done by Inuit Economic Development Corporations
to improve the economic situation of the inhabitants of their respective
regions. As regional examples for the comparison Makivik Corporation in
Nunavik and the Labrador Inuit Development Corporation in Nunatsiavut were
chosen. Nunavik, as the region with the first “regional agreement” in
Canada, in the form of the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement of 1975,
and therefore its possibility to deal with the contents of the agreement the
longest is an excellent comparison for Nunatsiavut, that just signed its
“regional agreement” in 2005 and therefore is just starting to work with its
new rights and benefits. Both Makivik Corporation and the Labrador Inuit
Development Corporation invested in various companies and projects over the
last few decades with variable success. The paper will look at the types of
projects that were invested in as well as at the influence these two
Corporations had on the economic situation within their respective regions
especially regarding issues like employment / unemployment rates, generation
of income, creation of training opportunities for the beneficiaries etc.
This paper is based on preliminary observations made as part of the
fieldwork for my PhD project in Nunavik and Nunatsiavut in summer of 2008.
View Presentation.
The
prospect of uranium mining has been controversial in different regions of
Inuit Nunaat since the 1970s. In 1983 the Inuit Circumpolar Conference
passed a motion declaring that “exploration and exploitation of uranium,
thorium, lithium or other materials related to the nuclear industry in our
homeland be prohibited”, and included this position in its 1986 Arctic
Policy document.
Greenland’s Home Rule Government imposed and maintains a ban on uranium
exploration and mining on the island, but on the other side of Davis Strait
the institutions resulting from the settlement of the Nunavut Land Claims
Agreement have chosen to aggressively pursue uranium mining in the
territory. In Northern Labrador the Nunatsiavut Government has imposed a
3-year moratorium on uranium mining on Labrador Inuit Lands, but a uranium
exploration boom is underway in neighbouring Nunavik.
This
paper will explore how the political and administrative regimes in the
different Inuit regions have helped determine these contrary approaches to
this controversial topic.
The Role of
Inuit Land Claim Organizations in the Political Economy
of Northern Canada
Land
Claim Organizations (LCOs) are an original element of governance stemming
from the self-government arrangement in northern Canada. Nowhere else, in
the Arctic, you can find this mix of public government with an element of
ethnic governance.
LCOs are
powerful players in northern politics, and social and economic development
but their role in northern governance has not been well conceptualized or
studied even if they involve a wide range of activities: defending the
rights of beneficiaries; managing land claim compensation funds and land
holdings; negotiating resource development on these lands and collecting
royalties on resource development. This gives them an important political
and financial leverage that is used for a variety of purposes. LCOs can
foster local development through their investments and programs. They
provide services to beneficiaries, for example by setting up funds to
finance the purchase of hunting equipment or by creating airlines companies
that provide transportation between communities. But their most interesting
role is in northern politics where they act as a watchdog for Inuit rights
in the northern public government. In fact, they represent an element of
ethnic governance in the midst of public governance.
This
presentation will compare, contrast and interpret the role of three Inuit
land claim organizations -- the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation, Nunavut
Tunngavik Incorporated and Makivik Corporation -- in the political economy
of Northern Canada.
After the Claims are Settled:
Capacity Building in Canada's Northern
Aboriginal Governments
A central
goal of land claims settlements and self-government agreements in Northern
Canada has been to return control of their lands, resources, and destiny to
the local Aboriginal people. This entails a wide range of policies and
programmes, including those designed to foster economic development (both in
the modern wage economy and the traditional economy). Moreover, given the
general weakness of the private sector in the North, governments themselves
are key economic players, both at the community level and regionally. Yet
while the formal arrangements and structures of the claims and
self-government agreements provide the essential framework and significant
financial resources, Aboriginal governments which lack adequate human and
organizational capacity, can have only limited success. Although concern
with "capacity building" is an omnipresent theme, in academic literature and
in reports from public and Aboriginal governments in the Canadian North,
systematic analysis has been in short supply.
This
paper develops a framework for approaching and analyzing capacity building
in Aboriginal governments in Canada's territorial North. Illustrative
material is drawn from governments in all three territories, with primary
focus on the experiences of the Government of Nunavut.
Pullar,
Gordon L., University of
Alaska Fairbanks
Knecht,
Richard A., University of Alaska Fairbanks, DANRD
Abstract
This session
will include a small group of faculty members and graduate students from the
University of Alaska Fairbanks as well as others involved in higher
education in the Arctic. The members of the group will make individual
presentations on issues of importance to indigenous peoples based on their
own research and personal experiences with particular focus on higher
education, leadership development, and cultural revitalization.
The Rural
Development Program at the University of Alaska Fairbanks has been in
existence for 24 years. The overwhelming majority of rural development
students are Alaska Native and the Applied Field-Based Program allows
students to study for their degrees while continuing to live in their home
villages. The department awards both BA and MA degrees in rural development
and program graduates serve in leadership positions throughout Alaska. Our
approach emphasizes effective leadership and community and economic
development that is informed by traditional knowledge, values and lifeways.
Like the rest of the circumpolar north, rural Alaska today is struggling
with substantial economic, demographic and environmental change. We will
outline how these forces impact the educational needs of our students and
the strategies we have employed to meet those needs.
View Presentation.
As many
Indigenous communities around the world face the imminent danger of the loss
of their culture and language due to continued assimilation and
westernization, the need for revitalization becomes essential. Many
communities have begun to focus on community-based education by including
Indigenous teaching in their various forms of education. From language
nests, to all Native education boards, the road to perpetuating Indigenous
culture is being walked. Ilisagvik College in Barrow, Alaska is the first
tribal college in the state. With tribal college status, Ilisagvik has a
dual mission of educating its students but also to perpetuate and strengthen
the Inupiat culture, values, and traditions. This paper explores what
programs Ilisagvik currently administers that follow its mission as well as
what more can be done at the college level to increase cultural and
linguistic revitalization.
View Presentation.
This
presentation will be a discussion of meanings, symbols and storytelling
among the Yup’ik of Southwest Alaska. It will focus on Elders’ knowledge in
historical and personal accounts. In contemporary times there are some
villages that are using this knowledge to revitalize cultural practices and
languages. The Elders express the importance of protecting their cultural
and language practices.
This
research topic is pioneering, not only as regards education but also in the
area of comparative sociological investigations if intra- and inter-ethic
relations of minority Northern peoples in today’s world, wherein one or
another educational system may either accelerate assimilation processes of
aboriginal peoples, or promote the preservation and development of their
ethnic culture and pride, or in an attempt to ‘civilize’ aboriginal youth in
boarding schools may, intentionally or not, result in their gradual
assimilation and social conformity. Study the ways and means of resolving
the two primary issues of contemporary life facing the minority Northern
indigenous peoples in Russia, Canada, the USA and Japan as reflected in
their educational systems, i.e.: (1) the incorporation (adaptation) of
Northern indigenous minority persons into the generally-available level of
benefits from contemporary civilization progress, while at the same time (2)
preserving their original cultures and languages.
Kofinas, Gary, Chapin Terry,
Joseph, Bernice and
Gerlach, Craig
The
unprecedented rate and extent of change in the functioning of the Earth
System challenge the capacity of society to sustain the desirable features
of our planet. To understand these changes, formal graduate training that
both integrates social and natural sciences and considers the dynamics of
change across temporal and spatial scales is offered at the University of Alaska
Fairbanks. Alaska and
the Circumpolar North are particularly appropriate places to train scholars
to research the dynamics of complex social-ecological change because of
their pronounced rates of climatic, cultural and socio-economic change. The
curriculum and research opportunities available through the program prepare
students in the theoretical and applied underpinnings of resilience theory,
vulnerability analysis, the emergent field of sustainability science, and
institutional and biophysical linkages among local, regional, and global
processes. This integrative perspective is poorly developed in graduate
education in the U.S. The
Resilience and Adaptation Program includes (1) a focus on global-local
linkages that shape sustainability at all scales, (2) a bridging program
with the College of Rural and Community Development and its rural campuses
that make the PhD more accessible to Alaska Native students, and (3)
opportunities for graduate students to participate in education and research
activities of the International Polar Year. The program’s focus on
sustainability makes it particularly relevant to indigenous students of
rural Alaska. The paper outlines
the achievements of the program and some of its barriers to success. View
Presentation.
Gombay,
Nicole, University of Canterbury
Abstract
To
varying degrees, and at varying times, indigenous populations across the
Arctic have undertaken land claims and negotiated powers for themselves in
an effort to ensure that they have greater autonomy from colonising forces.
This session explores the impacts of these claims and powers. To what extent
has self-government been realised? With what benefits and at what costs has
self-government been implemented? What are people reacting to and how far
have the limits been pushed? Ultimately this session aims to provide an
assessment of the degree to which Arctic territories are (post)colonial
states.
During
this session we will seek to address these questions in a circumpolar
context. These questions can be explored from a variety of
perspectives-indigenous and non-indigenous-and using a variety of themes
such as identity, language, health, resource use, governance structures,
education, arts, museology, economic development, cognitive sciences, and so
on.
The spread
of English in Nunavut has led to intergenerational gaps in local language
transmission. Language studies predict that Inuktitut will be in a weakened
state by 2020. Several education and public policy solutions are currently
being debated by the territory. Why are Inuit facing this problem? Using an
interdisciplinary approach with a philosophical focus, how might the
underlying problem be defined? What responses to the problem, so defined,
might be appropriate?
Relying on
the writings and thought of Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor, a scholar
and critic of modernity, this paper develops a descriptive analysis of the
problem that modernity creates for language and identity. It identifies the
key aspects of modernity that affect or are related to language retention
and identity at individual, collective, and cultural levels.
The paper
articulates the problem of language retention as seen by community members,
scholars (besides Taylor), and other individuals or collectives, and then
reformulates the problem in light of insight gained from reading Taylor.
In examining
the relationship between language loss and shifts in identity, the paper
addresses what it is about identity that might be considered important to
retain or protect. The specific sense of loss is articulated through the
readings of Taylor. The Inuit situation is used as a case study.
This
presentation is a summary of an extensive analysis of the thirty-year Inuit
Social Movement that resulted in the creation of Nunavut. Using Indigenous
methodologies and a holistic and collaborative approach that includes some
120 biographies and personal narratives, the author unfolds the ways in
which Inuit ontology, or ways of being (Inuuniq), directly informed the
movement’s formation, leadership development, strategies, structures and
outcomes. This anatomy offers important lessons for Inuit as well as other
social movement actors in understanding the key role that Indigenous
ontology and ways of being, as well as the process of articulating
Indigenous philosophy, played in every aspect of the movement.
The process
of de-colonization has been bloody for many Indigenous peoples, and often
devoid of concrete changes in either national policy or political structures
within the dominant society. Seldom do social movements take place within
the course of a single human lifetime, allowing us to follow one from its
origins to conclusion. In a geographic region that is inherently both
dangerous and violent, the Inuit successfully created and engaged in
non-violent processes of political transformation in which they: a)
recognized and anticipated the impacts of colonization; b) educated and
prepared future generations to lead through swift change; c) simultaneously
engaged in negotiations from local to global to address both immediate needs
as well as long term national and transnational agreements; and d)
implemented a new form of self-government for Indigenous peoples that worked
within the already existing parameters of national and regional government
within Canada.
This talk
focuses on “poaching” in Nunavik. Based on interviews with Inuit and
non-Inuit residents of Nunavik, along with interviews of representatives
from the various state agencies responsible for enforcing wildlife
management regulations in the region, I will explore the multiple, and
sometimes contested, perspectives expressed by the various actors involved
in hunting, fishing, and trapping. The research serves as a means of
highlighting the some of socio-economic implications of the increasing
application of Euro-Canadian regulatory systems in Nunavik. I will focus
particularly on how “poaching” reflects Inuit experiences of both the forces
of colonization and their resistance to those forces, which ultimately
centre around their attempts to define the terms for determining ethnic
relations and resource use in their territory.
View Presentation.
The paper
focus upon new metaphors in the making, as oil and gas enter the Artic area
of Norway. In the paper a preliminary analysis is done reflecting upon the
relationship between the new industrial turn and gender. Snow White is one
of the most important women-figures in the modern, western, storytelling
tradition. Snow White entering the Artic however, are as the name given too
the gas-field from where the industrial turn begin. The paper will address
this narrative connection and ask if this best is framed as a gendered
re-colonializing entering ongoing decolonial processes. Snow White in the
Artic, despite of her innocence’s brings about global economic, politically
as well as culturally transformative forces.
Oil and gas,
as the new possibilities for economic as well as regional development are
highlighted in several Norwegian scenario projects – where what these
reports have in common, is that none of them hardly touches upon how this
new industries will transform the gendered practices and by this
specifically the indigenous women’s possibility for self-determination in
the region.
The paper
analyzes the reasons, practical realization and consequences of the campaign
of merging of Russian regions, which has been launched by V. Putin’s
administration in 2003. Since then Perm Oblast in the Urals merged with the
neighboring Komi-Permyak Autonomous Okrug (district), Evenki and Taimyr
autonomies merged into the more populated Krasnoyarsk Krai, Ust-Orda Buryat
Autonomous Okrug merged with the Irkutsk oblast; the last merger of
Kamchatka and the Koryak Okrug took place in July 2007. As a result,
Koryaks, Evenkis, Dolgano Nenets, Komi-Permyaks, Ust-Orda and Aga Buryats
lost their territorial autonomy. According to Russian officials, the main
reason for merging regions is to foster better governance and to boost
economic performance. Nevertheless the initial goal of the campaign – to
bring down the number of Russian regions from 89 to less than 50 – has not
been reached. The merging is successful only in regions with a weak
bureaucracy and the absence of influential national movements. Although the
motivation of the current merging politics differs from the Soviet strategy
of industrial development of Arctic and Siberia inspired by ideological and
military purposes, the consequences could be similar. The critics of mergers
assess these consequences as renewed colonialism. Activists among ethnic
minorities in Siberia and the circumpolar North fear that mergers will rob
them of their language and traditions. Most probably ensuring the
preservation of the culture of indigenous peoples in modern Russia without
keeping their territorial autonomy is practically impossible.
View Presentation.
After the collapse of the soviet-typed regimes and the end
of the bipolar mechanism, a completely new world order has emerged. The
uni-polar order has resulted in the decline of significance of states as the
traditional subjects of public international law. In addition to the
existing entities (states, International organizations, “the people”, and
the natural persons) some brand new potential legal subjects have also
appeared. These are the uprising movements (if later they establish a
state), transnational companies etc. Although the minority groups or
communities had no international legal capacity at the moment, the rules
relating to them were also being developed in the past few decades. For
instance, the law of the so-called indigenous peoples tends to develop a new
regime in the near future (see the UN General Assembly Declaration on the
rights of indigenous peoples – however this is not a legal rule it has some
relevance on fostering the development of international law). Other
interesting entities (e.g. the territorial autonomies or autonomous
entities) got some new competence which conform them to states, the original
and absolute legal subjects of public international law. There are several
examples relating to the autonomous entities mentioned before, which gained
some extra-competence in the past decades, such as Greenland and the Faroe
Islands (belonging to Denmark), and Nunavut (belonging to Canada). Greenland
and Nunavut are inhabited by Inuit, and by means of the tools of the
territorial self-governance they have been able to more effectively
represent their interests. It is worth analyzing their present situation and
their efforts to be more independent in times of post colonialism.
In 1984, the
Inuvialuit of the western Arctic signed a comprehensive land claim agreement
with the Canadian government that established a new national park on their
traditional territory. Following decades of conflict, the signing of the
deal marked the first time in Canadian history that a national park had been
created as part of an aboriginal land claim and was widely hailed as the
beginning of a new era of conservation in which colonial state policies
would be replaced by more inclusive and democratic initiatives. Indeed, the
Inuvialuit Final Agreement (IFA) guaranteed Inuit peoples unprecedented
recognition for their hunting and trapping rights and granted them new
influence over federal wildlife and conservation policy. Yet the agreement
also ensured that ultimate authority over park management remained in the
hands of government officials. For instance, while Inuvialuit leaders
enjoyed equal representation on new-created decision-making bodies, they
were often forced to conduct park business in unfamiliar legal and
scientific language and their contributions to consultation processes
remained subject to veto by federal bureaucrats. Such qualifications raise
questions about the extent to which the conservation regime established
under the IFA represented a departure from older colonial models. Drawing on
analytical tools from the fields of environmental history and political
ecology, this paper examines the engagement of Inuit activists with federal
officials and wildlife biologists over the creation of Ivvavik National Park
in order to assess how protected areas management in northern Canada has
evolved since the emergence of the modern land claims movement.
Paper
abstract not yet submitted. It will be included in the web site version when
accepted.
Paper
abstract not yet submitted. It will be included in the web site version when
accepted.
Stern,
Pamela, Centre for Northern Studies at Sterling College
& Centre for Sustainable Community Development at Simon Fraser University
Cassady,
Joslyn, Drew University, Department of Anthropology
Abstract
The
occasion of the 4th International Polar Year provides an opportunity to
reflect upon the history, practices, and consequences of a discourse of
Northern Exceptionalism – the resilient notion that the Arctic environment,
and consequently its peoples and cultures, are anomalies in the physical and
social world. The extreme arctic climate, which presented enormous
challenges to European explorers and other visitors, contributed to popular
and scientific treatments of the circumpolar North as a unique social and
ecological laboratory. These early impressions continue to inform the
production of knowledge about the North. Indeed the very institution of
International Polar Years suggests Northern Exceptionalism.
The
northern research community is a clear beneficiary of special interest in
and attention to northern peoples and places. In fact, national research
agencies in both Canada and the United States have funding streams dedicated
solely to polar research. At various times, however, northern researchers
have been troubled by what is described as our failure to participate in
social scientific theory-building. The challenges extend beyond concerns of
scholarship to the conditions of life in the North today. Insufficient
attention has been given to the ways that a discourse of Northern
Exceptionalism shapes both the production of knowledge and the practices of
northern administration.
This
panel brings together a diverse group of scholars to consider questions of
Northern Exceptionalism from multiple, but ethnographically-informed,
perspectives. The 6-8 panelists will consider the history and discourse of
Northern Exceptionalism as well as practices that emanate from an assumption
of exceptionalism. In addition to considering the evolution and endurance of
a discourse of Northern Exceptionalism, suggested paper topics include the
role of exceptionalism in: 1) the administration of northern peoples and
lands; 2) international indigenous rights and environmental movements; 3)
testimonies of and redress for social suffering; 4) proposed solutions to
environmental contamination; and 5) the application of “traditional
knowledge” to governance.
It is easy
to find examples of how explorers, governments, companies and story writers
in the past have regarded the Arctic North as “The Other”, often in colonial
terms and pictures. Here, the populated circumpolar area was regarded as an
empty wilderness, and if attention was paid to Northern societies, they were
often pictured as exotic, nostalgic and even vulgar. It is well known that
people in North Norway live north of the moral circle. Of course, it is a
joke....
The North
has long had strategic and geopolitical importance, and been the arena for
several economic and industrial Klondikes. Though in the middle of the high
politics on the one hand, and with perceptions of the exotic wilderness on
the other hand, it has been natural to ignore the people actually living
there. Like Mikael Niemi wrote from Pajala; “Our forefathers meant zero and
nothing for the Swedish history”.
Today, the
North is again important. The strategic resources, the new geopolitical map
and the possibilities created by the melting ice cap, again turn Arctic and
non-Arctic governments’ and companies’ attention to the North. What do, or
will, people in the North mean for future developments in the north? Are
circumpolar societies’ needs and interests given more attention than in the
“colonial” periods in the past? Are today’s societies in the North capable
of defining their own interests, or will they obediently accept the
definitions and perceptions from the capitals in the South?
In my PhD
research I study the political agency of Arctic indigenous women in the
context of intergovernmental forums of the Arctic (e.g. Arctic Council).
Part of the study and the theme that I address in my presentation is the
question, how to analyze the relations of the substantive and descriptive
political representation of indigenous women.
Indigenous peoples in the Arctic have been active participants in the
different forums of international relations. Even thought there are several
indigenous groups in the Arctic and that the members of one people may
represent several nationalities, indigenous peoples have participated in
discussions concerning the Arctic as a coherent group. They have
highlighted, for example, the environmental problems concerning the Arctic
and have demanded their rights to own the land they live in and
international participation. The result being; they have established status
as actors and experts of the Arctic region and indigenous cultures. Among
indigenous peoples participating in international politics of the Arctic
there are many female representatives.
Thus as
enabling new kind of political actors, along with traditional states, to the
field of international politics of the Arctic and opening doors for women’s
political participation, Arctic institutions could be viewed special. But
does the exceptionalism hold when numbers are turned into substance
questions? Do indigenous groups or indigenous women have influence on the
topics that are discussed and the decisions that are made? Are ethnicity
and/or gender taken account on substance matters? I reflect these questions
throughout my research material and using discussions from, for example,
feminist political theories.
Revising
their long-held and controversial recommendation of unrestricted consumption
of fish from Alaskan waters, the Alaska Division of Public Health (ADPH)
issued a fish advisory in October 2007. This advisory targets reduction of
methylmercury exposure in pregnant women, women of child bearing age, and
children under twelve. Interestingly, the ADPH utilizes a reference dose to
calculate acceptable daily intake that is four times higher than the EPA’s
reference dose, arguing that the EPA’s calculation is “inappropriately
restrictive” for Alaskans. An analysis of public health bulletins, as well
as interviews with public health officials, reveals that the rationale for a
more lenient reference dose involves the “unique social, cultural, economic,
and geographical challenges” of Alaskan citizens. This paper examines this
discourse of exceptionalism in Alaska public health policy and questions the
analytic and political legitimacy of using preservation of tradition in
calculations of risk. More broadly, this research documents the socially and
politically embedded nature of science-based state advisories on
environmental contamination.
Can white
miners create or know a sentient landscape, that is, a landscape which is a
live counterpart of its human inhabitants? As part of a study of citizen
engagement with development, the authors conducted open-ended interviews
with residents of a central Canadian town once famous for its silver mines.
Participants included men and women, young and old adults, lifelong resident
and recent arrivals. None of the interviews concerned the landscape, and
none of the interviewees is an indigenous person. Yet, attachment to a
living landscape and a set of closely related social practices – a hallmark
of indigenous and especially northern indigenous cultures – emerged as a
prominent and puzzling narrative in the interviews. Puzzling because we had
understood this deeply embedded attachment to place to be something uniquely
associated with indigenous peoples. In this paper, we explore previous
explanations for an exceptional indigenous attachment to place and consider
these in the context of information that the same kind of cultural, economic
and spiritual attachment to place is shared by a group of people of a place
marked by a form of industrial development – mining – and political and
economic institutions - widely understood to be the antithesis of a sentient
landscape. View
Presentation.
From the
perspective of a Canadian academic working in the interdisciplinary
humanities, North is, par excellence, the cardinal point du jour.
With the fourth IPY in full swing, a conspicuously open Northwest passage, a
now culturally ratified belief in climate change (with North as “indicator
topography"), pressing issues of natural resources (diamonds, uranium, oil),
equally pressing questions of sovereignty, renewed scientific interest in
“traditional” ecological knowledge, North has become a zone of renewed
instrumental concern for the South. Prior claims of northern exceptionalism
— which in Canada draw equally from a model of colonial imposition, and the
whimsical and persistent imaginaries of Canadian nordicity — seem to be
endorsed more than challenged. Simultaneously, in the domain of the
humanities there are a host of re-elaborations of the very discourses of
Canadian Northern exceptionalism — among these Weibe, Moss, Hulan, van Herk,
Kroetsch, Kunuk, and Grace — that bring to light a North that is no longer
merely an empty space and passage to elsewhere, but rather, a North that has
become a site and a figure, and a caution and a limit — a problem, in other
words. While such work has been decisive in thinking through the veil of the
“True North Strong and Free,” one might claim that this is but another mode
of imposition, another claim for exception. Drawing from five years of field
and archival work in the Northwest Territories concerning the material and
cultural history of uranium production, my text will consider the case for,
and ethics of, a critical exceptionalism.
Geographical
discourse has played a significant role in designing northern regions as
exceptional, whether we consider physical or human geography. This trend was
maintained even after geography had shifted from a descriptive discipline,
attached to exceptionalism, to an explanative (or explanatory) one, attached
to generalization through comparative and quantitative methods. Those very
methods, indeed, contributed to design the Arctic as exceptional by any
means.
The
“cultural turn” of geography in the early 1990s, linked to the rise of
postmodernism and postcolonial studies, has in some way closed that cycle,
showing how the construction of the Arctic in scientific discourse followed
the same pattern as that of any colonized part of the world.
Yet, one can
argue it was too late, as the concept of the Arctic as exceptional had
deeply pervaded both the “general public”, including civil servants,
ecologists and tourists, all major actors for the economic, social and
cultural development of the Arctic.
This paper
seeks to analyze the bases of exceptionalism in “explanative geography” (or
“explanatory”) and its long lasting consequences, focusing on the Canadian
Arctic situation.
Poppel,
MarieKathrine, ISI,
Institute of Social Studies
Berliner, Peter
Abstract
Rapid
economic, social and political changes have affected and have been generated
by arctic communities. Relatively recent shifts from a high level of
self-sufficiency among arctic communities to their incorporation into
national states, different welfare systems and the global economy have
challenged cultures that have coped successfully with severe environmental
conditions over millennia.
Social
scientists have tried to identify responses to social, economic, and
environmental change by social systems and seek models for optimizing these
responses.
Welfare
research has traditionally been dominated by the social sciences, with
sociology, political sciences and economics as the central disciplines.
Scientific quality and originality can however be further increased through
expansion to other fields, through interdisciplinary cooperation and
including local knowledge and best practices. Major scientific breakthroughs
can be gained using research approaches based on knowledge from several
different areas of research and disciplines as e.g. cultural studies, social
work, psychology and gender and generational perspectives.
Within
this general framework, the session invites presenters from all disciplines
and especially researchers and practitioners with experience from the social
field to present themes and orientations for the development of welfare
research.
In
Paamiut in Kalallit Nunaat a community mobilisation program has been
launched as a response to a history of violence, suicides and drug abuse.
The program is developed by the community through public meetings and
interviews of an inclusive sample of community members. The overall goal of
the program is to strengthen community resilience and revitalization of the
culture through values and resources, shared activities, job opportunities
and options for entrepreneurship. The objectives are (1) to support the
quality of the local school, (2) to support local people in developing 5 new
and sustainable vocations, (3) to make a 50% decrease in incidents of
violence, other criminal acts, suicide, and substance abuse, (4) to create
transparency in decision-making in the public service and administration,
and (5) to prevent child neglect.
Shared
values were formulated as (a) pride of being able to fend for oneself, (b)
solidarity in the family and in the community, (c) openness, curiosity and
hospitality, (d) respect for people, equipment and the environment, (e)
peacefulness and tolerance, and (f) active participation and development
instead of passive adjustment. The presentation will focus on how these
shared values are utilised to mobilise the community through cultural,
economic, and social activities. Furthermore, the presentation will discuss
the participatory baseline design applied in the documentation of changes
conveyed by the programme.
View Presentation.
The introduction and the
development of “the welfare state” in Greenland and the rapid socioeconomic
and sociocultural development has had major impacts on the family structure
manifested in nuclear families consisting of fewer members and households
that typically do not include more than two generations. At the same time
the portion of women taking part in labour market activities have been
steadily increasing and the gender balance among people with further
education has changed in favour of women (M. Poppel 2006). It seems fair to
assume that these changes have affected not only the gender roles within the
traditional Greenlandic family but also the perceptions of what men and
women contribute with to the family.
The focus of this
presentation is the contributions of the individual to the household:
material as well as non-material. The approach is the perception of the
individual: what kind of social and other provisions do the individual
emphasise as her/his most important way of helping the household. In the
paper potential differences in perceptions according to gender, age and
labour market affiliation
as well as the division of
labour within the household, in the different regions in Greenland will be
analysed. View
Presentation.
There is only limited research that address and
illuminates, what makes students in Greenland stick to school until
graduating, despite obvious apparent obstacles, such as inadequate language
skills or family and kin background, without a tradition of formal
education, and if, only at a low level.
In my pilot project at the School of Social Work, Nuuk,
Greenland I have interviewed 12 students. On this research background I
intend to identify and present factors that influence student's ability and
motivation for graduating. It was expected initially that support from
strong kinship ties would be a main reason for completing education. Yet a
main factor is apparently peer group networks, as classroom solidarity among
students themselves has been found to be the single most important factor
for staying and completing their education.
Usually
giving birth makes a girl or a woman a mother.
During two years of fieldwork in
two local communities in Greenland, Nuuk and Tasiilaq (2005-2007) I was
confronted with a somewhat ‘momentary’ maternity, transgressing my wildest
Western imagination.
Through a cultural analysis of
reproductive decisions in Greenland, this study contributes to new insights
into cultural perceptions of lifecourse and kinship based on action and
events, rather than on biology and chronological time.
In this anthropological study I
argue that women’s reproductive decisions are social actions directed
towards both her own hopes for the future, her fertility and for love, but
they are also directed towards the communities in which she engages in, in
everyday life. These communities represent diverse perceptions of what
constitutes an ideal progression of life events.
The political community considers
education an event that should be accomplished previous to childbearing and
motherhood, while the “family” as another community, represents local ideals
about motherhood as a way to maturity and status of adulthood.
In between these two ideals about
the progression of life, I will place a group of young women (17-30 years
old) I met in Nuuk and Tasiilaq who became mothers early in life, and
combined early motherhood with educations. Educating themselves often
involved leaving their home town, and sometimes also leaving their children
behind with other kin. Very often grandmothers acted out the parenting in
the biological mothers place, until she returned. This I have called
‘momentary’ og ‘flexible’ motherhood.
In this study I argue that
flexible motherhood (or fluid maternity) is somehow socialized into the
lives of children and adults. They learn by the way of family life that more
than one person can “act” parent in different situations. Women learn that
if they get pregnant, they can give birth, but still go on living as a young
girl.
I look at perceptions of time and
lifecourse as related to fertility in the young girls stories of
reproductive decisions, and argue that neither time nor lifecourse seems
connected to aging and biological time, linear time. Rather fertility and
lifecourse seems dependent on actions and events.
Motherhood in Nuuk and Tasiilaq, I
experienced, is not necessarily a permanent and irreversible status. Besides
a biological fact, motherhood is considered largely an action, a practice,
and your actions as a mother or parent is what qualifies you as a mother,
and that is what allows you to enter and re-enter the “momentary” status of
motherhood in Greenland.
When a mother claims that her
child is not her own she forces us to reconsider the cultural conceptions of
kinship. In this study I challenge the idea of Marc Nuttall (2000) (and
others) that some kinship relations are ‘non-optative’ (Heinrich 1963), such
as parents and siblings. I argue that even motherhood is negotiable and
flexible, which the stories of young women whose parents take over the
parenting of their daughter’s child illustrates. But I assert that I do not
mean hereby that you can choose your kin, as both Nuttall (2000) and
Bodenhorn (2000) suggests. On the reverse I claim that the women I met in
Greenland did not choose to be mothers or not, they participated in a
complicated negotiation of being related and of acting parenthood, in which
they did not always only decide themselves.
Furthermore the reproductive lives
of the young women in Tasiilaq and Nuuk challenges ideas about what is
defined as ‘real’ and ‘authentic’ in cultural perceptions of kinship, and it
suggests that in the Greenlandic perception of transformative or flexible
kinship, kinship in actions is considered ‘real’ or ‘better than permanent’
in the sense that it brings along more opportunities for a woman making
reproductive decisions, since it might be reversed.
View Presentation.
Rasmussen, Rasmus Ole, Nordregio, Stockholm, Sweden
Brocket, Susan, Nordregio, Stockholm, Sweden
Roto, Johanna, Nordregio,
Stockholm, Sweden
Abstract
The focus of
the session is on three parts or perspectives that make up a unified whole.
Part I: Seeing reality will
explore how one discovers and present facts about the reality of regional
characteristics and development indicators: how one visualizes or “sees”
reality, and how presentation modes can influence what is seen.
Part II: Understanding reality
explores the interpretation and understanding of development processes in
regions. The same set of data will often be used in different ways,
depending on how the user perceives reality, depending on ethnicity, gender,
previous experience and basic values. So, even though two people “see” the
same pattern, the meaning of this pattern will be different.
Part III: Changing reality
explores the role of spatial planning in development. The goal of planning
is to ensure that development is efficient and goes in the desired
direction. But pluralistic planning, that takes multiple views of reality
into account, has its own particular logic.
The session consists of presentations by theorists and
practitioners from the Circumpolar North, and the key structure of the
session is a number of short presentations followed by dialogue and
discussions within each of the three perspectives structuring the session.
We expect that the caliber of presentations will permit their assembly into
a Nordregio working paper, to be published by Nordregio.
View Presentation.
The paper
will focus on the challenges to describe and illustrate the Arctic and the
Arctic regions. In general the Arctic region has been seen in the upper edge
of the map but what happens when we change the scale and view from
north-south polarization to circumpolar comparison? In the light of some key
political and demographical themes the presentation will give a glimpse to
arctic possibilities. It also takes up the main challenges of international
comparison: There are huge differences between the national systems both in
terms of methodology, time and territorial structure. Examples from
Nordregio’s work on arctic issues will be used to illustrate overarching
concepts and principles. Comparisons within countries and across countries
will show how mapping can be used to argue for both similarities and for
uniqueness. View
Presentation.
The focus of
the presentation will be on the ongoing activities in relation to mapping of
areas of interest and importance in relation to planning, and the
presentation will outline how the ongoing mapping of indicators in Greenland
has been developed, and what one is able to “see” because of these efforts.
View Presentation.
Data access
is crucial for the planning process. The establishing of Statistics
Greenland was the result of a political negotiation with OECD when Greenland
in the late 1980s was looking for international loan option approval. Since
then Statistics Greenland has been an important asset as well as a liability
for the planning process in Greenland. The presentation has its focus on
both the perspectives as the problems connected to data access in the
contemporary planning discussion in the Circumpolar North.
View Presentation.
Similarly as
in Greenland, the establishing of facilities for data access and development
monitoring was considered important in connection with the establishing of
Nunavut. To some extend the first attempts to establish an independent
territorial statistical authority leaned towards the situation in Greenland,
but also based on the role of data access and documentation in connection
with the Nunavut land claim process. The role of the Statistical authority
in building territorial authority, however, has been met with very different
understandings, and consequently the question of “need of” and “access to”
data has experienced both up’s and down’s. The presentation will focus on
mismatches and differences in perceptions of realities in data access in
connection with the development process.
The
presentation will explore three concepts in connection with the ongoing
changes in the North: The economic challenges in connection with shifts from
small scale renewable extraction to large scale renewable and non renewable
resource exploitation; the demographic challenges in relation to ongoing
changes in gender and generation based preferences regarding future
development perspectives; and the challenges in the North of the ongoing
impacts of globalisation and “knowledge economies”. Examples from research
on Arctic regions will be used to illustrate how perception of both problems
and potential solutions are dependent on the preconceptions about
development processes.
View Presentation.
The
presentation will focus on the relations between Home Rule and municipal
planning, and the presenter illustrates how important current issues in
Greenland’s development are being discussed and addressed, and how the
content of these discussions is dependent on the viewpoints of the parties
involved. View
Presentation.
The
presentation will focus on the processes and perspectives of regional
planning in Alaska, discussing means and measures in the planning process.
View Presentation.
The
presentation will discuss paradigms for strategic spatial planning in the
context of the arctic. Participatory planning is desired to ensure
democracy in a situation where there are multiple ways of viewing
development processes, but it raises issues of communication and conflict
management. The design of good, collaborative planning and development
processes is discussed, as well as measures for dealing with the contrasts
between conflicting goals. Examples from Nordic planning efforts will be
used to illustrate the concepts and methods presented.
View Presentation.
The
presentation looks at the ongoing planning process in relation to large
scale industries in Greenland, and will explore the current planning effort
in connection with the new aluminium smelter, and compare the way in which
it has been conducted to the ideals of participatory planning and inclusive
governance. View
Presentation.
The
presentation will focus on the relation between communication and public
awareness of planning activities. The key point is the public accessibility
and level of information in connection with the new aluminium smelter, and
the role the media has in connection with public involvement in the planning
process in Greenland.
View Presentation.
The
presentation will discuss the challenges planning faces when the local
communities are very small and the local authorities do not have local
planning capacity. This is the reality in several communities in Greenland.
Either, these communities will not do any planning or the communities will
rely on external consultants´ assistance.
View Presentation.
Nymand Larsen, Joan, Stefansson Arctic Institute Borgir, Iceland
Schweitzer, Peter, University of
Alaska Fairbanks, Department of Anthropology
Abstract
The
background for the proposed session is the Arctic Social Indicators (ASI)
project, 2006-2008, which is a follow-up project to the Arctic Human
Development Report, and endorsed by the Arctic Council. ASI seeks to devise
indicators to facilitate the tracking and monitoring of human development in
the Arctic that acknowledge the distinctiveness of Arctic life and Arctic
understandings of well-being. The project’s main objective is to devise a
limited set of indicators that reflect key aspects of human development in
the Arctic, that are tractable in terms of measurement, and that can be
monitored over time at a reasonable cost. Six domains have been chosen by
the ASI working group for the construction of indicators: Fate control and
or the ability to guide one’s own destiny; Cultural integrity or belonging
to a viable local culture; and Contact with nature or interacting closely
with the natural world; Education; Demography/Health; and Material
Well-being.
The
proposal is to hold a session where members of the ASI working group present
their research findings. The proposed session will include an overview
presentation followed by presentations by each of the six ASI domain teams.
Formal discussants, possibly from relevant groups such as SLiCA, Arctic Stat
and ECONOR, will be included. Following feedback from formal discussants the
session opens up to a general forum with participation from the audience.
View Presentation.
This
paper focuses on the domain we call “material well being.” The paper
begins with a discussion of the organization and structure of the arctic
economy followed by a definition of material well-being within the context
of the arctic region. Based on the definition of material well-being we
develop a set of indicators which are then discussed in terms of various
criteria for assessing their strengths and weaknesses.
We define
material well-being to mean “some measure of local residents’ command over
goods and services”. It should be time and location specific – small scale.
While material well being might be measured by GDP for a nation, the GDP
indicator is problematic when applied to small regions, and therefore we
propose alternative indicators to GDP.
The
arctic economy can be thought of as divided into essentially three parts:
money or market part; traditional/subsistence part; and transfer part. In
many parts of the arctic goods and services and transfer income are provided
directly. The arctic is also characterised by the large flows of money out
of the region through non-resident labour. Our analysis discusses the
tension in the identified indicators between indigenous or tradition-based
communities, and settler or non-tradition-based communities.
Our
discussion includes three measures to define each of the three components of
the arctic economy; personal income, subsistence harvest, and housing. Our
analysis concludes with a discussion of a composite index for measuring
material well-being, followed by our recommendation regarding measuring
material well being given the current as well as possible future
availability of data.
View
Presentation.
Hamilton, Lawrence, Bjerregaard, Peter and
Poppel, Birger
The
Arctic Human Development Report (AHDR 2004) chapters on “Arctic Demography”
and on “Human Health and Well-Being” capably surveyed conditions and broad
trends across nine sub-national regions — Alaska, Greenland, Iceland, the
Faroe Islands, and Arctic regions of Canada, Norway, Sweden, Finland and
Russia. There exist many social contrasts among these regions, or between
them and larger societies to the south. Stark contrasts can be found within
each region too, however. The AHDR regions contain
industrial/post-industrial cities such as Anchorage, Reykjavík or Murmansk,
which numerically dominate the statistical picture. But they also contain
more rural areas such as western Alaska, Iceland’s Westfjords or Russia’s
Chukotka. Most rural areas, in turn, contain a range of communities from
regional hubs with several thousand people and service-oriented economies,
on down to small villages with hundreds or less and stronger dependence on
subsistence.
As the
next step beyond the AHDR, this paper examines issues related to scale that
arise as we consider how to disaggregate health and population indicators
for Arctic societies. In doing so, we focus on two dimensions of scale:
human geography and time. Indicators that might function well enough to
describe populations of hundreds of thousands, and places where change is
relatively gradual, behave differently when applied to small and rapidly
changing Arctic places. Even where the indicators’ definitions remain the
same, comparing them requires extra care in the Arctic. These points are
illustrated by examples of disaggregated time series for several indicators
including infant mortality, teenage birth rate and net migration.
View Presentation.
The
Arctic Social Indicators (ASI) Project, a follow-on from the Arctic Human
Development Report (2004), has the objective of developing a limited,
tractable number of indicators to measure Arctic human development. The
Arctic Human Development Report listed three domains especially important to
Arctic residents: control over one’s destiny (’fate control’), closeness to
nature, and cultural vitality. The ASI project’s task is to develop
indicators and measures to track human development in these three areas, as
well as to develop arctic-specific measures for the three extant domains
used in the UN Human Development Index (material well-being, health and
education).
This
paper focuses on the domain we call “fate control.” We discuss why fate
control is important to Arctic residents, and what is important in
determining one’s fate in the Arctic considering political, economic, social
factors and decision-making capacity. We propose possible ways of measuring
this facet of human development, including an ‘empowerment index’ composed
of six indicators (political, economic, and social), and a more stream-lined
indicator considering a measure of local rights to land and sea resources.
Strengths and challenges of each approach in terms of measurability,
commensurability, longitudinal stability, scalability and other indicator
criteria will be discussed; we also discuss current data availability and
data needs. We will conclude by presenting initial testing of our index and
indicator for several areas of the Arctic, at different scales.
View Presentation.
Schweitzer, Peter, Csonka, Yvon, Kaplan, Lawrence D. and Irlbacher-Fox, Stephanie
Our paper takes the Arctic
Human Development Report (AHDR) as its starting point, which recommended the
domain “maintaining cultural identity”. We rephrase it here as “cultural
well-being” because we believe that the issue isn’t just about “maintaining
and continuing traditional cultures that are at risk under conditions of
rapid change” but also includes notions of cultural creativity and cultural
autonomy.
Language is clearly one of
the center-pieces of cultural well-being, which cannot be addressed without
talking about language issues. It is important for minority languages to
consider language vitality that is the percentage of indigenous people
speaking the language or the age of the youngest people using the language.
Other parameters of language recognition and status will be discussed as
well.
Apart from advancing an
indicator measuring indigenous language retention, we will discuss the
notion of cultural autonomy which – although difficult to capture in an
indicator – remains critical for an understanding of cultural well-being.
Our discussion also will include the rationale for indicators chosen and not
chosen, as well as reflect on the apparent overlaps between the domain
“cultural well being” and other domains, such as “closeness to nature” and
“material well-being”.
View Presentation.
The Arctic
Social indicators project, a follow up to the Arctic Human Development
Report, is developing a set of social indicators to measure and monitor
human development and well-being in Arctic regions. The Arctic Human
Development Report identified three attributes of human development for
Arctic peoples and communities that have not been previously addressed in
development indicators or criteria - fate control, guiding one’s own
destiny, cultural integrity - belonging to a viable local culture, and
contact with nature- interacting closely with the natural world.” (emphasis
added) (AHDR)
The
identification of these three attributes represents a uniquely focused
approach to human development that goes to the heart of Arctic cultures. The
goal of this paper is to present the findings of the “contact with nature”
domain working group which identified and evaluated indicators that we
believe are good proxy measures for contact with nature.
We first
define the concept and the central importance of contact with nature to
Arctic peoples. We also briefly present the literature related to the
concept. In the AHDR report, contact with nature is defined as “a close
relationship with the natural world together with a sense of belonging to
the land (and the sea)…living close to nature”. (AHDR) Beyond that
reference, contact with nature was not further defined or developed. Arctic
societies are characterized as “place-based systems” that “feature human
adaptations… closely tied to local environments”. (AHDR)
The paper
presents ten potential indicators and assesses them based on the criteria of
data availability, feasibility of measurement,
clear meaning, affordability, robustness over time, and applicability to
indigenous and non-indigenous peoples. These
potential indicators include: time on the land, number of traditional
activities, people and time in traditional economy, harvest per capita,
consumption of country foods, income spent on nature-related activities,
local control of resources, proportion of economy that is dependent on the
natural resources, and retention of youth in traditional subsistence
activities. The paper ends with a recommendation for “consumption and/or
harvest of “country food” as the best indicator for contact with nature.
View
Presentation.
This paper
focuses on the domain “education.” The discussion of this domain is
tailored around the keywords: Education for whom? Education for what? And
education how? The indicator should come up with measures of input, output,
processes and involvement. Our chosen indicators is the “participation
and completion of post-secondary education” which comprises three
sub-issues: the proportion of a cohort pursuing post-secondary educational
opportunities; the ratio of students finalizing post-secondary education
opportunities; and finally the percent of students finalizing post-secondary
education opportunities being in the community/municipality/region 10 years
after completion of the post-secondary education.
Our paper
supports our choice of participation in post-secondary education with the
following points:
•
Indicates to what extent the students have adequate primary and
secondary education qualification
•
Indicates to what extent there is an interest among young people to
achieve educational goals
•
Indicates to what extent the community is promoting education as a
means for the future
There are related questions here, for instance, equal
opportunities—equity. Completion rate is not only a proxy of the ability to
finish a program; but also a measure of both emphasizing localized access:
is it possible to do this in a setting that fits the cultural and social
expectations of the student.
The
indicator enables the identification of a number of associated policies
where study of policy documents would be valuable. Do the policies, in
connection with post-secondary education, promote retention of youth? Do
the policies promote gender equality? Do the policies enable involvement of
locals in decisions; are there policies promoting local access; are there
policies enabling infrastructures where surpluses and deficits are balanced?
View
Presentation.
Spein, Anna R., Kvernmo, Siv E.,
Sexton, Hal,
Melhus, Marita and Kristiansen,
Roald
Objectives. The presentation summarises snuff use and cigarette smoking
rates and combined snuff/cigarette users among Sami and non-Sami 10th
graders in North Norway.
Study
design. Data were collected from the “Youth & Health in
North Norway”, a cross-sectional, school based study, conducted
in 2003-2005. Methods. The total sample included 4880 participants
(response rate: 83%). Sami comprised 7% (N= 359), and females 50% (N=2442)
of the total sample.
Results:
The proportion of current (occasional and daily) snuff users were 19%
(N=907). Gender (males 29% vs. females 9%; p£.001)
differences occurred. No significant ethnic differences existed. Similarly,
the proportion of current (occasional and daily) smokers was 27% (N=1295).
Gender (females 31% vs. males 22%; p£.001)
and ethnic (Sami: 34% vs. non-Sami: 25%; p£.001)
differences existed. Sami more often than non-Sami reported living together
with a smoking sibling (20% vs. 12%, p£.001).
No ethnic differences occurred for living with a smoking mother (37%) or
father (30%). The numbers of combined cigarette and snuff users were: 10%
(N=503). Gender (males: 14% vs. females 7%; p£.001)
and ethnic (Sami: 13% vs. non-Sami: 10%, p£.05)
differences occurred. Overall, among daily smoking males 66% reported snuff
use, while the proportion among females was 48%.
Conclusions: After the millennium, decreasing smoking rates has been notated
among Norwegian youth. Spein et al. (2002) generally noted similar smoking
rates among 15 to 19 year old Sami and non-Sami in North Norway during the
1990s. The preliminary results of more Sami 10th graders being current
smokers in 2003-05 suggest a less positive smoking development among young
Sami when compared to regional and national trends. This is the first study
investigating snuff use among indigenous Sami. A high proportion of snuff
users in North Norway combined it with smoking, similar to national and
international studies (Grøtvedt et al., in press; Tomar, 2007). These
findings are further discussed in light of sociodemographic, education
plans, and risk-taking behaviour variables.
Aim:
The aim of this study was to propose and dispose data for core indicators
for children's health and well being tailored to Greenland and measured at
the national level.
Material and methods: The indicators were
proposed in respect to the national Public Health strategy, the current
knowledge of child health, and the rights of the child. Criteria of quality
and relevance for the indicators were set up.
Results: In total 30 core indicators of child
health in 0-17 year old children were proposed implemented immediately and
24 indicators were selected for later implementation. Data on the first
showed that many children are vulnerable due to living in a village,
relative poverty, lack of education, living in lone parent families, and in
general did the selected mortality, morbidity and health risk measures show
high proportions of affected children compared to Nordic countries.
Conclusion: Core indicators on child health
and well being in Greenlandic children showed that a large subgroup of
children is vulnerable due to socio economic conditions, their morbidity,
health determinants and risk behaviour. It was concluded that following the
indicators in the future would secure important basic knowledge on child
health and wellbeing in Greenlandic children.
View Presentation.
This
exploratory research develops an instrumental measure of social capital
based on subsistence harvest sharing data. It uses Woolcock’s (1998)
definitions of social capital at the micro level—intra-community ties and
extra-community networks—and integrates Burt’s (1992) theories of bridging
versus closure. It is the first step in a larger research agenda to test the
hypothesis that small Northern communities with both kinds of social
capital, integration and linkage, are more successfully adaptive and
resilient in the face of rapid social and ecological change.
Two
operational definitions of integration are explored: the density index—the
number of ties expressed as a percentage of the number of ordered pairs
within the community—or the network constraint (Burt, 1992), which measures
the extent to which the households’ ties are redundant, each to the others;
the mean index for the whole community serves as a measure of integration.
For linkage I use the proportion of households in the community that have
ties to households outside the community. In addition to questions about
giving and receiving subsistence foods, the surveys ask about many other
types of ties, including information and advice about hunting, sharing
hunting equipment, providing household labor (housework, childcare, cutting
firewood, building or vehicle maintenance and repair), social support and
financial ties.
The most
straight forward measure of community resilience is stable or declining
population. I also explore other measures constructed from community
characteristics data to represent dimensions of wellbeing identified by the
Arctic Human Development Report (2004).
View Presentation.
The ASI
fate control group (Jens Dahl, Gail Fondahl, Andrey Petrov, Rune Fjellmann,
and Carl Christen Olsen) explored a number of alternative avenues by which
the degree of fate control can be measured. Given the unique place of fate
control among ASI domains and its exceptionally complex nature, it proved to
be difficult, if not impossible, to offer a single all-encompassing measure.
In the process we constructed at least three sets of indicators and/or
indices, pursuing three distinct approaches. The first approach was
associated with developing an intricate system of fate control metrics,
where each of the five fate control sub-domains is described by one to four
indicators. E.g., we offered an elaborate metrics of political empowerment
and economic fate control. However, considering data limitations and
methodological complexity the suitability of such an extensive approach is
unsatisfactory given current ASI objectives. The second avenue was to use a
single most important indicator, such as rights to land and subsurface
resources. Unfortunately, such a single indicator fails to adequately work
at all scales of analysis. The third method was to create a composite index
of fate control (or Empowerment Index) by compiling standardized
sub-domain-specific indicators. While the third approach was the most
attractive at the early stage of our indicator development, future research
should focus on developing a sophisticated measurement system based on
identified sub-domains and both SLiCA and traditional data sources. Current
and future indicators can be made available to the public in a form of a
web-based interactive Social Indicators Atlas of the Arctic.
View Presentation.
This paper
draws on the findings of the Arctic Social Indicators (ASI) project’s
chapters on Material Wellbeing, Education, Cultural wellbeing, Fate Control,
Health and Population, and Contact with Nature. We present a discussion and
some preliminary conclusions based on the findings of these individual
domain chapters. Based on the selection of arctic social indicators of
individual ASI chapters our presentation proposes and discusses a small set
of indicators for tracking human development in the Arctic. Data issues and
data needs identified in the project are discussed.
View Presentation.
Schweitzer, Peter, University of
Alaska Fairbanks, Dept. of Anthropology
Csonka,
Yvon, University of Greenland, Department of Cultural
and Social History
Abstract
“Moved by
the state” refers to the commonality of having to cope with relocations and
other population movements triggered by outside decisions. This session
addresses the phenomenon of state-induced population movements in the
circumpolar North in the 20th and 21st centuries. It is part of an IPY
project that undertakes a comparative analysis of local and regional
contexts of state-induced population movements and their impacts on northern
regions and on the identity of relocated people. The papers in this session
analyze a broad array of case studies (small and large, indigenous and
non-indigenous communities, in free market and central command systems,
ranging from the mid-20th to the early 21st century), for their extent of
commonality and diversity. Particular attention is paid to the local
expressions of moving, coping, rebuilding and remembering. The presenters
use demographic, political, social and cultural variables to track the
similarities and differences, both among communities facing being moved now
and those that have been moved in the past. All papers base on data gathered
during the first half of the “BOREAS-MOVE” project
In
theoretical terms, the papers address the tension between the increasingly
“translocal” and various “senses of place”. The question of how local
identities, “in” or “out of place” (of origin) are constituted leads to a
critical interrogation of the roles of “cultural” and “practical”
engagements in creating and recreating place within a particular
environment. The discussion will hopefully address the relevance of these
research results for the ongoing negotiations between states and communities
about location and relocation in the face of increasing social and climate
change. View
Presentation.
The topic of
my paper will be called “excess population” problem in Lapland from 1950s to
1970s. At first glance the subject could sound illogical: At that time
Lapland was (and still is) the most sparsely inhabited region in Finland. In
addition, the demand of workers there was very high just after WWII. During
the reconstruction time (1945-52) the northern wood industry companies
competed with southern companies for good workers. For instance, they paid
higher wages. The Finnish government also had a very active role in the
development process of industry and agriculture in Lapland. The government
engaged with harnessing of the Kemijoki River (the most important wild
salmon river in Lapland) and offered cheap loans to those companies which
promised to invest in Lapland.
However, the
situation changed quite rapidly at the end of the 1950s. During the 1960s
and 1970s a huge number of young people between the ages of 17-30 moved from
Lapland to the factory work of the Southern Sweden and Southern Finland. In
my paper I will analyze the migration policy of the Finnish government. I
will ask 1) how the local, regional and central administration authorities
“helped” migrants to move away from the region? what kind of propaganda was
used?, 2) how the ordinary people reacted to the “excess population”-problem
according to the local and regional newspapers? and 3) how the government
re-assessed its regional policy principles after the structural changes of
the 1960s?
There are no
previous studies which analyze the role of the state as far as the northern
migration is concerned. According to my hypothesis, the role of the state
was much more important than presumed or conceded. To the political parties
the question of the “excess population” was very embarrassing and they tried
to keep low profiles: there were no public debates in the newspapers about
the issue. After WWII, Lapland was a very important source of wood and
electric power – but governments and parties were not ready to investigate
in the north after the 1960s. However, the big changes in the 1960s,
half-obligatory migration and the other measures of the government, like
construction of the biggest reservoirs in Europe to Lapland, have left deep
scars in the minds of people of Lapland. That’s why it is important to take
the period of the “big change” under academic analysis. View
Presentation.
Danish
colonization interfered with Greenlanders’ settlement patterns ever since
the beginning of the colonial period in 1721. Population concentration
policies, however, climaxed under the modernization plans of the 1950s and
1960s. These policies rapidly became unpopular in Greenland, and Danes were
blamed for them. In this paper, I argue that some recent policies of the
Home Rule Government, which replaced direct Danish rule in 1979, have goals
similar to those of earlier times, but that these goals are not openly
expressed nor discussed.
We still
lack knowledge about the long-term, multi-generational consequences of
earlier relocations and concentrations, both negative and positive. I argue
that at a time when some policies encourage further concentration of
populations in Greenland, it is necessary to foster public debate and to
learn more about the possible consequences of past, present, and future
relocations, not only from the economic point of view, but also from the
point of view of “human development”, and of differential regional
developments. View
Presentation.
Case studies from the Canadian Arctic
typically depict relocations as forced or coerced migrations reorganizing
Aboriginal lands and lives along naive civilizing lines of church and
government agents, with little or no resistance from Aboriginal people. In
fact, Aboriginal people deployed traditional and innovative strategies to
oppose and reorder relocations. However, the former view has proven a
powerful narrative in contemporary efforts to decolonize Aboriginal
territories and communities, with implications both for Aboriginal people
and non-Aboriginal citizens of states critically re-examining their history.
Over the past decade, reconciliation has emerged as
one of the central themes of Aboriginal-state discourse and negotiations in
Canada. This resonates particularly with relocated peoples, many of whom
have sought and won cash settlements from governments, or a species of
apology: carefully worded, legally circumscribed, professionally vetted, and
of questionable sincerity. Reconciliation, as an idea, exposes deep
fault lines between Canadian and Aboriginal attitudes toward rights and
responsibilities, citizenship, historic trauma, memory, and guilt.
Using Inuit and Innu case studies from Northern Labrador,
perhaps the region of the Canadian North most affected by relocation, this
paper examines the workings of narratives of displacement and suffering in
several decolonization settings, from human rights tribunals to land claims
negotiations. It addresses the question: “Can we come to a truthful
assessment of the past, and agree on a meaningful path of reconciliation
over past and present inequalities?”
View Presentation.
Heleniak, Timothy E.
This paper
analyzes the reaction of the people living in the Russian North to the new
conditions following the breakup of the Soviet Union and the economic
transition away from central planning towards a market economy. The paper
will begin with a conceptual model for migration decision making theorizing
as to how many and what types of people might decide to migrate from the
North under new conditions. To answer these questions, the paper will draw
upon both quantitative and qualitative data. The main source of quantitative
data will be from the 2002 Russian population census, in particular
questions on place of birth and length of residency. These data will be used
to attempt to answer such questions as: does being born in the north or
long-term residence build up space-specific social capital that makes
leaving difficult? Migration flow statistics on inter and intra-regional
migration will help to determine whether residents of the north decided to
migrate elsewhere in the regions they lived in, elsewhere in the North, or
away from the North. Data on migration by destination will determine where
they went. Qualitative data from surveys will be used to determine factors
behind migration decisions. The role of Russian government programs to close
or consolidate northern settlements and force people to leave will also be
evaluated. View
Presentation.
This paper
analyses how attachment to the North, which at first glance seemed to be an
inhospitable place, evolved among the first generations of inhabitants in
Russia’s young industrial cities, using case studies from Murmansk and Yamal
regions. In both cases, incomers arrived on what they perceived as empty
places, which they subsequently turned into cities. All of the informants
arrived with the intention to stay for a limited period. However, the places
in the North gradually became their home. Although informants come from
different generations, they were of similar age when they arrived to the
North and share similar experiences of building up their places, which
allows direct analytical comparison. We describe the reasons for the
relocation to the North in the first place, and then the process of how they
justified the prolongation of their stays, which eventually became
permanent. We argue that processes of developing attachment to place run
parallel to the ‘creation’ of these very places. Before industrialisation,
these places did not exist, and informants develop attachment to the ‘work
of their own hands’. We show how material reasons interplay with non
material factors in influencing people’s decisions to stay in the North. Our
findings suggest that place becomes personalised by people’s individual and
collective memories, experiences, practices, and interaction within the
community. Senses of belonging and attachment to the North among incomers
are therefore the result of processes of both human physical and mental
construction. View
Presentation.
The
paper focuses on the vakhtovyj metod in the Russian Federation.
Vakhtoviki are long-distance shift workers, in this case at oil and gas
fields usually, who work for one month followed by one month recreation at
home. Mezhregional´nye Vakhtoviki have their places of residence in
central and southern regions of Russia and often travel several thousand
kilometers to their workplace.
How
did Soviet planners “motivate” young people to get “on the move” between
North and South? Firstly, I will look at state incentives during the Soviet
period, such Komsomol programs and suggestions made by company experts.
Ethnographic examples from active and retired Vakhtoviki, who were recruited
through Komsol programs, will provide individual perspectives on these state
measures. Secondly, I will ask to what extent state intervention exists
today in the extractive industries, which already during the 1980s advocated
shift labor as an important alternative to the cost-intensive maintenance of
permanent settlements. What are current expert models of state intervention,
in times of a liberalized market? How are workers motivated today to join
vakhtovyj metod? Ethnographic data will show problems Vakhtoviki face to
accomplish private life and work life several thousand of kilometers away
from home. Unsatisfying conditions for a positive work-life balance turn out
to be a main limiting factor for the recruitment of Vakhtoviki. Does the
state provide incentives to companies to better organize shift labor?
View Presentation.
This paper
will explore the sense of place and belonging among the population of Moscow
dwellers who moved from the Magadan region to the western part of the
Russian Federation in the post-Soviet time. The history of state-induced
relocations in the Russian Far North in the 20th and 21st
centuries is marked by various state rationales of an economic and political
nature that saw the movement, both voluntary and forced, of thousands of
people to and from the Russian Far North. In the popular imagination,
Magadan is firmly connected with the traumatic experiences of Stalinist
GULAG, a place of despair and suffering. Yet for many former residents, it
is also a place where much of their adult life and often childhood and
youth, had been lived in a seeming isolation from the Stalinist past.
Drawing on the theories of the state, this paper will examine the emotional
landscape of those who have been subject to these movements, focusing on the
state policies on the one hand, and experiences of a ‘double re-settlement’
on another, and discussing perceptions on relocation that are ‘local’ to the
North but narrated by those who no longer ‘belong’. Or do they?
View Presentation.
Since the
rise of Cold War politics in the Bering Strait, Chukotka has been designated
a federal border zone area. During the second half of the twentieth
century, the border zone regime played a major catalyst in a wide range of
social and cultural transformations. It was a chief cause for a number of
settlement closures and relocations, the rupture in the long-standing
contacts between related families and communities living on the two sides of
the Bering Strait, and the institutionalization of strict control over the
movement of people into, out of, and within the region. On the whole, we
can hardly think of a dimension of life in Chukotka that has not been
affected by its border zone status, which continues to shape the identity of
the region today. Yet, in the face of all the grave restrictions and minor
annoyances imposed on the flow of their everyday lives, many contemporary
Chukotkans speak in support of the border regime, insisting they are better
off with it than they would have been without it. According to this view,
being an area closed to the unrestrained influx of outsiders, Chukotka is
shielded from a number of social perils, such as street crime, mafia
dealings, and drug abuse suffered in other parts of the post-Soviet space.
This paper sets out to explore the mythologies of the border zone regime in
Chukotka, paying particular attention to the sentiments of patriotism and
xenophobia they produce. View
Presentation.
Increasingly
over the past four decades, Northwestern Alaskan residents have been
threatened with severe erosion and flooding due to a changing climate. Today
at least four rural Inupiat villages and one rural Koyukon Athabaskan
village are thought to have less than fifteen years before flooding makes
permanent residence in the current village locations impossible, leading to
the necessary relocation of residents. Throughout negotiations with and
lobbying efforts to state and federal lawmakers, village representatives
have tried to make the case for recreating small, discrete communities in
areas near current village sites instead of relocating residents to larger
regional ‘hubs’.
This paper
analyzes the processes of rationalizing, essentializing, and politicizing
place, culture, and lifestyle before lawmakers in order to justify the
expense of recreating a rural village. We will give brief accounts of
historical relocations for a perspective on state/tribe interactions during
prior relocations, while focusing on current discourses between and
interviews with local residents and representatives from governmental
institutions. Drawing on anthropological theories of disaster and case
studies of forced migration, we look critically at how extreme events bring
fundamental aspects of both the state and the local into focus, and why
defending the ‘rural’ and the ‘local’ can become complex, emotional, and
problematic.
The paper
will explore the sense of place in the Thule district, Northern Greenland,
including the emotional topography by which people live. An analytical
starting point will be the notion of a nomadic landscape, drawing
from the essay on nomadology by Deleuze and Guattari (1999). The nomadic
landscape is constituted by a network of spatial centres – or points of
reference – from each of which an infinite spatial realm takes its
beginning. The paper will discuss which are the relevant centres at present,
and how they relate to past points of reference. The ambition is to
demonstrate how, in a nomadic landscape, movement is integral to memory,
sociability and experience; this is vital to the understanding of present
day responses to the reduced mobility owing to changing weather and ice
conditions in the Thule district.
Traditionally, mobility was closely linked to hunting and
fishing practices, displaying a strong element of seasonality, but also to
forced (and other) migrations in the past. In general terms, the paper aims
at looking at the local perceptions of the environment in view of past
experiences, and at identifying the salient points of reference under
changing conditions.
Huskey,
Lee, University of Alaska Anchorage, Department of Economics
XE "Huskey, Lee"
Abstract:
Migration
is a major influence on the size and demographic structure of the population
in Arctic regions. Modern migration involves long-term consequences for
northern communities that reach far beyond the immediate effects on the
migrants themselves. The pattern and scale of migration will affect public
spending, community economies, and traditional activities within the region.
Patterns of migration differ significantly across Arctic regions and between
indigenous and non-indigenous populations. Three sessions will discuss
recent research on migration and its consequences throughout the north.
While most research on migration in the north has been disciplinary and
country specific, the papers presented in these sessions will examine
migration flows around the Arctic through interdisciplinary comparative
research. Two sessions will examine: 1) The determinants and patterns of
migration in the circumpolar north; and 2) The consequences and policy
concerns resulting from northern migration. The third session will be a
roundtable discussion of northern observations about migration.
Kuzomen’ is
a village located on the White Sea coast in the north-west of Russia. It
used to prosper until middle of XX century due to its central administrative
and educational role in the region. The mass migration of the villagers to
the city started in the area in 1950s and continued throughout the second
half of XX century. It was especially high in Kuzomen’ compared to
neighboring villages. The reason for that was that Kuzomen’ had its own
secondary school; school-leavers wanting to pursue higher education did not
come back to the village. The significant loss of population generated a
chain of dramatic consequences for Kuzomen’. During 1950-1970s the Soviet
government carried out the policy of kolkhozes’ enlargement. Kuzomen’s
kolkhoz with all its resources was moved to the neighboring village Varzuga,
as Kuzomen’ experienced a shortage of labor. Later, the official road from
the raion centre was built to Varzuga and stopped 20 kilometers before
Kuzomen’. There is no permanent electricity supply in most villages in the
region. In 2007 power lines were introduced in Varzuga and again did not
reach Kuzomen’.
Towards the
end of 1990s backwards migration started as many of those who had left
Kuzomen’ at a young age felt a desire to return to their homeland. Kuzomen’
today reflects these migratory routes and is home to permanent dwellers,
summer visitors and those who spend half a year in town and half a year in
the village. This influx of people calls for acknowledging and reflecting
this factor in the local policy.
View Presentation.
One of the
fundamental characteristics underlying discussion of human society in the
Canadian Arctic is that it has been an extremely mobile population.
Environmental conditions in the region meant that the Indigenous population
moved often to ensure their survival. The settler population’s presence in
the region was determined by the changing boom and bust cycles of natural
resource exploitation. While much attention has been devoted to debates of
whether the indigenous population was relocated or migrated voluntarily,
comparative little attention has been given to trying to understand the more
contemporary reasons people move into, around, and out of the region.
The trends
of globalization, post-industrialism, new communications technology, the
knowledge society, and political empowerment indicate that new migration
patterns may be developing that need to be analyzed. This paper will attempt
to examine migration in the Canadian Arctic using the most recent census
data and the Aboriginal Peoples Survey. Migration patterns based on size of
community, economic base, indigenous population, importance of traditional
economy, gender, age, and education will be examined.
Hamilton, Lawrence
and Rasmussen, Rasmus Ole
Net
migration in the North, whether inflows of newcomers seeking jobs, or
outflows of local-born young adults seeking opportunities elsewhere, plays a
major role in shaping both the size and structure of populations in small
northern places. Among newcomers there commonly are more young adults than
old, and more men than women, which affect marriage patterns and many other
aspects of small-community life. Less obviously, local-born outmigrants
from northern places often include more women than men - also affecting
social conditions and the life prospects of both movers and stayers.
Migration flows sometimes are tracked directly by statistical agencies.
Even where this is not so, gender and age patterns in migration leave
demographic "footprints" in population structure, and shape its change over
time. We examine population pyramids and other demographic indicators for
northern Alaska and Greenland that show how northern community population
structures are reshaped by age, gender and other differentials in net
migration flows. View
Presentation.
The
circumpolar north is a sending region. Throughout the eight Arctic countries
outmigration has exceeded in-migration for northern regions in recent
history. However, the migration experience among communities within the
north varies. This presentation examines the migration experience for one
type of community, northern cities. Across the Arctic, cities in the
northern regions vary in the number, type, location, and scale. Northern
cities are defined and identified. The migration and urban experience of
northern regions is discussed and compared across the north. The urban
migration experience is compared to theoretical expectations and the pattern
found in southern regions. The policy implications of discovered differences
are examined. View
Presentation.
Imagine you
are separated from your brothers and sisters by an imaginary border, created
in the name of sovereignty. Inuit have been nomadic peoples since time
began, even today, many Inuit move great distances to live the traditional
way of life without permission, border patrols or passports.
In the past
the Inuit traveled throughout the Circumpolar Arctic to visit, trade, hunt
and explore in the areas of what is known as 4 different countries.
Greenland (Denmark), Canada, United States and Russia. In our rush to move
into the 21st century the Inuit are now in a sociological straight jacket,
with restrictions on travel and trade. This is so, even if it's to visit
family in Greenland, Alaska or Russia.
Perhaps it
is time for the Inuit to unite together as one people as they have always
been; this paper hopes to address this need.
Inuit are
threatened peoples. The survival of the Inuit language, culture and way of
life hinges on each of the sympathetic majority of each of the four
countries the Inuit reside in. Their national governments have concerns over
sovereignty, trade agreements with North American and European partners and
security concerns from threats from outside countries. An Inuit State- Has
the time come?
This
research paper explores the history of political advancement and cultural
changes of the Inuit as a whole. Looking at the macro level, the Inuit are
re-gaining their identities and their cultural awareness as we move towards
a globalized economy.
Huskey,
Lee XE "Huskey,
Lee" , University of Alaska
Anchorage
Abstract:
Migration
is a major influence on the size and demographic structure of the population
in Arctic regions. Modern migration involves long-term consequences for
northern communities that reach far beyond the immediate effects on the
migrants themselves. The pattern and scale of migration will affect public
spending, community economies, and traditional activities within the region.
Patterns of migration differ significantly across Arctic regions and between
indigenous and non-indigenous populations. Three sessions will discuss
recent research on migration and its consequences throughout the north.
While most research on migration in the north has been disciplinary and
country specific, the papers presented in these sessions will examine
migration flows around the Arctic through interdisciplinary comparative
research. Two sessions will examine: 1) The determinants and patterns of
migration in the circumpolar north; and 2) The consequences and policy
concerns resulting from northern migration. The third session will be a
roundtable discussion of northern observations about migration.
While much
focus during the last decade has been on the possible impacts of climate
change on the settlement pattern in the Arctic, less attention has been on
the role that migration may have on the future settlement structure.
While
communities historically have been able to accommodate to changes in
climate, it seems to be much more difficult to predict and adjust to changes
in migration patterns, especially because there are marked differences in
migration behaviour between gender and generation classes. These patterns
can be seen as connected to a number of related differences in aspirations
and approaches to change. Firstly in relation to the question of work and
work related activities, where the perception of customary male activities
related to renewable resource exploitation seems to be “sticky”, in the
sense that the male discourse – or perhaps the prevailing discourse in
respect of males - has difficulty in moving on from what once were key
activities, but now constitutes only a miniscule percentage of the available
jobs. Contrary to this, the females in their upbringing are socialized into
collective activities, more attentive to other’s needs, and consequently
much more open to change. As a result of this, they become less limited by
specific job characteristics, determined by what may be considered as being
“traditional” and “acceptable” activities. To use an analogy, males seem to
be socialized into path-dependency, creating difficulties in accepting other
paths and changes, while females tend to be socialized into situations where
adjustment and change are required leaving them prepared to move between job
categories and job options. At the same time different gender and generation
groups have very different approaches to the social environment, which also
influences their preferences.
Based on
register data and surveys (questionnaires, interviews) an overview and
analysis of trends in the internal and external migration patterns in
Greenland will be presented. The focus of the analysis is on one hand on the
marked differences in gender and generational reasons for moving, and on the
other hand on the socio-economic characteristics related to differences
between reasoning and action taken. View
Presentation.
Subsistence harvesting plays an important role in cultural identity and
features prominently in struggles for political rights among indigenous
peoples across the Arctic. Its role in contemporary economies of arctic
communities is less clear. One view sees subsistence as the employer of last
resort for people unable to find paying jobs or leave declining communities
for a better life elsewhere. An alternative view places subsistence as a
productive activity that contributes to the quality of life and attracts
people to live in rural arctic communities, despite lower cash incomes and
inferior public services. Migration decisions provide a mechanism for
determining which of these views has more empirical support, based on the
theory that people move in response to perceived locational differences in
expected well-being. Data from the Survey of Living Conditions in the Arctic
(SLiCA) and other household surveys provide evidence of the extent to which
decisions to move respond to variations among communities in subsistence
opportunities relative to wage-earning opportunities. The results provide
insight into how arctic Inupiat residents value subsistence opportunities
relative to opportunities to earn wage income, as well as how sensitive
community population trends might be to changes in subsistence resource
availability. View
Presentation.
It is
well established in the literature that one primary reason people move from
place to place is to seek employment. This paper concentrates on the case of
internal temporary migration in Alaska. Some Census data are useful for
analysis of migration, but those data are not collected frequently enough to
address temporary migration questions well. Using a set of pre-existing
non-Census surveys, this paper examines temporary migrants in Northwest
Alaska. For the area investigated, approximately 8% to 16% of the population
engaged in temporary migration for market work. Substantial seasonal
differences in temporary migration rates are uncovered, as are gender
differences. View
Presentation.
Since the
OECD report published in 1999 the Greenland home-rule adopted policy
measures based on incentives to promote migration from settlements and
smaller towns to the four so called ‘competition towns’ of Qaqortoq, Nuuk,
Sisimiut and Ilulissat. The unitary price system based on the principle of
goods and services having the same price wherever in Greenland goods and
services were supplied functioned until partial reforms of this system were
implemented. The reforms meant an approach to cost based pricing, and the
principle was a gradual transition in sectors based on cross subsidies
taking one sector at the time. In essence goods and services became more
expensive in settlements and smaller towns, while it became less expensive
in the four towns. Especially the consequences of reformed energy pricing
could become serious for low income groups having their living conditions
deteriorated. Moreover, trying to promote an ‘exodus’ to the four towns
could be problematic in terms of economic costs of migration to the
Greenland Society. View
Presentation.
Using
data from the 2001 Aboriginal Peoples Survey and the 2004 Nunavut Household
Survey, this paper will outline what is known about the extent of -- and
reasons for migration -- by the Inuit of Nunavut. Implications for the
future will be explored.
Huskey,
Lee XE "Huskey, Lee"
, University of Alaska Anchorage, Department of
Economics
Abstract:
The
movement of people changes northern communities. In recent times most
northern regions have experienced a loss of population through migration.
Because certain demographic groups are more likely to migrate, migration
also changes the character of communities. This roundtable will provide a
place for a general discussion of recent migration research and a sharing of
migration stories from communities and regions throughout the north.
Kruse, Jack, University of Alaska Anchorage, ISER
Poppel, Birger, Survey of Living Conditions in the Arctic,
Ilisimatusarfik - University of Greenland
Abstract
This session will focus on the application of results of
the Survey of Living Conditions in the Arctic. By applications, we include:
interpretation of regional results; interregional comparisons; multivariate
analyses; validation of measures; identification of social indicators;
comparisons with ethnographic data, previous survey results, and other data
sources; assessments of SLICA methods – including the effectiveness of
collaborations between researchers and indigenous peoples and among
researchers of different disciplines.
The
session will begin with an overview of SLICA, including questionnaire
design, sampling methods, survey administration, data processing, and
release of results (see
www.arcticlivingconditions.org ).
Our intent is to promote the use of SLICA data and results. Papers
discussing planned and potential use and application of SLICA results are
welcome as well as papers presenting empirical applications and qualitative
assessments of SLICA. One or more sessions will be planned to allow time for
an open discussion of future applications of SLICA data and methods.
Poppel, Birger
In 1994
Statistics Greenland conducted a Survey of Living Conditions in Greenland
based on the Scandinavian model for measuring living conditions. One of the
lessons learned was that this survey either did not reflect the welfare
priorities of a large part of the Greenlandic population or documented
inconsistency between the goals of the individuals and their actual choices.
In connection with the analyses and reporting of the Greenlandic living
conditions study in 1994, it became obvious that problems arose when a
research design presupposing a high degree of social and economic
homogeneity internally, and hence the presence of universally necessary
resources from a relatively homogeneous late industrial society, were
transferred to a country which first of all is characterised by a
non-parallel development, secondly can hardly be described as
industrialised, and thirdly has its own cultural and historic profile.
The
conclusion to these findings, experiences and consultations with
researchers, indigenous organizations, and governments in Canada, Norway,
Sweden, Finland, the United States and Russia were that any further research
into the living conditions of the indigenous population in Greenland and
other indigenous peoples of the Arctic would require a new survey instrument
designed specifically for countries in Arctic regions where a large numbers
of indigenous residents still rely on the harvest of local resources for
food. It was furthermore concluded that it was more important to draw
comparisons between Greenland and other Arctic regions rather than between
Greenland and European countries.
This
presentation focuses on some of the methodological and theoretical
deliberations, the major objectives and the research design of the Survey of
Living Conditions in the Arctic, SLiCA.
SLiCA
has been conducted in a partnership between researchers and the indigenous
peoples in the countries and regions. The significance of this partnership
will be addressed too.
View
Presentation.
Over the
last fifteen years research in health as well as in living conditions in
Greenland has been studied through different recurrent national surveys.
Research in health and living conditions address
overlapping issues, with a diverse focus. Having such two different national
surveys collected during the same time period is a unique opportunity to
expand knowledge and perspectives on health and social inequality in
Greenland through comparative analysis.
This study
sets out to compare the most recent Greenlandic data respectively from SLiCA
(The Survey of Living Conditions in the Arctic) and Inuit Health in
Transition (collected by Greenland Home Rule & National Institute of Public
Health, University of Southern Denmark). The SLiCA-data was collected in
2003-2006 and the Inuit Health in Transition-data in 2005 -2007.
The
presentation will address methodological aspects of doing comparative
research and provide examples on how comparative analyses can add to a more
comprehensive picture of health and living conditions in Greenland, which
can be supportive for future health policies. At this stage (spring 2008)
these comparative analyses are at a preliminary stage, but the results will
be ready for the conference in August.
Comparative
studies among Inuit are also possible in other circumpolar regions.
Developing this comparative study to include Inuit across the circumpolar is
the strategy for further investigations.
View Presentation.
Domestic
violence affects first of all the women and the children of the families and
has an impact to the families` and the society’s social, cultural and
economic life and especially to the children’s growing up. Gender and
violence is often analyzed from the women’s perspective. In my PhD-project
Domestic violence – Violence against women by men the focus is on
men, masculinity, and men’s power practices.
This
project gives the opportunity to describe and illuminate the problem from
different field approaches using different sources. It gathers information
on men’s violence from several different sources, including drum songs,
narratives, police reports and findings from the Survey of Living Conditions
in the Arctic, SLiCA.
The focus
of this presentation is victimization of the individual, which I approach by
analysing the relationships between respondents´ backgrounds and resources.
In the
paper, potential differences according to gender, age, labour market
affiliation as well as alcohol problems at home in the childhood and today,
in the different regions in Greenland will be analysed.
View Presentation.
Poverty among Children in
Greenland: A Statistical Analysis of Data on
Income for Households with Children
Schnohr, Christina, Nielsen, Sissel L. and Wulff, Steen
The study
was the second part in a series of three, examining child poverty in
Greenland. This study was a quantitative study of
income data of households with children, and by means of descriptive
statistics as well as logistic regression analysis, the prevalence and
determinants of poverty, was examined.
The study
was based on data from Statistics Greenland, and consisted of 8, 082
households with children in 2004. Data included 17,923 adults and 15,979
children, of which 17% were in settlements, 58% in towns and 25% in Nuuk.
The study
used three measures of poverty, relative poverty, poverty based on a means
test and implicit poverty. Relative poverty was the proportion which had
less than 50% of the median income, poverty based on a means test was the
proportion who had received social benefits during 2004, and implicit
poverty was a measure derived from the standards used in the specific town
for when a family was in need.
9%, or 1,416
children in 576 households, in Greenland lived in relative poverty, 39%, or
6,142 children in 2,821 households, lived in poverty based on a means test,
and 4%, or 507 children in 174 households, lived in implicit poverty.
Logistic
regression performed for each of the three poverty measures determined
factors which were general for households classified in poverty. These were:
1) households with young adults (under 25); 2) single parent households; 3)
households with many children; 4) households in settlements: and 5)
households with adults born in Greenland.
View Presentation.
In an effort to contribute to the current developing
understanding of the implications of large economic development projects
upon Northern Peoples of Canada and Alaska, quantitative data drawn from the
Survey of Living Conditions in the Arctic (SLICA) will be used in
combination with field work in a Dene community in the Northwest Territories
(NWT), Canada. Particular attention will be given to 2001 SLICA findings
related to subsistence activities, use of native language, and ties to
family. These findings will be elaborated upon and linked to a current
field study regarding diamond mine impacts in a small remote Dene
community. The primary purpose of the latter study was to have women and
youth reveal the social, economic, and cultural impacts created by the
diamond mines located in their region. The study revealed that the wage
economy created by the diamond mines has impacted the community
significantly. Work rotations and high wages, for example, have impacted
subsistence activities, values placed on material goods, children's use of
native language. Both studies show that cultural erosion is occurring at a
very rapid rate within indigenous communities - whether Inuit or Dene – in
northern North American regions. Impacts may be hastened by large economic
development projects, such as mining.
View Presentation.
The Arctic region is increasingly being viewed as an important
resource-base, and is being explored for its resource development
potential. While many researchers in the 1960s suggested that northern
populations would ultimately make the transition from subsistence dominated
economic activity to wage employment, more recent studies reveal that the
traditional economy remains important, is desirable, and is to the overall
benefit of local individuals and communities. The purpose of this research
project is to explore the relationship between northern mining developments,
and subsistence activities and values in two arctic regions. Two main
questions are addressed in the study. Firstly, how does mining development
in the Arctic relate to the subsistence values and activities of local
Indigenous peoples? Secondly, how does participation in mining employment
affect peoples’ subsistence values and practices? In examining this
relationship, it is necessary to understand the effect that mining projects
can have on regional income and employment levels. Also, since the
subsistence economy is based primarily on land-based activities and a
healthy natural environment, it is necessary and important to understand the
relationship between mining and the resulting perception of environmental
quality. The proposed presentation will discuss some of the early findings
from a recent analysis of four mining projects located in Alaska and
Northern Quebec. Data was collected from the Survey of Living Conditions
in the Arctic (SLICA), and from environmental assessment hearings in
Nunavik and Alaska. View
Presentation.
Kruse, Jack
Violent
death rates are generally high among Arctic Native peoples and are a source
of major local, regional, and international concern. At the same time,
discussions about violent death, depression, alcohol abuse and other social
problems often focus on treatment and mitigation of the problems themselves,
drawing negative public attention. In 2003 Charles Dorais of Makivik
Corporation, Kuujjuaq, Canada and Ed Ward of Maniilaq, Inc., Kotzebue,
Alaska suggested as one of five international analysis themes,
relationships between social problems and other dimensions of living
conditions. Dorais is a member of the Canadian Steering Committee and
Ward is a member of the Alaska Native Management Board. The Survey of Living
Conditions in the Arctic offers an opportunity to examine social problems
such as violent death in the context of living conditions that contribute to
well-being and thereby may reduce the prevalence of social problems. This
paper examines our hypothesis that overall well-being and social problems
are both related to a combination of other dimensions of living conditions
including domestic and cash production, strength of cultural values, social
participation, and a sense of local control. The analysis is based on over
7,000 personal interviews with Inuit adults in Greenland, Canada, Chukotka,
and Alaska. View
Presentation.
Usually, the general trends in Aboriginal Development
Studies focus on specific social determinants such as : personal or
collective income, economic growth, types or scale of resources, health
conditions, level of education, and housing conditions, to name a few.
Without denying their importance, the APS-SLICA survey helps qualifying, at
least for the Inuit communities, the presumed universality of their
prevalence. By getting back to the ethics roots of the concept of
development (the quest of well- being), this presentation will show the
evidence of the great importance of two dimensions of well-being
nevertheless evacuated in the standard measures: the importance of social
ties and Identity.
View Presentation.
Economic Stratification and Living Conditions in the
Arctic
Duhaime, Gerard
Abstract not received to date.
View Presentation.
Dybbroe,
Susanne, Aarhus
University, Dept.of Anthropology/Etnography
Tróndheim, Gitte, University of
Greenland, Department of Cultural and Social History
Abstract
A growing
number of Arctic residents are moving into towns and cities. Life in general
in the Arctic is influenced by decisions and movements originating faraway,
connecting the Arctic globally by way of economic relations, the media,
youth culture and geo-politics. There is nothing inherently new about this,
however: the speed is stunning. Urbanism as a form of life and processes of
urbanisation has changed regions and ways of life that until this generation
was highly isolated. We see urbanization in terms of the development of
urbanity, density, and complexity of organisation usually associated with an
urban way of life. We also see the development of urbanism in places that in
terms of size and demographic density are not usually thought of as urban.
And we see the development of expectations of particular ways of life in
regions that cannot produce these conditions on their own, without strong
support from rich governments, whose elites may have different ambitions
with respect to the utilisation of scarce resources.
The
session invites presentations dealing with trends and issues relating to
this state of affairs: the overall urbanisation of Northern society. Topics
may be ethnographic specific, dealing with ways that individuals and groups
deal with interventions and changes of different sorts; or broadly
analytical, treating questions of theoretical importance relating to the
development of the comparative study of Arctic urbanism.
Immigration
of Inuit into southern Canadian cities from the Arctic increased
substantially during the 1980s. According to the 2001 Census of Canada,
approximately 8,000 of 45,000 Inuit live outside the Arctic region. As the
number of Inuit in urban centers is increasing, so too is the number of
homeless Inuit in these centers increasing. It is estimated that there are
more than 90 homeless Inuit in Montreal, which probably has an Inuit
population of about 800. This paper describes life and characteristics of
urban Inuit, especially, homeless ones in Montreal. It also shows service
activities of the Native Friendship Centre of Montreal and Inuit Association
of Montreal, which are essential for survival of the urban Inuit in
Montreal. The urban Inuit have not formed any useful social networks or a
community for sharing information and food to promote their adaptation to
urban environments of Montreal. Thus, along with many urban Inuit, I argue
that an Inuit community center, which can be a basis for a social community
or social networks of the Inuit, should be established in Montreal.
View Presentation.
This paper
deals with the development of attachments to nature among former labor
migrants in industrial communities of Northern Russia. The idea of conquest
of Nature was dominating in the soviet official rhetoric, defining nature as
meaningless unless it was exploited for human needs. Many migrants who were
sent to industrialize the Soviet North did not fully string along with the
state in the soviet pathos of nature conquest. For people who populated the
newly-built industrial cities, interaction with northern natural
environments took an important place in their biographical experiences.
Popularity of mushrooming, berries picking, fishing, etc. all over the large
territory of the Russian North is incredible. Considering the fact that the
majority of the population in these regions is non-indigenous and consists
of several generations of former migrants from other regions of Russia/USSR,
the importance and similarity of practices "in nature" in different parts of
the Russian North is surprising.
This paper
is aimed to analyze in historical perspective relations to nature and
practices in nature of non-indigenous inhabitants of the Russian north. What
role practices in nature play in belonging to the place of new northerners,
their emotional attachment to the north? How interaction with natural
environments influences social networks and social cohesion in communities
of northern industrial towns?
The research
is based on a wide range of materials: newspapers and archives documents for
a historical overview of industrialization of the Russian North;
biographical interviews, memoirs and diaries for analyzing personal
experiences.
View
Presentation.
The fact that most people of
the Russian North live in urban places is largely the result of the Tsarist
and Soviet policy to conquer, tame and settle this vast area due to state
expansion and industrialisation. Different from monofunctional industrial
towns, northern provincial capitals are centres of political power and
legislative decision making. They often have a special ethnic character
because of large numbers of migrants from rural areas and their descendants.
These cities are charged with the symbols of the central role they play in
the region. Nowadays regional capitals try to adapt an inherited
infrastructure and a settlement pattern to the new economic and social
realities. I analyse the viability in the northern city focusing on possible
common perspectives of northerners for post-Soviet city development. Urban
development is considered here as social process located between place and
space, inside and outside, image and representation. Naryan-Mar - capital of
the Nenets Autonomous District (European Russian North) and Yakutsk –
capital of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia, North-East Siberia), stand for the
Soviet approach to northern Urban development. This can be seen from factors
such as population distribution, rate of urbanisation, locations of urban
settlement, and an ethnic and geographic division of labour. I examine
differences and commonalities in regional spatial dynamics between these two
capitals, as different interests, power-relations and ethnic groups try to
establish mutually beneficial relationships. I argue that northern
communities and regions construct their identities based on issues of space
(centre-periphery, mainland-frontier, remoteness-proximity, perception and
images).
Studies based on assumptions developed
in a European context have predicted that the importance of kin relations
would decrease in Greenland, as it was becoming modernized and urbanized.
Research on social life in Greenlandic towns focused on the decrease of
household size, whereas ethnographies of small settlements gave the
impression that such places were the last strongholds of traditional
Greenlandic culture and family organization. The fieldwork I have been
conducting in two towns of North and West Greenland establishes however that
kinship ties remain very important in urban contexts.
Kinship
relations in Greenlandic towns can come into existence through
consanguinity, affinity, adoption, naming and friendship. Although urban
kinship can be utilized in many different ways, the basic ideology is
centered on expectations about moral and mutual obligations in the realm of
sharing, marriage, naming, and adoption, among others. Relatives have many
different kinds of mutual obligations in their lives and sharing defines the
family. Family members strive to keep relatives together to avoid being
isolated and having no one to support and share with.
People have
a choice as to whether or not to fulfill the mutual obligations of the
family, and sharing does not always mean that kinship system and forms or
social organization are harmonic.
View Presentation.
Greenlandic youth navigate towards life in urban centers and increasingly
get their youth experiences from living in expanding, dynamic urban
environments. Life strategies including choices of
education are nowadays closely linked to the urban Greenland. Life in towns
and cities affects young people’s knowledge regimes, competencies and their
perception of the future, in institutional and everyday life, as well as in
creative and experimental spaces.
Based on my
argument about the inextricable link between youth and urban centers in the
Greenlandic context, my presentation raises questions related to
understandings of urbanity. What is urbanity and what does it mean? How do
young people use the urban environment in Sisimiut? How do they experience
the city?
Questions
asked in my presentation are based on my PhD project "Youth and the City–
investigating urban youth culture in Sisimiut, Greenland: visions, skills
and creativity" funded by Danish Research Council and part of "Urban
Greenland - movements, narratives and creativity (2006-2009)."
Arctic
urbanization and urbanism presents the anthropology of the North with
challenges in terms of both focus and methods. What is 'urbanization' and
what is 'urbanism'? How may a theoretical clarification define our approach
to the study of an increasingly complicated social context, in which place
and distance are taking on new significance? A growing number of Arctic
residents are moving into towns in the north and migrating within the north
or between the north and the south, between small places and metropolitan
areas. Mobility, always an integral part of Circumpolar Arctic societies,
is happening for different reasons, stimulated by new concerns and triggered
by wholly new assessments of alternatives from within local communities.
Accessibility in and out have influenced expectations and changed the way
individuals and groups engage in mutually committing kinds of relationships.
How as anthropologists do we operate in this new context? What should be our
empirical and theoretical concerns and why? How do we capture the underlying
continuity as lived by individuals and groups in societies on the move?
View Presentation.
Lynge,
Lona, MIPI (Documentation Centre on Children and
Youth)
Banerjee, Nina
Abstract
The objective of this session is to present contemporary
social research on children and youth in the Arctic regions. Having children
and youth as a common research focus papers from various academic
disciplines are invited. The session will also aim at forming a network of
researchers working within the field of children and youth.
The study
is the first part in a series of three, examining child poverty in
Greenland. From a children’s perspective, the report
describes how children of families in straitened circumstances experience
and cope with the financial situation of the family. The study involves
children from settlements, towns and the capital. The criterion for the
selection of children is that they are between 10 and 17 years old and that
one or both of their parents are on social welfare because of their
inability to provide for themselves and their children. The study shows that
the children experience various kinds of material and social deprivation and
that they are aware of their family’s straitened circumstances. Some
children actively cope with the situation while others choose an avoidant
approach and have what you might call a passive coping strategy. In addition
to interviews with 24 children and one or both of their parents, the report
features an analysis of 71 essays by 9th and 10th graders on the ways it
affects children when their family is short of money, and what elements are
essential to their well-being. The report also contains an analysis of
drawings made by 36 children aged 11-12. The drawings illustrate what it is
like to grow up in a family of means and a poor family respectively.
Contrary to the interview survey, the children who wrote the essays and made
the drawings were not selected according to specific criteria, but represent
different income groups in Greenland.
My paper
examines young people's ideas about their own future among the Eveny, a
small indigenous group of reindeer herders in the village of Topolinoye in
Northeast Siberia, based on 12 months' fieldwork.
In the field
I explored how Eveny children are involved in learning processes which are
not limited to school and what meanings are being produced in these
settings. Drawing on the stories told by local children and my interaction
with them I have explored how children experience this social world and how
it influences their ideas about the future.
Looking at
the village and the forest as two distinct but interacting social spaces I
focused my research on both the village and the forest, and started by
wondering to what extent children's socialization differs in each of these
settings, and what influence this might have on their later
life-trajectories.
View Presentation.
The study
is the third part in a series of three, examining child poverty in
Greenland. It deals with children from families in
straitened circumstances and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The study gives an account of the right to an adequate standard of living as
defined by the convention and analyzes whether children from families in
straitened circumstances enjoy this entitlement. Moreover, the duties of the
Greenlandic authorities are delineated vis-à-vis ensuring that the children
enjoy an adequate standard of living, and references are made to a number of
recommendations from the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child which
monitors the enforcement of children’s rights.
The study
concludes that children from families in straitened circumstances in many
ways do not enjoy an adequate standard of living. Thus, children from
families in straitened circumstances experience that their need for
sufficient and nutritious food, proper clothing, and reasonable housing
cannot be met, and that they are hampered in their development in various
ways. The study points to the fact that the authorities are legally obliged
to intervene with assistance and support programs in order to remedy this
situation as soon and efficiently as possible. All relevant resources
available must be used to meet this obligation. The study suggests
increasing the financial and non-financial support of families in straitened
circumstances, adopting a coherent and comprehensive action plan to combat
child poverty and realize children’s rights, and reducing inequality as
regards distribution of wealth in society.
This paper presents the overall research design of the series Greenlandic
Children’s Standard of Living published in three parts by MIPI –
Documentation Centre on Children and Youth in 2007. It includes discussions
on the handling of ethical issues with regard to researching children and
how research affects and is affected by the status of children in society.
Langgård,
Karen, University of Greenland, Dept. of Language,
Literature and Media
Abstract
The
question of a general sustainable development in the local regions of the
Arctic also includes the question of a sustainable development of
intellectual culture and language competence.
'Glocalization' (globalization vs. localization) is the process where the
impact of global tendencies is partially seen as opposed to local
tendencies. Even at utmost remote settings the co-presence and interplay of
both universalizing and particularizing tendencies is evident. This
condition raises certain questions about the consequences of the interplay
between the local and the global policy regarding culture, media and
language. Who are the decision-makers and gatekeepers?
The
session will focus on the diversity of the situation of Inuit languages and
Saami languages and how Language Policy and Language Planning are in the
different parts of the Arctic. Ongoing research, a subproject to IPY ID 123:
“Glocalization – language, literature and media”, will through individual
projects gather new data on the circumpolar development of language that is
taking place in the Arctic among Inuit and Saamis. Please, for IPY ID 123
see
www.uni.gl. The goal of the
session is both to let the IPY project researchers present their research
and to invite other researchers to present research on these themes.
This lecture presents
results from an enquiry among young people age 10-16 in Tana-valley - the
border area between Norway and Finland. This is an area with a Sámi majority
where bi- and trilingualism has been and is common.
A language shift away
from Sámi language to Norwegian and Finish has occurred, but never affected
the whole Sámi population or the whole area. The policy towards the Sámi
population also changed much through the 80s and the 90s both in Finland and
Norway. Sámi was taken into use in school and kindergartens as a language of
instruction. It was made an official language in this area and taken into
use in local administration along with Norwegian and Finish. The use of
Sámi in media increased. After this Sámi language seems to have been
revitalized and there might be a tendency that the language shift has been
reversed.
I will present results on
young people’s language background through three generations. I will talk
about which language their grandparents speak, which language their parents
speak and which language they speak themselves. I ask specifically about
their knowledge of the three languages in the valley: Finnish, Norwegian and
Sámi and also English, about their language behavior, their language
attitudes and their identity if it is a single identity or multiplied.
View Presentation.
This paper is an
analysis of naming practices among the Inupiat of King Island, Alaska.
Cultural names related to place and the local ecology indicate how people
perceive and act upon their local environment and how they perceive their
own role within that environment. These perceptions, reflected in language,
serve as a cultural window to how King Islanders understand their
environment. Changes in the naming practices relating to contact with and
influence of non-Native cultures are symptomatic of cultural disruption
common to many native communities and may indicate changes in cultural
identity and subsistence patterns.
Information given by
King Island Inupiat elders regarding plant, bird, and place names is
currently being developed into a database for cultural preservation
purposes. This information will be evaluated in order to determine the
extent of Western influence on these names and the consequent effects on
cultural identity among the King Island Inupiat community. This analysis
will contribute to an understanding not only of how this Native community
identifies culturally significant plants, birds, and places, but also how
these names have changed through time as a result of non-Native influence
and, consequently, how cultural identity and subsistence patterns have
changed as well.
This analysis will also serve to promote a clearer understanding of Inupiat
culture and the meaning of place within indigenous communities, and also
contribute to a synthesis of traditional ecologicalknowledge (TEK) and
Western science related to plant and bird species populations in the
BeringStrait region and may encourage language.
The Southern
Sámi people is a small ethnic minority in Norway and Sweden. There are not
many people left who speak Southern Sámi as an everyday language, and it is
considered endangered. In this situation there is an effort made to
revitalize the language. Young people who have learned the language in
school are having a strong desire to save the language and to contribute to
it’s survival by speaking it more often and by transmitting it to the
youngest generation. This, however, is not easy. That is not only due to
lack of a complete competence of the mother tongue in the Southern Sámi
language. Many young southern Sámis talk about a barrier to using the
language as often as they would like to. In this talk I will present what I
have found out about what this barrier consists of. I will present two
different dimensions of the barrier: one ethnicity dimension and one
language dimension. The ethnicity dimension consists of two main factors:
self-identification and stigmatization. The language dimension also consists
of two main factors: actual language skills and language purism. I will show
how these factors join and together make the barrier to speaking Southern
Sámi. I will also show the strategy some have used to overcome this
barrier. View Presentation.
This
paper discusses the metaphor “language death”. “Language death” is an
important concept in language policy and planning. Here we present findings
from the efforts to revitalize the South Saami language in Norway, as well
as similar efforts on behalf of the Manx language on the Isle of Man, form
the empirical basis for this discussion.
South
Sámi is one of a number of Saami languages. Today, South Saami is spoken by
several hundred native speakers. There has been no statistical analysis of
the status of South Saami, but it is assumed that most of the native
speakers are people over 50 years of age.
During
the past few years projects have been initiated to revitalize South Saami.
Due to the threat of “language death”, linguists have been motivated to
participate in projects to revitalize languages with few speakers. In this
connection, some questions have to be raised: How long will it be possible
to run campaigns in order to make a language “live”? Should a language be
declared “dead” when the last native speaker passes away?
As an
extension to these questions, it is necessary to take a critical look at the
metaphor “language death”. Is “death” a good metaphor to use regarding
languages?
Climate
change and its influence on the social, cultural, and political dimensions
of the North is an area of critical societal importance in our time. Nowhere
is this clearer than in Siberia, where the ecosystems and peoples are
experiencing unprecedented change as this region warms and as globalization
alters traditional ways of life. Many Siberian natives, representing some 30
to 40 different languages (a complexity unmatched in any other region of the
Far North), continue to live a subsistence lifestyle, supporting themselves
by herding (caribou in the North, sheep in the South), hunting and fishing.
Language, culture, and the relationship to the land have been key parts of a
fragile and yet tenacious Siberian indigenous identity. Those Siberian
peoples who maintain their language also maintain traditional culture,
including music and art forms. All this is threatened with catastrophic
change by global warming and a resulting globalization.
At this
point it seems unrealistic to think that the Russian government will
implement policies which will help indigenous languages flourish. In this
paper I investigate the role of external linguists and non-governmental
organizations (NGOs) in affecting such policies and argue for alliances
between environmental NGOs and local Siberian groups to leverage influence.
I further argue that the external linguist can and should play a role of
advocacy for local groups where the groups wish, and that such advocacy is
part of an ethical model for working linguists working with endangered
language groups.
View Presentation.
Inupiaq
in Alaska comprises two major dialect groups, each containing two dialects,
which in turn have sub-dialect variation, creating a rich linguistic picture
indicative of the diversity expected in and around the homeland of the Inuit
branch of the Eskimo languages. In the absence of an all-inclusive
language planning effort, local programs addressing language issues take a
variety of forms. This paper will look at efforts underway in Alaska
to strengthen and perpetuate Inupiaq and compare language planning
strategies being employed elsewhere in the Inuit world.
By exploring
some aspects of Inuit language and culture, we will get an insight into
Inuit theories concerning the relation between isuma (« mind ») and
uqausiit (« spoken words »). From an Inuit perspective, mind and
spoken words are considered as very powerful. Spoken words were said to be
thoughts living in the canopy of heaven originating from the world of the
non-humans (spirits or deceased). A shaman once brought them back to earth.
The contemporary discourse does not contradict the whole of these
conceptions concerning the origins of language. Spoken words are still
perceived as powerful tools able to change situations (sakkuit
designates projectiles, powerful words and insults). They are also described
as objects produced by humans in charge of their good working order:
uqausivut inunnut sanajaunirmata (the verbal stem sana- means
« to make, to carve, to give a shape to something”). Words follow an
upstream/downstream path from the inside of the body towards the outside
after being first submitted to a kind of assemblage of different elements.
But meaning is only produced by the addition of shared personal experiences.
Our approach has not only theoretical implications, as we must keep in mind
that Inuit gained political power without violence relying on the power of
spoken words. What lies behind Inuit constructive approach of spoken words?
How can we avoid misunderstanding Inuit discourse?
The project is a PhD-thesis. In the West Greenlandic
language, time is marked in three different ways, first by conjunction,
indicating simultaneous and sequence of situations, secondly by aspectual
suffixes, and third by tense suffixes. In this presentation I shall
demonstrate the tense systems in the Inuit languages.
View Presentation.
This
research was carried out in 2002-2007 by Laboratory of Protected Areas and
Ecology of Culture (Institute of Ecological Problems of the North of the
Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Science) field researches in order to
study a language situation in a context of social and ethno-cultural
processes of adaptation of the Nenets of the island Kolguev to social and
cultural transformations.
Settling of
the island Kolguev by Nenets has taken place in the second quarter of XIX
century. The Nenets community kept a traditional nomadic way of life until
the 1930s. The policy of the Soviet government directed on social-cultural
integration with the creation of “multinational Soviet people“promoted an
alienation of Nenets from their national culture.
Nenets of
Kolguev nowadays live in the settlement Bugrino (less then 500 inhabitants)
which is located in the south of the island. The language situation here is
typically a distribution of bilinguals. Half of the group of interrogated
Nenets called both languages as the native language - Russian and Nenets.
The other half - only speak Nenets language. Russian language dominated on
Kolguev. Nenets language is used “in a domestic circle”. Almost all
respondents are able to speak, read and write in Russian. Knowledge of
Nenets language for half of all respondents is limited by some words only.
All the
information by books, newspapers, radio, TV, video comes to the inhabitants
of Bugrino by Russian language. Only a few inhabitants prefer to read in the
national language.
Most
respondents agree with the statement, that Nenets and Russian languages in
the Nenets Autonomous Area should be used on an equal basis. According to
their opinion, Russian is necessary, as “state language”. Studying of Nenets
language is important for the “preservation of a tradition".
We could
mention also two contradictory extreme points of view. One is “Nenets
language should dominate everywhere”, another “We shall study at school
English language, which is more practical for the future, but not Nenets
language”.
In today’s
situation, the role of Russian as the language of interethnic dialogue
raises. The paradox with the Nenets peoples from Kolguev is that they use
Russian language visiting Naryan-Mar (the capital of Nenets Autonomous
Area), because their dialect differs from “official” Nenets language.
Languages
are often described as “living entities”, a simple and simplistic metaphor
used to translate the fact that their syntax, morphology and lexicon are not
fixed for ever but evolve in time. For what concerns the lexicon, terms stop
to be used by a whole speaking community, or fractions of it, whereas at the
same time new words enter the language to name objects, concepts brought by
socio-economical, political, cultural changes. The reasons behind the disuse
of current words and the processes of generation and integration of new
words reflect the “state of mind” of the speaking community.
During
recent field work in Mittimatalik (Pond Inlet) in Northern Baffin Island
(Nunavut, Canada), I came across several Inuit terms or syntagms, belonging
to the lexical field of the night, still very well known by elders but to my
surprise sunk into oblivion among the young adults who were asked about
them.
In this
communication, I will thus look at the four words or syntagms concerned:
unnuattak “bright night of spring”, unnuijuq “seal hunting at
breathing holes at night in winter”, sinnaaqtaujuq “be victim of an
aggression while asleep” and itinngitainnaqtuq “never wake up, i.e.
die in his sleep”. After presenting their meaning and examples of use, I
will try to explain what could have led to their recent disuse and
replacement by more generic terms. The apparent paradox of the situation
arises from the fact that these more or less forgotten terms amongst young
generations designate realities or acts which still belong to the
contemporary world, at least as possibilities. I will present my suggestions
for the reasons of this lexical change.
View Presentation.
Koryak,
spoken in northern Kamchatka, Russia, is an endangered language. Numbers of
speakers are difficult to estimate; Koryak varies considerably from one
dialect to another, and there has been little reliable linguistic
demographic research in northern Siberia, but the most widely spoken variant
of Koryak has less than 4,000 speakers. Koryak became a written language
only with the advent of Soviet policies of modernization in the 1920s. This
paper introduces this tumultuous history of writing Koryak to frame an
analysis of the political economy of writing indigenous Siberian languages.
Oppressed in many forms under the Soviet Union, Siberian languages were
given room in school curricula again during glasnost, and now are
actively supported by local authorities. Curriculum development for Koryak
is partially driven by the politics of indigenous identity in Siberia.
Teaching children and adults to write a language is more than presenting the
shapes of letters. Textbooks throughout the 20th century present changing
images of Koryaks and their place in Russian society. The most recent
textbooks published in the 21st century strive for a community-centered
approach. However, an ideology of standardization and a perceived need for a
standard orthography seem to be hindering more than helping language
revitalization efforts among Koryaks. This ideology is part of a Soviet
legacy of top-down education planning. Writing, teaching, and reading
indigenous languages like Koryak are fraught with conflicting demands from
communities, key elders, state actors, and teachers.
Langgård,
Per, Oqaasileriffik - the Greenland Language
Secretariat
l
Heilmann, Beatrine
Abstract
The
question of a general sustainable development in the local regions of the
Arctic also includes the question of a sustainable development of
intellectual culture and language competence.
'Glocalization' (globalization vs. localization) is the process where the
impact of global tendencies is partially seen as opposed to local
tendencies. An example of local appropriation of global computer technology
is going on in Nuuk:
Oqaasileriffik Nuuk has in cooperation with the University of Tromsø since
the spring of 2005 worked on a finite state automaton for Greenlandic. In
October 2006 the automaton was implemented as a spell checker (now with
coverage above 90% most unrecognized words being loanwords and proper nouns
of foreign origin – and thus very close to being robust). Next step is a
disambiguating grammar for Greenlandic in a constraint grammar framework. As
concrete applications of the project the Greenlandic automaton could be
ported to other dialects of Inuit languages eventually paving the way for
automatic translations of unedited Greenlandic text into such dialects and a
mouse sensitive glossing tool into Danish could most likely be established
within a foreseeable time. This research is part of IPY ID 123:
“Glocalization – language, literature and media”. Please, for IPY ID 123 see
www.uni.gl.
The goal
of the session is both to let the IPY project researchers present their
research and to invite other researchers to present research on these
themes.
In 2003 an attempt
was made to provide spell check for Kalaallisut based on a list of more than
300.000 words. The project was unsuccessful since the speller in spite of
the considerable size of the list would recognize only 25% of actual words
in normal contemporary texts. The extreme type-token relation in
polysynthetic Kalaallisut proved to effectively rule out further attempts at
'easy' solutions.
In its place the
finite state automaton project was launched in 2005 and in October 2006 its
first practical application was published when it was installed as the
spelling checker Kukkuniiaat in the MSOffice suite.
Concomitant with
update of the automaton a disambiguation project in a constraint grammar
framework was started this year to pave the way for fully-fledged automatic
parsing and a database with lexical information is right now under
construction to prepare implementation of the parser in general end-user
programs such as translators, e.learning, lexical compilers, etc. as soon as
the parser is robust enough for such purposes.
Morphological
parsing has by now reached a level of robustness that we expect to publish a
Kalaallisut – Danish glossing-tool (a 'quicktionary') in 2009. Parsing above
word-level is still at a laboratory stage but we expect the first
installations needing extensive syntactic parsing to appear in 2012.
View Presentation.
The IPY
research project LICHEN focuses on the languages and cultures of the
northern circumpolar region. Faced with minority languages, governments have
pursued policies of assimilation. This has applied to indigenous languages
in Canada, Gaelic and Scots in Scotland, and Finnic minority languages. The
consequence has been the creation of ambivalent or negative feelings towards
the mother tongue already in childhood, leading to low self-esteem,
educational underachievement, unemployment and economic deprivation. Thus
language and culture are clearly as important to the survival and well-being
of populations as more obvious ecological and social issues.
The aim
of the project is twofold: firstly, to create an electronic framework for
the collection, management, online display, and exploitation of existing
corpora of the languages of the circumpolar regions, also applicable to
other corpora representing regional, social and other varieties of
languages. To achieve this we rely on close collaboration between several
well-established corpus projects, discussing common goals, needs and
problems and identifying best practices. Secondly, the project aims to
collect, preserve and disseminate information about the languages spoken in
the region, thus enabling research on them. This will also help promote the
linguistic confidence and self-image of the speakers of these languages,
strengthening their cultural awareness and facilitating cross-cultural
communication between these peoples in an age of rapid global change. Thus,
the project will benefit not only the academic community, but also the
speakers of the languages concerned, and indeed other communities around the
world battling with the same kinds of issues.
View Presentation.
An ongoing project started 2005 in Oqaasileriffik
Greenland, has opened opportunities to develop easier ways to make
dictionaries, and other things. Ultimately, these opportunities can save
many resources (time, energy and money) in our society.
This project contains language technology, a machine
called Kalaallisut FST (Finite State Transducer) tagger, that is a kind of
word converter, which makes morphological analysis of words, and in reverse,
a machine which can make words of morphological analysis.
The benefit to have this project, among other things, is
that the risks of losing Kalaallisut in the future get smaller, and the
possibilities to learn Kalaallisut will be extended.
This session will present the Kalaallisut FST tagger by
focusing on its purpose and status, then showing its applications. To
conclude, we will describe the procedures to realisation of the machine.
Langgård,
Karen, University of Greenland, Dept. of Language,
Literature and Media
Abstract
The
question of a general sustainable development in the local regions of the
Arctic also includes the question of a sustainable development of
intellectual culture and language competence.
'Glocalization' (globalization vs. localization) is the process where the
impact of global tendencies is partially seen as opposed to local
tendencies. Even at utmost remote settings the co-presence and interplay of
both universalizing and particularizing tendencies is evident. This
condition raises certain questions about the consequences of the interplay
between the local and the global policy regarding culture, media and
language. Who are the decision-makers and gatekeepers?
The
session will focus on the diversity of literary texts including all kind of
texts from oral tradition to modern rap. The development in the different
parts of the Arctic differs from region to region concerning the writing
down of the oral tradition, the further development of oral tradition and
the rise and the development of written literature. Ongoing research, a
subproject to IPY ID 123: “Glocalization – language, literature and media”
(for IPY ID 123 see www.uni.gl.), will make a survey over existing
documentation and will gather new data on the circumpolar development of
literature that has taken place in the Arctic among Inuit and Saamis with
the Faroese literature included by way of comparison.
The goal
of the session is both to let the IPY project researchers present their
research and to invite other researchers to present research on these
themes.
First I
will give a short general introduction to the overall project “From oral
tradition to rap”, part of IPY ID 123 on Glocalization, in order to inform
about the frame that lies behind the session.
After
this, my presentation will focus on the European fiction that was translated
into Greenlandic and published in the Greenlandic newspaper Atuagagdliutit
in the 19th century, ever since the newspaper started in 1861.
What kinds of literature do we find? Is it possible to see a link between
these translations and the Greenlandic literature that developed after the
turn of the century, i. e. from 1908 and on? How does the Greenlandic
language of the 19th century cover the content of literary works
written in cultures rather different from the Greenlandic one?
Atuagagdliutit is famous for its coloured illustrations – how do these
pictures intertwine with the literature and support the reception of the
content in the Greenlandic population of that period? The presentation will
thus deal with the appropriation and the transculturation that took place in
the last decades of the 19th century.
View Presentation.
In this
paper I will examine some examples from Alaska of how the oral tradition
continues to inform our understanding of the past and how it can be used to
address our current needs. I will begin with a definition of oral tradition
that places the focus on how and why people retell stories. The emphasis
will be on how people find meaning in old stories and the circumstances
surrounding their decisions to re-tell the story and thereby keep it alive
in the thoughts of others. I will draw upon stories from Inupiaq, Yup’ik,
Yupik, Athabascan, and Tlingit traditions.
View Presentation.
The city of
Flin Flon, Manitoba, located north of the 54th parallel, is
likely the only community in the world named after a fictional character.
In the early 20th c., prospectors tramping through the bush came
across a book lying on the trail: a novel called the Sunless City
(1905), by a British writer, J. E. Preston Muddock. Some months later, upon
discovering gold, they named the lake near their site “Flin Flon,” after the
novel’s hero. The city that grew up near the site would keep the “Flin Flon”
name.
The
Sunless City is a satirical work of science
fiction about a Jules Verne-like journey to the centre of the earth.
Piloting a fish-shaped submarine, Flin Flon explores a supposedly bottomless
lake, eventually discovering a passage to a subterranean matriarchal
society. Flin Flon’s confusion at this new world is the source of the
book’s humour and satire.
Despite the
importance of this novel to the history of Manitoba’s north, few writers
have examined it. In turn, using Sherrill Grace’s Canada and the Idea of
North and Margaret Atwood’s Strange Things: the Malevolent North in
Canadian Literature for a critical framework, I propose to examine
the Sunless City as a “northern” narrative (albeit a transplanted one).
As a result, my paper will have two functions: to examine this unusual
novel, which has been discussed only fleetingly, and to demonstrate that
Canadian “nordicity” or “northernness” can be used as a critical approach to
understanding and contextualizing a work of literature.
View Presentation.
Defining
genre and type in the (original) Greenlandic narratives is no easy task,
because like other primitive people’s oral accounts they contain a mixture
of traditional myths, legends and folk tales incorporating
ritual acts, magic formulae, taboos and rules of conduct, as well as
everyday stories. The reason is that these people do not distinguish
clearly between prehistoric and present time, fantasy and reality, internal
and external life, all of which are perceived as a connected whole; thus
the function of the tales is to make the storyteller and listener
understand life as this connected whole. It is only in the written
culture that a distinction between the genres is felt – and you can talk
about a more or less conscious choice of genre by the individual
storyteller or author in relation to the contents and function of the
narrative.
Knud
Rasmussen himself (in Myter og Sagn, vol. 1, pp. 67-70) points to the
difficulties in genre division, and distinguishes between distant ‘myths’ of
the past (‘oqaluttuat’) and the more recent and local ‘legends’
(‘oqalualaat’). Then he undertakes a ‘very rough’ division of the narratives
according to four criteria of contents: 1.The Epic, 2.The Religious, 3.The
Humorous, and 4.The Soporific stories. You would expect to find this
distinction in the table of contents, which, however, is not the case. In
stead he makes use of headings like: ‘Eskimo Mythology’, ‘Perception of
Nature’ (primarily containing myths, e.g. “The First People”, vol.1),
‘Animal Fables’ (a mixture of animal fables, e.g. “The Raven That Took a
Wild Goose for Wife”, vol.1 – and tales of magic, e.g. “The Man Who Took a
Fox for Wife” (~AT 400, vol.1), ‘Epic Legends’ (a mixture of legends, e.g.
“Mannik”, vol.2) – and folk tales e.g. “Marluliat. The Twins Who Learned to
Dive”, vol.1), ‘Meeting Foreign Tribes’ (likewise a mixture of legends, e.g.
“The One-Eyed Inland Man of the Kingittoq Mountain, vol.3 – and folk tales,
e.g. “Nerrersuujuut or the Gluttonous Trolls” (related in motive to AT 311),
vol.1), ‘Accounts of Manslaughter and Vengeance’ (almost all legends, e.g.
“The Invincible Qaassuk” vol. 2), ‘Quaint stories’ (the main part being folk
tales, e.g. “The Giant”, vol.3) and ‘Songs and Satirical Songs’ (~ folk
songs).
I would like
to present a paper concerning pisiit, those highly praised poetical personal
songs, focusing on Nunavummiut pisinginnik (pisiit composed and performed by
the Inuit of Nunavut). Pisiit are still today very much appreciated.
Generally they are right in the centre of complex performances. These
‘total’ performances include poetry, music, dance and also different actors
(composers, singers, drum-dancers and audience). The connections between
those productions and unique personal events make them rather
“incomprehensible” if we try to understand pisiit out of their specific
context and out of Inuit perspective. They cannot be considered as
decontextualized objects. Pisiit have been studied from a musical point of
view, but I would like to draw the attention on the words and focus on their
power. What is passed down through pisiit? How are they passed down? How
come they produce today so intense emotions on performers and listeners? I
will use an ethnopoetic approach and concentrate on Inuit perspective
concerning “performance”.
I will show
how Koryak oral narrative is organized by recurrent relations into a poetic
form. Linguistic anthropologists have demonstrated the organization of
lines and verses among many different peoples speaking totally unrelated
languages, suggesting that this property of oral narrative may be universal.
An ethnopoetic analysis based on the original language can transform what at
first appears as simply a cute story in prose translation into a powerful
work of art. Attention to form in the original Koryak also elucidates
deeper subtleties of symbolic organization—a glimpse into the way Koryak
culture organized the universe. By working back and forth between the small
detail of linguistic structure of the Koryak language and the larger
patterning of relations within the narrative, one can see how all the parts
fit together, parts which seem disconnected in the first prose translation.
My initial analysis indicates that each of the five
narratives recorded by Jochelson in 1901 are by different people. Each one
seems to have an individual style, making it difficult to generalize about a
Koryak way of telling stories. While one woman makes dramatic use of
intonation, rhythm, and voice quality, another seems to tell a three-minute
story while only taking two breaths! Another storyteller makes extensive use
of gestures, indicated through her frequent repetitions of “like this” and
“thus,” which must have accompanied gestures. Thus, ethnopoetics analysis
exposes the importance of individual artistry and agency in traditional
narratives even more than it provides generalizations about Koryak culture
generally. View
Presentation.
New lives
- new stories: The first Sami and the first Greenlandic novel, a comparative
analysis. In 1912 Anders Larsen published the first Sami novel:
Bæivve-Alggo (A new dawn). In 1914 Mathias Storch published the first
Greenlandic novel Sinnattugaq (The Dream). Why did these two texts emerge
almost simultaneously? How similar are the two texts? How similar were the
two authors’ backgrounds? What are the relations – if any – to the oral
tradition? View
Presentation.
Land
settlement and self-determination are important issues that dominate
contemporary indigenous politics world-wide. The focus of this presentation
is on oral narratives and the subtleties of political discourse amongst the
Deh Cho Dene indigenous group situated in the circumpolar region of northern
Canada. This provides a new perspective on their political processes and the
development of a new Deh Cho Dene-styled political structure.
I argue that
their discourse is multilayered and complex and closely connected to their
social lives. The land is central to Deh Cho Dene culture as a source of
principles, political and economic visions and resources. Oral narratives
are used to illustrate the complex place that land occupies in Deh Cho Dene
politics. Moral principles expressed in oral narrative are often rooted in
perceptions of the land, and these also find expression in the political
process, as in the claim to territorial land. Oral narratives are crucial
in constructing political strategies based on cultural knowledge and
principles. These provide the basis for consensus decision-making by
reinforcing Deh Cho Dene values and strengthening the political position.
In this
paper I will provide a brief overview of how cultural perceptions shape the
viewpoints that constrain discussion and political resources. I will use
excerpts from ethnographic field notes and theoretical frameworks to explore
the extent that cultural styles of discussion and the act of decision-making
affect political outcomes. In this context I will examine the manner in
which actors shape the political environment by the use of language - in
particular how language is presented as a product and communicates the
intention of implicit rules. Understanding the subtlety and complexity of
Deh Cho Dene political discourse contributes to an appreciation of the
values that form their political processes.
View Presentation.
Despite attempts over the last few years to re-conceptualise
the North as a living environment – complete with its minority cultures and
languages – comparatively little has yet been achieved within the Anglophone
world with respect to updating the images of the North that are contained in
its literatures. Some recent studies have alerted the English-speaking world
to the range of literary texts figuring the subject, but individual detail
is mostly subordinated to breadth of vision, and the result is somewhat
impressionistic.
As with so many cultural phenomena, a simple lack of
familiarity with the culture or environment that is being described may all
too often result in the creation of stereotypical images (some of them
powerfully robust or misleading). This situation stands in serious need of
rectification. Accordingly, our pilot study focuses on the poetic collection
Henceforth the Anglo-Saxon is the Brother of the Finn! (2003),
investigating what it reveals about the changing historical image of the
Finns in the Anglophone imagination. By constructing a digital database on
the topic, we aim to investigate how the potential of new technology could
be fruitfully harnessed to the advantage of image studies. Using techniques
deriving from Cultural Imagology, we will also develop a methodology for the
fruitful exploration and advancement of images from other parts of the
Circumpolar North. This project should also have financial benefits for both
the peoples of the North (particularly within the tourist industry) and the
Anglophone community with which they interface.
Marnersdottir, Malan
Abstract to be added when received.
View Presentation.
Rygaard,
Jette, University of Greenland, Dept. of Language,
Literature and Media
Abstract
Media and
information technologies in the circumpolar area are important agents for
both national and global connections. Generally speaking, in the Arctic,
people have been isolated as to economic, political, geographic and cultural
matters. Media and the increasingly advanced information technology
diminishes this isolated position; changing the concept of time and space;
joining what is separated by distance and geography; separate and unite
across gender, age and nationality; promote new dimensions for public and
private existence and create new virtual communities based on language,
culture, identity, interests etc.
Based on
the thesis that media and information technologies are important factors for
“glocal” processes, media researchers in Greenland, Canada, The Faroe
Islands and Denmark plan to conduct an extensive comparative survey during
2008, concerning questions of media access, media use and consumption,
participation in digital media scapes, content preferences etc. The focus of
the study is the 12-19-year-olds at the elementary schools and at the high
schools, divided by ethnic groups; gender; age; social stratification and
geographic groups in the participating countries.
The
collection of data will be carried out locally and will be shared by the
participating researchers across countries in a joint SPSS database, which
allows individual, national and joint comparative analysis of the
results, as a subproject to the ongoing research project IPY ID 123:
“Glocalization – Language, Literature and Media. For IPY ID 123 see
www.uni.gl. The goal of this session is partly to allow
the IPY project researchers presenting their results and partly to invite
other researchers to present their research on the themes in question
Since the
dissolution of the Soviet Union, a series of murders of Russian children by
adoptive parents in the United States became a trigger, amidst existing
political tensions between both countries, for the Russian government to set
a moratorium ending foreign adoption in 2005, which led to the launching of
a new domestic adoption program in Russia and a reevaluation of
inter-country adoption practices in both countries. Russian news coverage of
the murder cases led the public to believe that Americans are bad parents
since they provide them a violent home in the United States. American
parents and adoption advocates, concerned for the future of orphaned
children in Russia, reacted to the negative news coverage and moratorium
saying there was an adoption “crisis” at hand with the fear American
families could no longer adopt. The moratorium was dropped in 2007 with the
re-establishment of 12 American adoption agencies as NGOs, but it negatively
altered the way in which Russians and Americans perceive each other as
parents and providers for orphaned children. In Russia, foreign adoption of
orphans is seen as a loss of a national resource– youth, but at the same
time, orphans are commodified by western agencies within the international
market of adoption. In this paper, I analyze how media coverage of these
murders has affected the system of inter-country adoption, but also, on a
larger scale, how it has affected the way both Americans and Russians
perceive each other and orphaned children.
Young people
in Greenland are part of a global trend among young people around the world
(that is only a qualified truth of course) being consumers of global
products, especially as to clothing, lifestyle and media stuff. All the
things that are results of a world ’shrinking of space’, ‘shortening of
time’, ‘speeding up the pace of life ‘(Xavier & Rosado, 2002: 5-6) advanced
by new technologies and communication.
This global
interconnectedness has created debates about a cultural flow, which
enlightens people around the world and creates ‘-scapes’ (‘media-’, ’ethno-’
and ‘idea-’) that is ...‘shared large and complex images and narratives’
(Appadurai, 2002: 50-51), to contrive that new forms of ‘imagined
communities’ (Benedict Anderson, 1983), similarities or ‘shared identities’
(Gilroy, 2002: 303ff) make different countries and their inhabitants
homogenized. This is the asseveration, but which ‘shared identity’ do the
youth in Greenland carry forward – if any? Is it an identity formed via
their local life or is it, rather, created through a global youth culture?
Based on
three Camera/Diary-projects (Cam/Di-project) (2000, 2003, 2006) in which
disposable cameras and diaries were sent to several locations and schools
around Greenland, we have tried to get some inside information about the
life of children and youth, among many other things focusing on identity
formation and differences between their urban and non-urban constructions,
which we will focus on in this joint presentation.
The
informants of this project are ranging from 10-25 years-of- age and
represent a substantial acumen into youth life in Greenland with around 1200
pictures and 400 descriptions.
View
Presentation.
A
tremendous effort is being made in many Inuit communities in Canada to
reverse the sad statistics of drop-outs from school.
New forms
of involvement and educational strategies are being researched and
implemented. The Canadian national Inuit organization, Inuit Tapiriit
Kanatami, with the leadership of Mary Simon held a national educational
conference in the spring to address these concerns.
One of
the problems identified is that many children (and this is not only true in
northern regions) find television, the internet, videogames, DVDs and the
many other forms of electronic “education” and entertainment so much more
interesting than school. The question then becomes how to best utilize the
new technologies to promote learning and to convince students to remain in
school.
Dana, Leo, University of Canterbury
Abstract
Visual
media is a helpful tool when doing research as it captures much more than
possible with words alone. We also find it useful as a teaching medium to
share our research findings with peoples of the Arctic. We invite scientists
to discuss this and also to screen documentaries.
The video
camera as an instrument of a field linguist is rather a new phenomenon. No
doubt that we owe the possibility of using a video camera during the
fieldwork to the technical progress which made video cameras portative and
easy to manipulate. A video camera is especially useful while working in
small ethno linguistic communities undergoing the process of language shift.
The video
recording of the situations in which the heritage language is still used are
important documents both for forming a proper understanding of the language
situation in the local community where the fieldwork is being done and for
the future linguistic analysis (many non-verbal elements of communication
can be fixed only with the help of a video camera). Comprehensive
documentation of an endangered language, beside the collection of linguistic
data, presupposes the collection of information on the ethno-cultural
environment in which the language is functioning, and video recording is the
easiest and at the same time the most precise way to fix such information.
Sometimes during a linguistic expedition there appears an opportunity to
video record valuable ethnographic materials. We began to use video
recording in our linguistic fieldwork in 1998. Now our video archive
contains about one hundred hours of video recordings. They can be divided
into purely linguistic (people speaking, telling stories, performing
folklore texts, singing sons, etc.) and non-linguistic (every day life of
people, environments, traditional culture, etc.). The paper presentation
will be illustrated with video fragments recorded during linguistic
expeditions to Selkup, Ket, and Evenki settlements and nomadic camps of the
Middle and Upper Taz and the Middle Yenisei.
View Presentation.
Associations
have repeatedly been found between cultural disruptions, the stresses of
acculturation and assimilation, identity struggles, and ill-health in
circumpolar communities and conversely, between cultural continuity,
enculturation and well-being in Native populations. Previous research,
however, has failed to identify the how these linkages are understood and
articulated in the everyday lives of Indigenous people. The proposed
presentation will outline these issues and describe a pilot project that
aims to test untried methods for articulating and understanding how
conceptions of ethnic identity shape the coping strategies used by parents,
grandparents and young Alaska Natives who are attending university far from
their home village. The pilot project will (1) assess the feasibility and
suitability of untested methods for Inupiat (Alaska Native) participants,
(2) conduct preliminary analyses to discern whether photovoice and indirect
elicitation techniques can illuminate how cultural narratives (ethnic
imagery, traditional practices and Inupiaq social expectations) are linked
to resilience—the capacity to overcome adversity and thrive—in everyday
life, and (3) ascertain whether age-cohort comparisons illuminate the ways
that cultural constructions are modified over time to sustain meaning across
generations. The research will consider the efficacy and outputs of an
untried, participatory method called photovoice with youth and using
indirect elicitation methods with their families.
In 2000 the
Austrian filmmaker Nikolaus Geyrhalter was shooting Elsewhere among
indigenous peoples around the globe. The four hour documentary consists of
12 episodes lasting 20 minutes. A different indigenous group was visited
each month in 2000 by the film crew to talk about their daily problems to
provide an insight into their remote existence far from the mainstream
millennium festivities.
The fifth
episode, May, was dedicated to the Inughuit of Avanersuaq (North Greenland).
As location manager for the Thule shoot, I was responsible for sourcing a
local interpreter and a family of hunters prepared to take part in the
documentary, the locations and to solve all logistical problems such as
housing and transportation. As a trained cultural anthropologist, I prepared
the scientific background for the numerous interviews conducted with the
protagonists.
Supported by
the late Ingmar Egede, I selected two closely related Inughuit hunters with
their wives as protagonists during preparatory fieldwork in 1999.
Siorapaluk, the world’s northernmost settlement, was chosen as the main base
for the film crew and location for the film project. In 2001 Elsewhere was
released and met with general acclaim.
I would like
to discuss the human dimension behind Elsewhere’s production in my paper
highlighting the diverse ethical questions that arise from entering the
field with a film team and attempting to balance the whole with my personal
reflections as a mediator striving for objectivity.
View Presentation.
Plattet,
Patrick, University of
Alaska Fairbanks
Gray,
Patty A., University of Alaska Fairbanks
Abstract
Post-Soviet studies of social change in the Russian North have mainly
focused on the socioeconomic and political dynamics of this phenomenon.
Without neglecting these aspects, this session seeks to explore contemporary
changes by presenting the variety of religious movements that has flourished
from the Finnish border to the Bering Sea since glasnost’ (revival of
Russian Orthodoxy, (neo-)shamanisms, evangelical protestant groups, new age
spiritualities, Mormons, Bahais, “ekstra-sens” practitioners, etc.). We
invite contributors who can help highlight the creative use of religiosity
in the Russian North today by identifying the nature of religious life in
various cultural and historical contexts, and by documenting the dynamics of
religious change among contemporary Arctic and sub-Arctic mixed communities.
Participants are encouraged to focus on the “in-between” religious phenomena
that have emerged more or less recently at the interstices of
institutionalized religions in connection with rapid social change.
In a
comparative perspective, the papers of this session will examine the
following topics: the relationship between social organization and
religiosity; the “inside” of religiosity (motivations, expressions, etc.);
connections between religious and non-religious aspects of social life
(where is the border?); verbality/literacy/language issues (durability of
religious literary forms, consciousness of religious literacy, etc.);
discourses about “authenticity” (what is a “true” believer?) and
belongingness (what causes a sense of belonging in any religious practice?);
ethnicity & religion; legitimacy & authority (from a religious perspective).
Papers
which emphasize the “doing” of religion, and which explore the moral,
intellectual, analytical and methodological implications that the study of
religious change has in a reflexive approach, are especially welcome.
A defining element of the ‘religio-scape’ of Russia in the
1990s was the heavy inflow of foreign missionaries, who were to a large
extent welcomed, especially when they also couriered humanitarian aid. The
city of Magadan received this inflow, and was also a significant gateway to
indigenous populations in rural areas. Fifteen years later, the general
religious context in the city has shifted, such that outside influences have
been squeezed out ideologically as well as practically, and a more
historically ‘Russian’ religious identity oriented toward Orthodoxy is
emerging in some quarters. Pushing beyond a post-Soviet ideology of morality
and citizenship toward a reconstructed Russian one has been a key concern
for institutions such as the Russian state and the Russian Orthodox Church,
who actively perpetuate the notion that to be Russian is to be Orthodox (and
vice-versa). For a place like Magadan, many of whose residents are exiles
and their descendants, such a hegemonic creed does not hold up, neither for
adherents of Orthodoxy nor for adherents of other variations of
Christianity. For some, religious identification and expression in Magadan
has taken on an ‘underground’ quality, while others strive to legitimize
alternative religious expressions. This paper explores how this national
pseudo-policy on Russian spiritual culture has altered people’s religious
practices locally, and examines how the state’s influence on religious
culture motivates some believers to seek different forms of religious
consciousness.
We have conducted joint
fieldwork in the Ust-Kulom region of Komi Republic in 2006 and 2007. We had
prepared a questionnaire and an essential part of it was dedicated to
religious topics. This is in accordance with the research plan of the Boreas
programme‘s project “New Religious Movements in the Russian North: Competing
Uses of Religiosity after Socialism” (NEWREL). We treated these fieldwork
trips as a pilot phase of our part of the project and attempted to collect
some preliminary data about the contemporary religious situation in the
district and about religious feelings among the local Komi population. We
interviewed mostly indigenous inhabitants of the area, but also conducted
several hours long interview with a new local Orthodox priest (who has
residence in Ust-Kulom since September, 2006).
Among other topics, we
mapped mutual opinions about each other (priest’s attitude towards local
people and vice versa). We analyse the ways village people describe
their expectations concerning their new priest and what the priest thinks
about these expectations. The second analysed topic is the description of
the local community, given by the priest. And finally, we provide some of
our own impressions about the dialogue between the traditional northern
orthodox Komi community and their new priest.
Neoshamanism and revival of
shamanic practices is a popular topic of research (Valentina Kharitonova,
Caroline Humphrey, Mihály Hoppál, etc.). However, researchers of
neoshamanism have not taken into account the diversity of ideas and forms
behind different local and ethnic shamanic institutions. Because the
traditional shamanic institutions varied in Siberia, the reawakening of
shamanistic practices also has different forms. In our paper, we approach
shamanhood/shamanism in two different cultural settings: among the Eastern
Siberian Nanay and the North-West Siberian Khanty. In dealing with these two
different shamanic systems, we analyze their connection to tradition and new
media, ideology, ritual practices and symbols. We trace and compare the
concrete historical processes of the transition from traditional shamanism
to neoshamanism in the two regions and reveal both the traditional shamans’
thoughts about the new phenomena and the neoshamans’ attitude to the
tradition. Interpretations are based on the knowledge of the local society,
ethnic culture and the ideological climate of people concerned. We also pay
attention to co-operation and conflicts in local religious contexts and ask
how shamans serve their society: who are their clients, supporters and
opponents.
This paper deals with
social construction and use of knowledge in the multicultural context of new
religious movements in contemporary Siberia. Sociological theories of
secularization or, using Max Weber’s term, the ‘disenchantment of the world’
in the 19th and 20th centuries proceed, as a rule, from the strict
opposition between ‘religious’ (or ‘irrational’) and ‘scientific’ (or
‘rational’) world views or explanatory models. It appears, however, that
contemporary religious communities usually do not represent themselves and
their teachings in terms of credo quia absurdum est. Moreover, many
new religious movements rely heavily on ‘scientific’ and ‘rational’
arguments legitimizing spiritual dogma and social order. The Last Testament
Church is a religious community founded by amateur artist and former
policeman Sergey Torop in Minusinsk (Krasnoyarskii krai) in 1991. The
movement’s leader is venerated by his followers as Christ and his activities
are considered to be the Second Coming. The teaching of the Last Testament
Church includes elements of Christianity and other world religions along
with various forms of the New Age spirituality. Remarkably enough, many
dogmatic, ritual, social and spiritual patterns of the movement’s culture
are represented and discussed by its followers as related to quasi- or
para-scientific hypotheses and theories. The construction and use of
knowledge in this religious context appeals both to natural and social
sciences, from physics and biology to history and ethnology. The analysis of
‘re-enchanted rationality’ of this religious community allows us to revise
and rework the classical anthropological triad of magic, science and
religion as discussed by Bronislaw Malinowski.
Toulouze, Eva, Vagramenko, Tatiana and
Vallikivi, Laur
This paper focuses on the
Christianisation of the indigenous population of the Russian Arctic in the
post-soviet period. We compare missionary encounters in two neighbouring
regions: the European Nenets and the Yamal Nenets. Baptists and Pentecostals
were the most successful in winning converts among reindeer herders and
village people in the borderlands of Siberia. This paper aims at discussing
what the motives for conversion are for the Nenets and how they create
collective and individual agency in these encounters. We show how the
earlier experience with the Orthodox Church in the 19th century has partly
shaped the Nenets’ reactions to contemporary Protestant missionisation. We
also argue that the indigenous people both as subjects of tsarist Russia and
as citizens of post soviet Russia (independent herders, collectivised
herders, villagers) cope with incoming ideas and practices in various ways.
These ways depend on the Nenets’ experience with the state (e.g. official
[anti-]religious discourse) but also on their understanding of the
missionaries’ relations to the state. Also, a deeper integration to the
“Russian world” through conversion has offered a chance for the Nenets to
move between different spaces that enable or prescribe different modes of
action perceived to be contextually more benefiting. As the case of the
Nenets proves, conversion to Christianity may become attractive for the
individuals and local communities challenged by the problems and
expectations of a globalising world, in which new perspectives on immediate
and delayed return are opened.
Since the 1990s,
inhabitants of the Russian North have shown a growing interest in various
forms of spirituality, religious experience and religious institutions. In
Northern Kamchatka and in neighboring Chukotka, Protestant denominations in
particular have contributed to the rearrangement of the religious landscape
of indigenous peoples, which, in the past, was oriented predominantly toward
“familial shamanism”. This paper seeks to re-examine assumptions regarding
the “familial” dimension of religious life in this region. Through a series
of comparative case studies, it will analyze the modes of religious
adaptation that have emerged during Soviet and post-Soviet times among the
Koryaks and the Chukchis. Drawing on both first hand ethnographical data
gathered and older archival and published sources, the authors aim to
provide answers to the following questions: To what extent are members of
the Protestant churches mobilizing familial modes of organization and
structuration? What do notions of religious specialization and religious
authority mean in a context where the institutionalization of specialists is
not necessarily required? And, if the Protestant worldview needs to be
analyzed in light of ritual practices that have been present for much longer
in the Russian Far East (related either to hunting life or to herding life),
can the approach used to study “New Religious Movements” also help us to
renew our understanding of Chukchi and Koriak varieties of shamanism?
Rock music in the Far East Sakha, mixed with folklore and
usage of shamanic melodies, dates back to the 1970s. This music has always
been very popular among ethnic Sakha and was often hailed by Sakha
intellectuals as part of the modern Sakha culture. In the 1990s, with the
collapse of the Soviet Union, shamanic rock became also well known in
European Russia and outside of the former Soviet Union. In my paper I
discuss Sakha shamanic rock today. The shamanic rock artists are very aware
of Sakha ethnic culture and mix into their music symbols and elements that
emphasize what is been viewed as the "heroic past" of the Sakha nation:
great warriors, powerful shamans, elements of the national epos Olonkhoo.
They represent the approach that shamanism is an important part of the Sakha
culture and see themselves as carriers of this Sakha culture. At the same
time, using shamanism, history and folklore in their music, they argue that
this is the way to oppose Westernization and commercialization of Sakha
culture. I show that this position is very ambivalent because artists are
very interested in commercial success.
Past and Present
Forms of Religiosity in
Itelmen History
In 1994,
when plans were being made for the now famous Itelmen festival,
Alkhalalalai, in the village of Kovran, the local Russian Orthodox priest
made it known that he was concerned about the part of the ritual in which
participants were absolved of their sins. Absolution of sins was, in his
view, the province of the Church. No clash of spiritual authority with the
Orthodox Church was intended. This cleansing rite was mentioned in the
earliest descriptions of Kamchatkan ritual practice and it was from these
writings, with the wave of indigenous activism that began in the 1980s, that
the forgotten festival and accompanying rites were revitalized. The Orthodox
Church, for its own part, has a long and deep connection with Itelmen
cultural life over the past 300 years. Recently, with the revitalization of
the Orthodoxy in Russia, many Itelmens have found an important source of
spiritual connection in the church. This paper presents the contrasting
effects of revitalization when on the one hand connected with
institutionalized religion and on the other hand connected with conscious
indigenous revitalization. Sources for new and revitalized modes of
spirituality include written ethnographic accounts, ritual practices,
personal memory and institutionalized (church) ritual. We describe the role
of these various strands of religiosity in the context of cultural and
religious revitalization.
Shamanism Without
Shamans: Survivals and Revivals of a Distinctive View of the World
(Northeast Siberia)
Even while
the Soviet regime persecuted shamans, certain aspects of the shamanic
worldview persisted. Many of these concerned uncertainties and anxieties
which could not be soothed by the Soviet state's rationalist forms of
control and assurance. In the absence of shamans, these took do-it-yourself
forms such as divination from fire, from dreams and from the behavior of
animals.
Meanwhile,
the children of the persecuted shamans suffered from identity crises and the
repression of their love for their parents, and these were only partially
resolved by becoming musicians or doctors.
The
officially-sanctioned neo-shamanic revival of the early 1990s, with its
nationalist agenda, largely missed the point. Rather, there has emerged a
range of forms of frustration, hesitance and transformation of a 'shamanic
impulse' which affects certain families and personalities.
Kazakevich, Olga A., University of Moscow
Burkova,
Svetlana, Russian Academy
of Sciences, Institute of Philology
Abstract
The texts
in the languages of autochthonous minorities of the North linguists and
anthropologists record during their expeditions are interesting not only as
linguistic phenomena, but also as documents of the epoch. In the life
stories of the people living in the far tiny villages surrounded by the
taiga and tundra the life of a person or of a family appears to be
represented against the background of the events relevant for the whole
countries. The stories give us a new dimension in understanding our history.
They make us better understand how the decisions of the politicians in the
centre of the countries influence (or not influence) the life in their
far-away corners. It seems it could be fruitful to join presentations on the
topic from different parts of the Arctic and to see what elements of the
country policy mostly affected the life of the Northern people from their
own view-point. Along with the content analysis a discourse analysis of the
texts could be presented, so that the form of life stories in different
languages and the ways of presenting historical events in them could be
compared.
The Koryaks live in the north of the peninsula Kamchatka and
an adjoining part of the continent. There are two main ethnic groups of the
Koryaks: the Koryaks-nomads and the settled Koryaks. The Koryaks-nomads
represent the cultural and the language unity. The settled Koryaks of both
Kamchatka coasts, on the contrary, live as several local groups, each with
its own dialect and subdialects.
There are four main socio-political processes which are
reflected in life stories of the settled Koryaks:
1) collectivization in the 1930th when the Koryaks were
bereft of all their property including reindeer herds;
2) amalgamation of collective farms into bigger units in the
1950-1960th when the Koryaks from small villages were compulsory moved to
big settlements, even from one coast to the other;
3) “religious wars” between traditional idolatry and
Christianity: in the 1940th it was only orthodoxy; today in Kamchatka there
are a lot of different Christian sects, and the situation got even more
complicated;
4) obligatory secondary education in Russian:
until the 1990th Koryak children have been separated from the families,
lived in boarding schools, and had no opportunity to use their mother
tongue. View
Presentation.
In the Upper
Kuskokwim (UK) is a small group of Athabaskans (no more than 200) of central
Alaska, living primarily in one village of Nikolai. The language is highly
endangered; the number of speakers does not exceed 30. UK documented history
begins in mid-19th century when the people were baptized into the
Orthodox faith by Russians. Nowadays the UK people remain devout Russian
Orthodox. The heritage of Russian America is still alive in the language in
the form of several dozen lone words. For example: the word for any white
person is jisik, derived from Russian kazak ‘cossack’ via a
complex sequence of phonetic changes. The ethnic group being so small, the
history of the people amounts to a collection of life stories. The stories
collected from most proficient language speakers shed light on the key
events of UK history during the 20th century. Before WW2, most UK
lived in small families, scattered in the woods and sometimes not meeting
any other people for years. During and after WW2 many men got involved in
industrial production and became familiar with technologies, often leading
to injuries. In 1948 the school, opened in Nikolai and ended the nomadic
lifestyle. It also had a devastating effect upon the UK language: those who
went through the school experience later refused to speak the native
language to their own children. The older generation of the UK people has
lived through a remarkable social transformation. One of the consultants, as
a child, was hunting birds with bow and arrows when the family was short of
nutrition, while now he owns a hunter-guiding business, probably worth some
million dollars. View
Presentation.
It comes as no surprise that
history at the periphery proceeds in very special ways compared to political
and economic centres, and looks quite different from the point of view of
the local inhabitants. The consequences of the events of global importance
often reach the outlying districts with considerable delay, and political
decisions taken in capitals are sometimes confronted with local reality.
From such a perspective we
will consider the history of the Nganasans during the Soviet period as it
can be seen from the stories told by the Nganasans themselves. The Nganasans
(the northernmost people of Eurasia) live in the remote inner regions of the
Taimyr Peninsula, on the permafrost territory difficult to access, far away
from both Russian and foreign political centers (unlike, for example, the
Russian Far East, which is located much further from Moscow but still plays
a key role in contacts with China and Japan, giving access to the Pacific
Ocean).
Some of the historical
events of major importance, such as Civil War in Russia, World War II, and
mass repressions in the Soviet Union, had almost no influence upon the life
of the Nganasans. Most of the political decisions had to be adapted, if at
all applicable, to the local peculiarities (shamans, for example, were
pursued by analogy with Orthodox priests). At the same time some events and
processes, not widely known outside Taimyr, have drastically changed the
life of the Nganasans. The most important event to be mentioned is the
change from nomadism to sedentary life initiated by the government (which,
along with other factors, actually entailed the loss of traditional Nganasan
culture). The nomadic way of life (at least in the Avam Tundra) was
completely abandoned after all of the domestic reindeer, gathered into huge
kolkhoz herds, had died during an epizooty.
In our presentation we will
look in more detail at these and some other events which the Nganasans
mention while talking about their own history.
View Presentation.
The paper
presents some results of the ongoing project “The Changing Russia in life
stories of the Ket, Selkup, and Evenki” which is being realized at the
Laboratory for Computational Lexicography of the Research Computer Centre,
Moscow State University, with financial support from Russian Foundation for
the Humanities, grant 07-04-00332a.
The
objective of the project is the processing, grammatical indexing, discourse
and content analyzing, and preparing for publication (both as a book and as
an Internet resource) of Ket, Selkup, and Evenki life stories recorded
during the linguistic expeditions to the Upper- and Middle Taz and the
Middle Yenisei basins led in 1996-2007. By now we dispose of three text
corpora (Ket, Selkup and Evenki), containing over 100 life stories. In the
paper the content of the texts will be in the focus. Our informants were
people of different age (from 25 to 89) and sex. They told us about their
lives sometimes mentioning family stories related to them by their parents
or grandparents. The historical events form the background of personal life
stories, and we can see these events from the view-point of the
story-tellers, thus getting a new dimension in understanding the history of
our country. The main periods reflected in the texts of our corpora are: 1)
the life before the collectivization (only in the stories of very elderly
people), 2) the collectivization of the 1930s, 3) World War II, 4) the life
after the World War II, 5) perestroika (reorientation) and the first steps
of neo-capitalism in Russia, 6) the present-day life. The leitmotiv of the
majority of life stories, especially told by elderly people, can be put as
“So we lived, so we suffered”. The evaluation of the present-day life by our
informants varies from absolutely positive to definitely negative.
View Presentation.
The main
events, which influenced the life of a Khanty shaman, who lived in a most
remote place at the tributary of the river Ob’ in the Khanty-Mansijskij
autonomous region, were the Cultural Revolution, collectivization and World
War II.
This
presentation is based on field materials, collected in 1989-1991 at the
Surgut District of the Khanty-Mansijskij autonomous region from Ivan
Stepanovich Sopochin (1910–1992), an outstanding Khanty epic-singer, healer
and fortune-teller.
The most
important of them are stories about his persecution as a shaman during the
Cultural Revolution in late 1930s, imprisonment, miraculous escape of
execution and the following nomination as “the red shaman” since it turned
out that he never took money for healing people. He was released on the
condition that he would practice shamanism only for his own family members.
But he secretly practiced shamanism in every-day life not only for his
family’s health, but was also the last and the only shaman who addressed
Khanty deities on behalf of the Khanty community in the 1980s, in spite of
his fear of being punished again. The struggle against shamanism as a form
of religion has tragically influenced all of his life.
The paper
deals with life stories of Forest Nenets documented during the expeditions
in Yamal-Nenets and Chanty-Mansi Autonomous Areas of Russia. Some texts
reflect personal experience and the others are based on elder relatives’
evidences.
The analysis
of Forest Nenets’ life stories shows that their content and discursive
features correlate primarily with gender differences. For women the changes
in the life of Northern population caused by social and political reforms
serve only as background information for description of everyday problems of
a separate family. On the contrary, in the men’s stories the political and
social changes constitute the foreground of the narration. The men’s stories
highlight the problems of destruction of traditional nomadic life and deer
farming which constitute the essence of Nenets ethnic life, as well as
conflicts with representatives of Soviet officials.
It is also
interesting to analyze the evaluations of the described events, which were
given by informants 50 years later and thus influenced by their accumulated
personal experience. The Soviet policy in the North in 1920–50s is evaluated
as ambiguous. It is reflected in the Forest Nenets’ comments as having both
positive and negative consequences. The women estimate the described events
mostly as negative but inevitable ones. In the men’s stories the comments
are more differentiated – from direct blame of officials’ actions to the
blame of Nenets for their misunderstanding of the reforms, some of which had
positive results.
The paper
also discusses some specific discourse features of Forest Nenets’ life
stories.
The paper
deals with the Votic life
stories written down by the author during her field work
and concerning the events of World War II as the
Votic-speaking people remember them. It centres
on some subjective causes of the Votic ethnos
disappearance as well as the Votic language death
which are bound up with these events.
The Votes
are among the oldest inhabitants of Ingria, the historical province in the
vicinity of the present St. Petersburg. The ethnonym “Votes” appeared for
the first time in Russian chronicles in the 11th century, and from the first
evidence this ethnos has always been mentioned in historical documents in
connection with wars. Throughout history the Votes participated in an almost
permanent arena of battles in the West Ingria. Due to wars, famines and
epidemics the Votes have never been numerous. However they succeeded in
remaining a viable ethnic group and retained their language until the middle
of the 20th century.
World War II became the fatal event for the Votic people and
their language owing not only to objective causes, but also to subjective
causes. Indeed many of the Votes have perished. Now the Votic language is
spoken only by a few people who were born before World War II who could not
transmit the language to their children. The majority of life stories I have
written down during my field work tell us about the events of World War II
as the Votic speaking people remember them. They contain information
concerning Votic ethnos
disappearance as well as the direct or indirect
information concerning the Votic language and the subjective causes of its
death. In my paper I shall analyze the collected texts from this point of
view. View
Presentation.
Inuit Voices in the Making of Nunavut, is a collaborative
research project aimed at documenting and publishing the life stories of
five Inuit leaders (Abe Okpik, John Amagoalik, Paul Quassa, James Arvaluk
and Peter Ittinuar), involved to various degrees in the negotiations leading
to the creation of the new territory of Nunavut in 1999.
After a
brief introduction to the project and a discussion of the importance of
documenting Nunavut history from an Inuit perspective, we will have a
presentation on the different methodologies used within the project.
Cross-cultural issues in collaborative research and training will also be
discussed.
This
research stems from an oral history project funded by the Social Sciences
and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) through its “Aboriginal
Research” pilot program and involving researchers and Inuit students from
the Nunavut Arctic College and Nunavut Sivuniksavut and a team of
researchers from Laval University in Québec.
View Presentation.
In my
presentation, I propose to investigate how Sámi storytellers choose to
relate to their context and traditions through narrative strategies.
See Abstract book for further text and footnote.
View Presentation.
Miller, Thomas
R., Berkeley College, Dept. of Anthropology and Sociology
Abstract
This
session explores the range and diversity of shamanism as practised across
the spectrum of arctic and subarctic cultures in Central Asia, northern
Europe, northern North America and Greenland. Topics may include the roots
of circumpolar shamanism and its spread, universalistic versus
particularistic approaches to its study, revitalization and
retraditionalizing of shamanism today, and current issues in shamanic
studies such as "who is a 'real' shaman, gender, and interactions between
shamanism, Buddhism, and Christianity.
“The Double Secret of the
Shaman – The Fifth Thule Expedition (1921-24)
and the Construction of Primordial Inuit Shamanism (Angakkuersaarneq)”
In the
framework of history of science – in this case of “Eskimological ethnology”
– we find in the famous reports of The Fifth Thule Expedition (the
anthropological volumes by Knud Rasmussen, Kaj Birket Smith and Therkel
Mathiassen on spiritual/intellectual culture) an “obsession” with shamanism.
Anything is done in the field to watch shamanistic
rituals, or at least to procure shamans as informants. Seen in the
historical context of this expedition it becomes quite clear that shamanism
became the essence of primitive religion, of primordial Inuit culture, and,
in an indirect way, of the prehistory of the Christianized Greenlanders.
Rather ambivalent, stories (and drawings) about and by angakut became
aesthetically much appreciated, too – at least in Danish-Greenlandic
literature, and often with a nostalgic fascination of an existentially rich
life form, inevitably vanishing.
Dated as
these reports remain, they still have significant repercussions as to this
day on how one from Inuit culture reflexive and identity political positions
try to imagine the “spirituality” of the ancestors – in spite of, but at the
same time deeply indebted to, the imagery of the members of the Fifth Thule
Expedition.
Shamanic
drumming and vocalizing forge a psychophysical passageway between the
ordinary world of the living and the extraordinary worlds of spirits. This
paper presents the case for a unified theory of sound and shamanism, drawn
from Siberia and linked to the broad range of circumpolar traditions. Based
primarily on field and archival research from the Sakha Republic (Russia),
the analysis of historical and contemporary recordings of Sakha (Yakut),
Yukagir, and other shamans offers musicological and ethnohistorical evidence
for the notion that the shaman's performance and musical lexicon open a
"sonic window" between these worlds. Through specific melodic and rhythmic
codes, the shaman's journey through this invisible opening creates a
transient link between human and not-human, joins the ecosystem of nature to
the symbolic environment of supernature, and constitutes the key to ritual
efficacy. Audiovisual examples from Siberian recordings past and present
provide a rich background for reconsidering the northern shamanic ritual
complex in light of Boasian and modern psychophysical hypotheses regarding
the connections of sound, mind, and body.
Shamanism is
normally considered as one of the superstitious things among the minority
ethnic peoples in Northeast China, but very few people do the research on
shamanism’s role in education. From author’s many time fieldworks and study,
the author finds it not neglectable that shamanism is an indispensable part
in ethnic education paralleling only less to folklore and superstition. This
paper explores the educational elements, though not as explicit as formal
education nor as the oral cultural transmission by way folklores or
superstitious tales, that are embedded in Oroqen (a nomadic hunting ethnic
minority in Northeast China) shamanists’ songs and symbolism.
Broadbent, Noel,
National Museum of
Natural History, Department of Anthropology
Abstract
Historical narratives are powerful vehicles of cultural expression, and
myths about prehistory and history have served to perpetuate attitudes about
nationalism, racial stereotypes, cultural, economic and social evolution,
territoriality and identity. The selection of a narrative is often a moral
or social choice affected by beliefs about the inevitability of a given
outcome, such as evolutionary and ecological ideas about cultural or
economic development. Narrative “truth” thus serves as a basis for practical
action and the promotion of national or community values. The narratives are
often implicit in discussions of cultural identity and land-use
relationships. Continuity with the past is also assumed. Historians are
beginning to deconstruct the narratives that have limited indigenous rights
in Sweden, and archaeologists are producing new narratives through
fieldwork. These results both challenge national interpretations of
indigenous rights and the law, and help broaden the base of Saami cultural
identities.
This
session will focus in particular on the Saami in Sweden, but contributions
from other regions will also be included.
Anthropology
and theology are often seen as each other’s adversaries. However ‘classical’
anthropology can be seen as indirectly supporting a theological agenda by
way of its conception of time. In the case of Greenland, both disciplines
have been interested in constructing an image of the ‘original native’
albeit for different reasons. For the missionaries, the past, or the
narrative of the native was something that the Greenlanders had to escape
from and move into civilization, and so the loss of the past was to be
celebrated. For the anthropologist this past, as an original native past was
to be celebrated and the loss of this past to be lamented. However both
disciplines held on to a narrative of the native set in the past.
In this
paper, I want to outline some of these points and discuss the implications
of this narrative for the present and the perpetual search for cultural and
individual identity formations.
During
the 19th century, the population in South East Greenland moved to West
Greenland and settled in the Cape Farewell Area. The
last migration took place in 1900 and the whole South East Greenland was
depopulated. From written sources from Danish and German tradesmen and
missionaries events and demographic changes in the southernmost part of
Greenland caused by the migrations can be reconstructed.
Oral
tradition of events from this time is part of the local historical
tradition, and not least the narratives of the dramatic events and the main
players of the last years have entered into the collective memory. During
the 19th century, the stories have been told again and again in the local
community, but at the same time they have inspired Greenland authors and
have been used as a basis for practical political action. The stories still
live in Greenland in a local as well as a national level.
In the light
of ethnohistorical sources about the migrating East Greenlanders and their
living conditions, this paper will focus on the memory in family and
society. The placing of the stories in different historic contexts will be
discussed, including the forming of identity among descendants of the
migrants. View Presentation.
This paper studies the narratives constructed about the
policies undertaken by the state of Finland towards the Sami people. The
narratives constructed by the Sami activists and academics are compared. How
is the policy typified and represented? What kind of a narrative is being
constructed? In my earlier work on the Sami identity politics in Finland,
I've detected at least two dominant, yet underlying narratives, where the
state of Finland has colonised the Sami, or fallen short of providing the
full scale of their welfare-services. A hypothesis is that in periods, the
academics, especially those practicing postcolonial methods and starting
points, have been more eager to construct narratives of colonialism than the
activists, who have had to deal with the political culture of Finland. I
intend not to deny all relevance of the narrative of state of Finland as a
colonial power or to celebrate the "welfare colonization" as a single source
for true empowerment, but the aim is to discuss the academic narratives in
the light of the (identity) political side of the matters. How successful
have the different narratives been in bargaining rights in the Finnish North
and in the Finnish political culture? To which narrative has the state of
Finland reacted positively? And, if taken as a single, overwhelming
narrative, has the research managed to convey the multivocality of many
micronarratives?
Leon
Hryniewiecki was a Polish medicine doctor and first chief of Chukotka
Peninsula. He was sent to Chukotka Peninsula in the XIX century as medicine
doctor. Later he was chosen to protect Russian authority there. .During only
one year, he collected some ivory items now housed in the Wladywostok
Primorskoje Museum. Dr. Hryniewiecki was interested in a lot of activities
such as meteorology, geology, etc. In the First International Polar Year he
also reached Nowoja Ziemla, and passed it. He is less well known than
Benedykt Dybowski. He is the only Pole who wrote about hukchee. His Papierek
z Nowej Ziemli is a unique, very interesting XIX century text. .His life
was short, but very exciting. He died at the age of 37
Kamchatka
Peninsula is a very Polish area. Most of the modern inhabitants have Polish
roots. The Polish XIX century view and knowledge of the discovered new
world was very different from today’s view. During my lecture I would like
to try translate old Polish XIX century texts into the English language. I
think it could be exciting for an audience. It will be also a possibility
for presentation of my new book (e-book ) “Written in the Snow” (
including also pictures of Hryniewiecki items).
View Presentation.
The approach
to oral narratives told by representatives of the Alaskan Athabaskan
community (Upper Kuskokwim) is based on the interpretive theory of discourse
(Chafe 1980; Cohan and Shires 1988; Mann, Matthiessen et al. 1992; Dijk
1997; Makarov 2003).
Stories of
personal experience as a discourse genre with a specific structure of
interaction (see (Barthes 1966; Polanyi 1989; Norrick 2000)
present individual experience on the background of common and sociocultural
knowledge. Specific type of relations that emerge between the individual
schemas of personal experience and group-shared common, or sociocultural,
knowledge include Confirmation, Support, Contradiction, Contrast,
Verification, Opposition, Elaboration, Generalization, and other. In this
project the research goal was to see what culturally valid generalizations
can be made on the basis of stories where the narrators were telling about
dramatic changes that took place in their community in the course of life of
one generation and had a significant impact on the fate of their language,
culture and families. View
Presentation.
The
interdisciplinary Search for a Past project focuses on Saami
prehistory on the Swedish Bothnian coast. Radiocarbon dates now demonstrate
that the Saami had been almost completely driven inland by A.D. 1279. They
were obliged to either integrate into Swedish agrarian society, or to become
nomadic reindeer herders. Both alternatives were encouraged by the Swedish
Crown. The Saami today have no title to land and their traditional
territories are Crown Lands. Only reindeer herding Saami are recognized, and
yet Sweden still refuses to acknowledge the Saami as indigenous people in
accordance with U.N. policies. Archaeological research is unraveling the
historical narratives that have been the basis of these cultural policies
for hundreds of years.
View Presentation.
Over a
span of centuries, writers have revealed that their view of the Arctic
region – in ancient Greek texts, Nordic sagas, and European exploration
accounts – entails myth as well as geography. The perceived location and
nature of the Arctic region and its indigenous peoples have varied according
to the historic period and cultural perspective of the observer. This paper
will focus upon late 19th/early 20th c.
American
narratives of Arctic exploration. I analyze a lesser known chapter of the
American quest for the North Pole: the involvement of Robert E. Peary’s
wife, Josephine Peary. Specifically, I will discuss the geographic,
cultural, and political importance of the gendering of the North Pole
exploration accounts. I re-examine the records of the North Pole quest using
a feminist geography perspective. If North Pole narratives were dominated
by concepts such as masculinity, primitiveness, and wilderness, why is the
participation of a “proper” Victorian lady in these expeditions important?
My analysis reveals how Josephine’s involvement reshaped popular
representations of the Arctic in the United States in surprising ways. In
the face of Greenlandic efforts to contain or control the U.S. military
presence in northern Greenland, early American expeditions to the region
deserve reconsideration. How did these historical American narratives of
Arctic exploration buttress emerging ideas of territoriality?
View Presentation.
The
identification of the remnants of ancient people in the contemporary
landscape is a central problem of interpreting prehistoric cultures and
communities. This matter is investigated focusing on the Stone Age in the
transition area between the present northern forests, mires and the low
mountain chain of the western Finnish Lapland. The aim is to find traces of
the first Mesolithic pioneers just after the deglaciation of 10,000 years
ago by following the highest shore lines of the predecessor of the Baltic
Sea, i.e. the Ancylus Lake, as formed by the melting waters of the last
Weichselian ice sheet.
Some results
of the field work will be presented from the season of 2006. The main
objective was to find samples for radiocarbon dating in order to provide
empirical evidence of the Mesolithic hunter-fisher-gatherers in the area.
The questions were:
- How
soon after the deglaciation the first pioneers may have arrived at the
chosen place?
- Did
the vicinity of the melting glacier, the shores of Ancylus Lake, or the
inland circumstances affect the motives why the people arrived?
- Where
did they come from?
- Who
were they – what kind of cultural identity did they have?
The basic
prospecting field methods in five different sites were used in the
documentation, e.g. GPS-mapping, surface survey, test excavation, sampling
and photographing.
The
environments of the sites represent a strong connection to the disappeared
historical Forest Sámi culture offering local parallels for constructing
interpretations on the early hunter-fisher communities.
View Presentation.
The paper
explores the discursive construction of the colonial encounter between
Europeans and Inuit in 20th Century Danish historiography
focusing on the merge of ethnographic writings and archival material in the
construction of the historical narrative of the early colonial period in
Greenland.
The main
focus is on the monumental History of Greenland I-III (written
1967-1976) by Finn Gad, a three volume history of pre-colonial Greenland and
the early colonization period from 1721 to 1808. The work remains a monolith
within historiography about early colonial Greenland to this day and is an
example of the discursive construction of the early colonial interaction
between Greenlanders and Europeans based on early 20th century ethnography
and source material from the colonial archives. The image of the
pre-colonial Inuit in Greenland presented becomes central in the
interpretation of the colonial archives, a method that Gad calls ’reading
behind the sources’ in an attempt to include the Greenlanders in the history
of the colonization. The backdrop of early 20th century ethnography thus
serves as additional layer interpretation through a filter of colonial
archival materials. In the paper this narration of the early colonial period
will be presented and discussed as a narrative from the colonial period and
its afterlife in present day, postcolonial Greenland.
View Presentation.
While
West Greenland was experiencing a social division under the Boards of
Guardians, Denmark would view the Greenlanders on the basis of the idea
about Greenlanders as they lived in North- and East Greenland. This
interpretation would long determine the Danish view of Greenland. After the
introduction of Home Rule this view is adopted by the Greenlandic upper
class, which uses it as its power base.
This has
an impact on how contemporary time and the past are viewed, in this paper
illustrated through the concept of ”sustainable development”.
In 1871
H.J. Rink (1819-1893) was appointed to the position as director for the
Royal Greenland Trade Department (RGTD). The next year Rink, who had lived
in Copenhagen since he retired from his position as “Inspector” (governor)
in South Greenland in 1868, once more visited Greenland.
Since
1782 employees of the RGTD performing duty in Greenland were submitted to
the famous Instruction which was issued by the board of the
Department. The instruction contained a set of rules intended to regulate
almost any possible form of contact between the Department’s employees and
the local Inuit.
His visit
to Greenland in 1872, together with his 13 years of experience as an
Inspector in the country, convinced Rink that it was high time to have a new
Instruction for the European and native born employees of the RGTD replace
the one from ninety years earlier. According to Rink, such a new updated
instruction would constitute an important element in a badly needed reform
of the Danish Greenland administration.
Hence, in
1873 director Rink issued a new Instruction intended to herald a change in
the old ways of doing things in Denmark’s colonial empire in Greenland. My
paper investigates whether it does represent a “New Deal” for Greenland – or
whether it was nothing but an updated version of old colonial policies.
View Presentation.
Doel, Ronald E., Oregon State University, Department of History
Abstract
To ask a
simple yet provocative question: what is Arctic knowledge? Who has it – and
who has the right to talk about it? Who defines it today; who defined it in
years past? In what ways is our understanding of the Arctic the sum of
distinct professional perspectives: an ‘Arctic of disciplines’? Do we have
a ‘big picture’ view? History is a way of knowing the Arctic—and in this
session, we will employ historical analysis as a way of understanding the
north, in the past as well as the present. Our aim in this session is to
place Arctic research within broad comparative perspectives: how were
insights won from studies in the field across a wide range of disciplines?
In what ways did cold war military concerns—and plans for potential northern
warfare—influence what Arctic knowledge was acquired? How have the practices
of colonialism and neo-colonialism in the north changed over the twentieth
century? In what contexts should the international polar years—including the
International Geophysical Year of 1957-58—be placed? How has Arctic
knowledge been constituted by changing technological practices, strategies
of resource management, and Traditional Ecological Knowledge? This session
integrates and synthesizes major research programmes underway within
“Colony, Empire, Environment: A Comparative International History of
Twentieth Century Arctic Science,” one of the seven projects supported by
the Boreas initiative of the European Science Foundation. While we intend to
raise questions and issues from our work, we also hope that this session
will facilitate roundtable discussions.
By the late
1940s, as cold war tensions escalated in the United States, the Pentagon
became deeply interested in the Arctic—and greatly increased funding for
northern research. This patronage came to shape perceptions of the Arctic
environment, but more than that, it created a distinct form of environmental
science in America, and did so well before biological environmental science
research began to flourish in the 1960s. Scientists within the post-WW II
national military establishment wanted to understand the "environment" as a
theater for military operations: the medium through which guided missiles
(and submarines) would travel, a bounded space potentially manipulable for
military ends. This "operational" form of problem-solving was inherently
interdisciplinary: like later perceptions of environmental degradation,
early cold war defense needs focused attention on broad scientific questions
and created a new (largely unexplored) lens through which Arctic landscapes
were evaluated. View
Presentation.
This paper
focuses on the post-Darwinian intellectual formation of Ernest Thompson
Seton, author of the "realistic" animal stories which he helped to establish
as an internationally popular literary genre during the first half of the
20th c. Seton's widely-read and widely translated stories, including the
famous collection entitled Wild Animals I Have Known
(1898), helped in no small way to shape the perceptions of vast
international audiences of nature-lovers, some of whom became pioneering
conservationists and ecologists. Seton attained his post-Darwinian outlook
informally while growing up under the influence of a local naturalist, Dr.
William Brodie, in Toronto, Canada. In turn he combined his literary and
artistic talents to formulate and disseminate a powerful message that "We
and the beasts are kin" and that, as a result, animals too have rights. In
an effort to translate his precocious ecological understanding into modern
science, Seton journeyed to arctic Canada in 1907 with Edward Preble of the
US Biological Survey, and published his findings in non-fictional works that
emphasized the value of local aboriginal knowledge. His rejection of a
single disciplinary medium of expression, instead blending art and science
to challenge humanity's conventional stance outside of nature, thwarted
Seton's lifelong ambition to find acceptance as a scientist. Yet both his
ecological outlook and the evidence he assembled deeply influenced the
scientific knowledge of the north that was constructed during the 20th c.
View Presentation.
In the
mid-1930’s, Danish geologist and Arctic explorer Lauge Koch established a
network of field stations and traveling huts in Central East Greenland. The
establishment of a permanent infrastructure in the field caused a revolution
in the whole culture and organization of Danish Arctic exploration. Within
this context, this paper examines a debate on scientific validity and
authorship in topographic and geological cartography that occurred at a
meeting in the Danish Geological Society on 9 December 1935. The meeting was
called by eleven of the most prominent geologists in Denmark, accusing Lauge
Koch of cartographic fraud and theft of scientific results. A detailed
analysis of the various points in the discussion makes possible the
identification of different technological and social foundations for
authority claims of different cartographic modes in Danish Arctic research
in the early 20th century. At the same time, the inconsistency with which
both parties carried their arguments reveals uncertainties about how to
assess the definition and validity of observation, compilation and
speculation in cartography, as field stations, new technologies and social
and structural change challenged traditional academic power structures
within the Danish Arctic scientific community.
View Presentation.
In this paper I will use glaciology and climate science in
the Polar Regions as a prime exemplar in order to arrive at a more general
understanding of the production of knowledge in the field. Glaciology’s
concern with truth and trust can be seen in a wider historical and
sociological context. In the “history of truth” (Shapin 1994) the geological
sciences occupy a special position. In the course of the 19th century we can
see the gradual differentiation of geophysical research, which evolved with
distinctly different relationships to credibility. The case of climate
change served as an early (from the 1930’s) and important test case, and a
forceful driver, for the development of a modernized field science of
glaciology and meteorology in the Polar Regions. Research practices of
precision in glaciological field work are used to enhance trust: field
notes, observation techniques, instruments, storage and transportation
technologies, etcetera, neither of which have been too carefully studied
before.
Research stations in the field are of many sizes and shapes,
sometimes of a makeshift character that we might preferably call
“installations” (with a conscious connotation to the art concept). In
essence, the research station could be interpreted as an institutional
attempt to resolve the tension between the laboratory and the field, and the
field as a border zone of insecurity to be permeated with the orderly,
encultured epistemology of the controlled experiment.
View Presentation.
This paper
is focused on the development of field studies in the Russian European
sub-Arctic and Arctic seas in the end of the 19th – first half of the 20th
centuries, which were driven by the interplay of different purposes,
interests and groups: economical needs to colonize the region, scientific
and teaching interests of the universities, military and resource use
interests. The paper describes the rise of networks of field stations in the
Russian North, analyzes different methodologies of field research, reveals
the everyday life and scientific practices on the stations and in the
expeditions. The scientific network in the Arctic formed through the
confrontation between interrelated places of knowledge - field stations and
research vessels - towards their unification and placement into the same
centralized network. The paper is based on the understanding of the Russian
stations and expeditions as a part of international networks, including ICES
and IPY activities, which allowed the intensive transference of tacit
knowledge of field research in the Arctic. I look not only on the
transference of the scientific practices between northern countries,
especially on the influence of Swedish and Norwegian innovative
methodologies of marine research on the Russian scientific practices, but
also on the application of knowledge obtained in other regions to the
specificity of field research in the Arctic.
Wachowich, Nancy,
University of Aberdeen, Department of Anthropology
Lincoln, Amber, University
of Oxford
Abstract
This
session will explore possible connections between creative practice and
political processes in the Circumpolar North. The multivalent and
metaphorical qualities of artistic practice allow it to address broader
social issues, generating dialogue among individuals and communities. The
focus of the session will fall on the emergence of aesthetic practice, and
the ways in which creativity can be made to speak to issues of sovereignty,
human rights, social welfare and cultural regeneration in the North. The
definition of creative practice is inclusive: accommodating a broad range of
both historical and contemporary expressions, in their material, digital,
performative, sound and oral manifestations.
Questions
could include:
Does the
North create particular aspects of a creative aesthetic? By what artistic
strategies do art and politics convene? What roles do collaboration and
cultural exchange play in developing new creative practices? How does
circumpolar artistic practice speak to broader political debates concerning
hunting rights, resource management and the social and economic welfare of
communities?
Considered
today to be among this country’s 50 most important Canadians by the Canadian
Museum of Civilization, Peter Pitseolak was born in 1902 on Baffin Island
near what is now known as Cape Dorset, Nunavut. He was raised in the
traditional nomadic Inuit life of hunting and gathering. His generation of
Inuit were the very first to bear the brunt of cultural forces
(Christianity, law, government, residential schools, the fur trade, alcohol)
that would transform their millennia-old life forever. In 1913, when he was
a young boy, Pitseolak met future Nanook of the North filmmaker
Robert Flaherty – an encounter which sparked his life-long passion for
photography. Pitseolak was extremely prescient and sensed that Inuit were on
the cusp of dramatic changes. He felt the urgent need to document his
culture and traditions on film before they disappeared forever. In doing
so, he created some of the most beautiful and striking images ever made
during this period in Canada's North. Linking Peter Pitseolak's work to
contemporary media from an Inuit point-of-view, such as that
of filmmaker Zacharias Kunuk, this paper explores his photography in the
context of insider/outsider media representations of Inuit culture, and the
enduring ingenuity of Inuit in re-appropriating southern technologies for
their own purposes.
This paper
will look at the politics and practice of digital and web-based media in the
North, set in a context of growing tensions regarding resource development
in arctic settlements. Its ethnographic focus falls on a series of
discussions taking place in the summer of 2007 and spring of 2008 in the
Canadian Eastern High Arctic community of Igloolik. Using an open
microphone and video camera, a Montreal video-artist, and former resident of
Igloolik, invited people to “video-blog” their viewpoints on the expansion
of the mining industry in their settlement. This was an effort to make the
democratic possibilities of the World Wide Web accessible for residents of
Igloolik so that social commentary could be voiced – unmediated – through a
new portal, an indigenous peoples Internet television station called Isuma
TV. The proposed paper will analyze the workings of this form of social
activism in view of broader Inuit efforts to assert sovereignty over their
homelands. Questions will consider the options available to people when they
are “requested” by prospectors to leave their camps, and whether new media
can enable a viable form of social action? Mining industries and media
activism will be analyzed against the backdrop of Inuit hunting rights and
traditional Inuit beliefs about the land.
View Presentation.
In this
presentation I will discuss filming as a methodological tool in ethnographic
field research. I will elaborate on the process of filming an ethnographic
documentary during fieldwork in Sermiligaaq, East Greenland (14 months,
2005-2007). The paper will address three main themes which relate to
collaboration, use of camera as methodological tool and wider intersection
with politics of representation.
The
documentary is a portrait of everyday life of a family in Sermiligaaq, a
small settlement on the Greenlandic East Coast; and shows a broad range of
daily interactions, village events, subsistence and labor activities in the
summer as well as the winter season. The paper will elaborate upon processes
of collaboration between the village inhabitants, the main protagonists in
the film, myself as “mediating” anthropologist - responsible for sound,
communication, interviews, as well the filmmaker responsible for camera and
technical aspects. I will discuss multiple concerns and interests on the
parts of the different participants, and how these perceptions shaped the
topic of the film. Moreover I will show how the filming processes were
incorporated into my ethnographic fieldwork and served as an important
methodological tool. The filming gave me a different perspective on some of
my research topics, and the possibility to access different areas of
everyday life. Considering impacts of the documentary on a wider public, I
will finally discuss issues of representation and identity politics.
It is within
the spaces of Inupiaq and Yup’ik women’s collective activity where stories,
politics, creativity and materials are integrated into the rhythm of women’s
movements. Women of northwest Alaska often join forces in groups of 3-7 in
order to process raw materials and create art, crafts, and clothing. Within
these female spaces of activity, women coil baskets, butcher and scrap
hides, sew kuspuks (hooded cloth shirts) and knit socks, mitts and hats. At
the same time they fluctuate between telling stories, cracking jokes, and
leaving silence. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Kotzebue and Nome,
Alaska (2006-2007), this paper will highlight the creative practices
involved in how Inupiaq and Yup’ik women use the pace of their hands and
bodies, gaps of silence, laughter and stories to construct personal
narratives and share them with each other. It will also emphasize the
process in which the women collectively assemble these narratives in order
to form opinions and draw conclusions about wider political issues such as
institutional education and health care and the continuity of historical
customs and cultural values.
View Presentation.
Singing with the Land, Dancing to
the Arctic: Expressive Culture and Perception of the Environment in Iñupiaq
Dance and Song
This paper
explores the relationship between Iñupiaq expressive culture and their
environmental knowledge. For Eskimo peoples, song and dance have long been
vehicles for transmitting history, traditions, and cultural values. People
express feelings and emotions embedded in their relation to the environment
and connection to the past, which have been acquired based on activities and
practice in particular surroundings. Song and dance give form to what
people know about the land through their culturally trained eyes and
experience of everyday body movements. My field research in Barrow, Alaska,
suggests that dance and song combine a cultural aesthetics with ecological
and embodied knowledge of the Arctic environment in a harmony of movements
and sounds. In Iñupiaq dance, mimetic expression of human and non-human
entities is one of the most popular subjects. Through dance and song,
Iñupiat enact relationships with animals on the three levels of
identification, feeling, and observation. It also depicts attachment and
sentiment to the land and the subsistence activities that take place there.
Although the functions and meanings of dance and song have transformed
today, to understand and enjoy these meanings fully, both dancers and
audience must know actual animal behavior and human activities. I argue
that expressive culture is a key sphere where contemporary Iñupiat
regenerate, reinterpret, and renegotiate their traditions and identities in
relation to the land to themselves and to wider audience.
View Presentation.
‘Artistic’
production has long been one way by colonizers have judged colonized
peoples. The colonizer’s style of rule is often dependant on their judgment
of the fitness of the colonized for entry into their cultural realm and
‘artistic’ performance is a crucial measure of fitness. Denial of artistic
ability is equated with relegation to the lower orders, and other artistic
expressions may allow for more humane considerations. These kinds of
evaluations were rife in the nineteenth century at the height of imperialism
and evolutionism. But did the late twentieth century reevaluation of the
cultural expressions of colonized peoples abandon the paradigm? Might the
reconsideration of, for instance, women’s works as arts and not crafts, or
“primitive” art as no longer mere fetishes but worthy of inclusion and
exhibition in cosmopolitan museums such as the Met or the Quai Branly depend
on the same ethnocentric ranking?
The paper
considers the progressive reevaluation of Canadian Inuit artistic
productions in the late twentieth and the twenty first centuries, for
possible persistence of the ‘art = human’ paradigm. It also examines Inuit
artistic discourse and agency in the light of postcolonialism.
A
national investigation of the use of religious pictures in Greenland carried
through 2004-05 has shown, that there are religious pictures in close to 75%
of all Greenlandic homes. There are thousands of pictures of Jesus as the
good shepherd, just as there are thousands of pictures of the Heart of
Jesus, the Heart of Mary and of guardian angels. These pictures are a part
of a religious practice. – People look at Jesus and they address themselves
to him in prayer, they tell their children not be afraid, because Jesus is
protecting them. The pictures are also an important part of a system, which
provides social security and social coherence. Pictures are exchanged at
weddings, baptism and birthdays, just as they wander from generation to
generation. My paper will examine visual piety as a living and innovative
part of religiosity in Greenland.
View Presentation.
Sköld, Peter, Umeå
University
Axelsson, Per
Parkinson, Alan J., Arctic
Investigations Programme, CDC
Abstract
Health
inequalities have become a prime target for global organizations such as the
United Nations and the WHO. In their Millennium Declaration, the United
Nations stress that no individual and no nations should be denied the
opportunity to benefit from development. Nevertheless, the indigenous people
of the world are not benefiting at all and the health situation that has
long been cause for alarm continues to be alarming. In a number of
resolutions the WHO has recently mandated to devote special attention to the
issue of indigenous peoples' health. The health disadvantages suffered by
indigenous people today are profoundly connected to their history of
colonization. Colonization is an experience that is shared by all indigenous
peoples over the world. The time, extent, impact, and understanding of
colonization vary among continents and cultures. Nevertheless, it is true
that colonization always brings change to the indigenous cultures: sometimes
positive changes, but often negative. Few researchers would dispute that the
indigenous populations of the world experience demographic transitions much
later than non-indigenous populations. Therefore a discussion of an
indigenous health transition is often addressed but, due to lack of data,
rarely examined. The purpose of this session is to problemize the health
transition of indigenous peoples in the north. It is open for scholars from
all social science disciplines.
The obvious
differences in living conditions among communities in Greenland have induced
health researchers to assume that place of residence can be used as a proxy
for temporal trend in epidemiological studies. The purpose of the
presentation is to examine this assumption, taking the theory of the
epidemiological transition into consideration.
In its
simplest form, epidemiological transition reflects the shift in a population
away from infectious diseases towards degenerative diseases. In Greenland as
a whole, this transition started around 1950 and is still taking place. A
comparison of villages with towns in Greenland indicates that for some but
not all diseases villages are currently more upstream than towns in the
process. For certain living conditions, e.g. diet, physical activity and
housing, the village-town gradient parallels a time trend, while for other,
e.g. transport, information and treatment of diseases, it does less so or
not at all.
It is
concluded that place can be used as a proxy for time only when one considers
the simplest of epidemiological models. A more useful approach would be to
consider differences among communities as a result of socioeconomic
disparities than as a reflection of an epidemiological transition.
View Presentation.
Objective:
To investigate the prevalence of self-reported experiences of ethnic
discrimination and bullying among Sami and non-Sami adults.
Study
Design: Cross-sectional, questionnaire-based survey.
Methods:
SAMINOR is a population based study of health and living condition that was
administered in 2003-2004 in 24 different Norwegian and Sami populated
municipalities within central and northern Norway. This analysis was based
on 12,265 men and women aged 36-79 years. Ethnic distribution was Sami
(33.1%), Kvens (7.8%) and majority (59.1%).
Results:
Overall, Sámi and Kven responders reported more ethnic discrimination and
bullying in general than ethnic Norwegians (p < 0.001). The reporting was
highest among the younger participants (p < 0.001). Men reported more ethnic
discrimination than women, while women reported more bullying. Responders
with the strongest Sámi affiliation reported higher levels of ethnic
discrimination outside the Sámi language Act’s district, while responders
with weak Sámi affiliation, Kvens and ethnic Norwegians reported higher
levels inside this district. Among the responders that reported bullying
previously, the most common type was discriminating remarks and the most
common locations were public schools. For the reported bullying last year,
the most common types were gossiping and discriminating remarks and the most
common locations were at work and in the local community. Two out of three
of those reporting ethnic discrimination, independent of ethnicity, also
reported bullying.
Conclusions: The findings from this study show that the Sami and Kven
population more often experience bullying and ethnic discrimination than
ethnic Norwegians. These results are consistent with experiences from other
minority and marginalized groups that experienced colonization. More
research is needed to understand the role of bullying and ethnic
discrimination in the Sami and Kven population’s well being and health.
View Presentation.
The
demographic obstacle? – Infant mortality in Swedish Sápmi 1750-1900. Infant
mortality is given dignity as one of the main characteristics of the high
mortality profile among indigenous peoples. The present paper analyses the
long-term infant mortality trend among the Swedish Sámi during the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Data is derived from the Demographic
Data Base at Umeå University, where detailed information at the individual
level allows for age control by day, week and year, and for sex. Moreover,
the analysis includes cause of death distribution, still births and
illegitimacy. The paper offers a solid demographic approach, but has also
the ambition to contextualize the results in perspective of changes within
the Sami society, culture and economic situation. Sápmi – the traditional
land – has always been a complex area with striking cultural differences
between Sami groups. Our paper scrutinizes geographical differences in
infant mortality within Sápmi, and includes the growing group of settlers
that move into the area. We ask if it is possible to find links between
cultural differences and differences in infant mortality. The main question
dealt with is if infant mortality was the real obstacle to a positive
demographic transition among the Swedish Sami.
View Presentation.
Alaska
Native elders are critical to the social and cultural values of villages.
There is very little research on ethnic minority elders and how they
subjectively define a successful older age. The lack of a minority
definition risks using a generic definition and portraying them as aging
less successful than their non-minority counterparts. This presentation
explores the concept of successful aging from an Alaska Native perspective
and what it means to age well in Alaska. The Cultural Consensus Model (CCM)
was used to gain a sense of the cultural beliefs about aging from Alaska
Native elders. Research findings indicate that a set of cultural beliefs
exist about successful aging, health status is related to successful aging,
passing down knowledge is critical to becoming an elder, and aging
successfully is based on personal responsibility and cognitions. The
findings also indicate that poor aging focuses on not being active, not
being able to handle alcohol, and giving up on oneself. One important
finding is that access to health care services was not directly related to
how elders define successful aging. Most elders stated that reaching a
certain age (e.g. 65) does not determine their status as an elder, but
rather the wisdom and experiences they gain throughout life. This research
will lead to a larger study of successful aging in Bristol Bay and look at
the role rural and urban communities play in how elders define their aging
process.
Suicide has
been an important public health problem in Nunavik since the early 80’s.
After briefly describing the problem with the latest data on the frequency
of suicide and suicide ideation or attempts in Nunavik, this paper will
address suicide prevention through the help of non professional resources in
the community (friends, family member, teacher, local leaders, elders, etc.)
and the many forms it takes in a small community. Data discussed here come
from field notes, interviews and observations gathered during a 8 month
period at the end of the 90’s while doing a Ph.D. anthropological research.
While
experiencing problems and distress, one may seek help from different
sources. Among the young people feeling suicidal, before going to
professional resources, the most common pattern is to seek help form of a
closed friend, “one that can be trusted”, a relative or someone else from
the individuals’ personal network. For these helpers, while wanting to help,
playing such role is very demanding and stressful; it can be overwhelming.
Taking local illustrations as examples, the main focus will be put here, on
the strengths and the limits of the informal sources of help for suicide
prevention services. The author will discuss the implications and challenges
these findings suggest for mental health services.
Suicide
mortality was examined in a cohort of 19, 801 persons categorized as Sami in
Arctic Norway between 1970-1998, stratified by age, gender, cultural
context, and traditional Sami core management. The results indicated that
there was a significant moderate increased risk for suicide among indigenous
Sami (SMR=1.27, 95 %, CI: 1.02-1.56) compared to the reference population.
In the study period, 89 suicides occurred (70 men and 19 women) with
increased suicide mortality both for indigenous Sami males (SMR=1.27; 95%
CI: 0.99-1.61) and females (SMR=1.27; 95% CI: 0.77-1.99). The results showed
a significant increased suicide mortality among Sami aged 15-24 for both
males (SMR=1.82; 95% CI: 1.13-2.78) and females (SMR=3.17; 95% CI:
1.17-6.91). Significant increased suicide mortality was found for indigenous
Sami males residing in Sami core area (SMR= 1.54; 95% CI: 1.04-2.20) and for
indigenous Sami males not belonging to semi-nomadic reindeer herding
(SMR=1.30; 95% CI: 1.00-1.65). Moreover, Sami belonging to semi-nomadic
reindeer herding household did not have significant increased suicide
mortality.
In
conclusion, the finding of a significant increased risk of suicide among
Sami is consistent with the general findings among other indigenous groups.
However, compared to several others indigenous groups the suicide rates
found among Sami is moderate and may be explained by better living
conditions and subsequently lower prevalence of general risk factors.
Furthermore, several common features concerning
indigenous suicide have been identified among the Sami, such as within group
variation, age distribution, gender differences, cluster of suicides and
frequent use of violent methods.
View Presentation.
Midwifery
care has been official policy in Greenland for over 100 years, thus insuring
that Greenlandic women have been able to give birth in close proximity of
the homes, families and communities.
In January
2002, a new referral system was inaugurated and consequently the number of
women referred from their villages and settlement to the National Referral
Hospital has grown. ”Safety through the eyes of the women” the first of five
studies is a narrative analysis of Greenlandic women’s experience of
referral and transfer during pregnancy. The study employs narrative analysis
of the focus groups and semi –structured individual interviews of the women,
who were transferred to the referral hospital for birth from 2001-2006.
Fieldwork has been conducted in three communities: Tasiilaq in East
Greenland, Ilulissat in North Greenland and Sisimiut in Central Greenland.
Fieldwork continued in North Greenland during the summer of 2008/2009.
It looks at
the new referral guidelines changing childbirth, and its place within the
family and community structure. It also tries to find the answer to what is
need for the families to feel empowered, so that they rise to the challenge
of referral and transfer during pregnancy and birth.
View Presentation.
Objectives: The presentation summarise findings from a doctorial thesis on
substance use among young indigenous Sami in Norway.
Study
design: Data were collected from the “The North Norwegian
Youth Study” – a longitudinal questionnaire study conducted in 1994–1995
(T1) and 1997–1998 (T2).
Methods:
The T1 sample included 3,000 ethnically diverse 15 to 19 year old high
school students (response rate [RR]: 85%) in a strictly school-based study.
The T2 sample included 1,500 18 to 22 year olds (RR: 55%) in a combined
school-based and postal questionnaire study. Sami comprised 23% of the total
samples.
Results:
Young Sami reported lower drinking rates at T1 and T2, higher parental
abstainer rates, and more public drinking, when compared with regional and
national non-Sami peers. Generally, north Norwegian youth had the highest
national current smoking rates (40%), although significantly fewer Sami were
current irregular smokers at T1. Regular smoking was strongly related to
risk-taking behaviours, e.g. intoxication. Sami with weaker cultural ties
(e.g. reporting pro-Norwegian attitudes, weaker ethnic identity etc.) had
the highest intraethnic smoking and drinking rates.
Conclusions: Young Sami living in north Norway were not at higher
risk for substance use than their regional and national non-Sami peers.
These findings contrast some findings among other Arctic indigenous groups
indicating “high” indigenous and “low” majority substance use rates. These
findings are discussed in light of various sociocultural factors.
Nonetheless, Laestadianism, “the Sami Christianity”, is believed to be an
important contributor to less drinking noted among Sami (Int J
Circumpolar Health; 2008; 67 (1): XX).
View Presentation.
The Inuit
dietary transition is interrelated with a range of other social, cultural
and economic factors that cannot be measured through classical dietary
surveys and may significantly impact both cardiovascular and mental health
in Arctic populations.
Objectives: Develop a culture-sensitive
score of «dietary well-being» in indigenous populations
in transition that take into account the biological (nutritional), cultural
and economical dimensions of food and nutrition.
Methods:
We use the baseline survey of the Inuit Health in Transition Cohort Study
that was conducted in the 14 communities (888 Inuit participants) of
Northern Québec (Nunavik) in 2004. We complement that individual information
by data available for each Nunavik village.
Results:
We develop a multi-level
model that integrates at the individual level: a diet quality score,
biological levels of relevant nutrients, the proportion of daily energy from
country food, perceptions of store-bought-foods, practice of hunting and
fishing, use of a community freezer, information on food security, income
and education; at the household level: presence of a hunter, average income;
and at the village level: availability of hunting and fishing equipments,
store-bought food supply (frequency, diversity, quality, freshness) and
other indicators of food vulnerability.
Discussion: We discuss the possible association between this «dietary
well-being» score and cardiovascular and wellness outcomes. The changing
role of food in terms of its meaning for the Inuit family and community -
e.g. the dietary acculturation and its correlates - is very likely to play a
significant role in the Inuit health transition beyond its strictly
biological dimension.
Inuit are
sustained by animals, birds, plants and fish in their region. Research has
shown that they are exposed to contaminants via their traditional diet of
these wildfoods. Contaminants (chemicals/compounds related to global
industrial and agricultural activities) are present in the local ecosystem
and food web, eventually being consumed by humans. The levels of
contaminants in wildfood and the potential health effects they may have are
of concern to Inuit in Nunatsiavut. These concerns threaten confidence in
the safety and value of wildfood. Meanwhile, social and cultural benefits
associated with a traditional diet and related activities are important to
the fabric of community life. Therefore it is vital that communication
about potential risks of contaminant exposure be accurate, while recognizing
the possibility of raising unnecessary fears. Poor risk communication has
been linked to confusion, mistrust, and in some cases negative changes in
diet behaviour.
This study
reviewed risk communication processes and networks in Nunatsiavut for the
dissemination of information related to environmental contaminants exposure
through traditional food consumption. The project used key informant
interviews, focus groups and document review to identify existing
communication pathways (formal/informal) delivering contaminants information
and health promotion messages, and to gather information on the experience
of young women regarding communication about health and nutrition issues.
This
research will inform new strategies for communicating about health
priorities with Inuit communities, so that they can make informed and
balanced decisions that can positively influence their health. The results
will interest circumpolar communities who are facing similar
communication/education challenges.
Objectives.
The government’s Action Plan for Health and Social Services states as a goal
that the Sami population’s encounter with health and social services should
be just as good as what the rest of the population experiences. The goal of
this study is to investigate patient satisfaction with the municipal GP
service in areas with both a Sami and Norwegian population.
Study
design. A cross-sectional population study using questionnaires. Methods.
The data were taken from the population based study of health and living
conditions in areas with both Sami and Norwegian populations (SAMINOR) in
which respondents were asked about their satisfaction with GP services in
their municipalities. This population survey was carried out in the period 2
002–2004. The analyses include 15,612 men and women aged 36–79.
Results. The
Sami-speaking patients were less satisfied with the municipal GP service as
a whole than were the Norwegian speakers; RR 2.4 (95% CI 2.1–2.7). They were
less satisfied with the physicians’ language skills; RR 5 .8 (95% CI 4
.8–7.0); and they felt that misunderstandings between physician and patient
due to language problems were more frequent; RR 3.8 (95% CI 3.3–4.3).
One-third expressed that they did not wish to use an interpreter.
Conclusions.
The results indicate that it is necessary to place greater emphasis on the
physicians’ language competency when hiring GPs in municipalities within the
Administrative Area for the Sami Language. This could improve satisfaction
with the physicians’ services.
View Presentation.
The Inuit
Health in Transition Study is a transnational study of health among the
Inuit in Greenland, Canada, and Alaska. The study has a strong focus on
diabetes and cardiovascular disease but covers also other aspects of health
including psychosocial health. During 2003-2007, about 3,500 adult Inuit
participated in the study in 29 communities in Nunavik and West Greenland.
Participants were interviewed, filled in a questionnaire, were examined and
gave blood and other biological samples. The studies in Nunavik and
Greenland are not identical but share protocols on diabetes, heart disease,
diet, smoking, social capital, self rated health, gambling and many other
topics. The study is being geographically expanded to cover also Nunavut,
Labrador and East Greenland, and comparable studies have yielded data from
Alaska Natives and Norwegian Sami. Data considerations and issues of
comparability between studies will be presented.
View Presentation.
Parkinson, Alan J., Arctic Investigations Program CDC
Mulvad, Gert
Abstract
The
Arctic Human Health Initiative (AHHI) is an IPY (2007-2008) Arctic Council
project that aims to increase the visibility and awareness of health
concerns of Arctic peoples, to foster human health research, and promote
health protection strategies that will improve the health and well-being of
all Arctic Residents. The AHHI coordinating project (#167) seeks to advance
the joint circumpolar human health research agendas of the Arctic Council
(AC;
www.arctic-council.org ), an eight
nation intergovernmental forum for sustainable development and environmental
protection, and the working groups of the International Union for
Circumpolar Health (IUCH; (www.iuch.org
). This special project session will review AHHI research, education and
outreach progress, and plans for the 14th International Congress for
Circumpolar Health to be held in Yellow Knife Canada, July 12-16, 2009-
(www.hlthss.gov.nt.ca/Features/Programs_
and_Services/icch/about_icch_2009.htm)
View Presentation.
The
purpose of the International Circumpolar Surveillance (ICS) system for
infectious diseases is to establish a network of hospital and public health
laboratories throughout the Arctic. The network would allow collection and
sharing of uniform laboratory and epidemiologic data between Arctic
countries that will describe the prevalence of infectious diseases of
concern to Arctic residents and assist in the formulation of prevention and
control strategies. Currently the system monitors invasive bacterial
diseases and tuberculosis in the US Arctic (Alaska), northern Canada,
Greenland, Iceland Norway, Finland, northern Sweden. While currently focused
on prevention and control of infectious disease the system could be adapted
to monitor other human health issues of concern in Arctic countries, and
serves as a model for a Sustainable Arctic Observing Network for human
health.
More
information at: www.cdc.gov.eid/content/14/1/contents_v14n1
Objective: Greenland reports the highest rates of chlamydia and gonorrhea in
the Arctic. Our objective was to use cognitive interviewing to validate our
sexual health survey with Nuuk residents.
Methods:
We used stratified and targeted snowball sampling to identify 14 Nuuk
residents to test the survey. Participants were selected based on age (15 to
65 years old), sex, identity (Greenlandic, Danish, both Greenlandic and
Danish), and language (knowledge of English, Danish, or
Greenlandic).Cognitive interviewing was used to test and validate our 22
question survey. Cognition questions tested the survey overall and
individual questions specifically.
Results:
Cognitive interviewing was conducted with 11 Nuuk residents (78% response
rate) ranging in age from 16 to 45 years (5 male, 6 female, 4 Greenlandic, 2
Danish, 5 Greenlandic and Danish). Questions about parental communication,
partners (trust, behaviors, and condom use), co-occurrence of alcohol use
and sex, and social/community support were identified as most relevant for
Greenland. Several questions considered relevant in Canada and the United
States, like traditional identity, abstinence, drug use and prostitution,
were not meaningful for Greenland. The Center for Epidemiologic Studies
Depression (CES-D) scale was confusing to participants, though depression
was considered an important factor influencing transmission of sexual
infections. Distinct differences in wording for Greenlandic and Danish
participants were identified.
Conclusions: Many standard survey instruments developed in the United States
and Canada are not directly applicable to Greenland. Community review and
input can help translate these instruments into more culturally relevant and
valid questions. View
Presentation.
Gyllensten, Ulf, Johansson, Inger and
Johansson, Asa
In the
Northern Swedish Population Health Study (NSPHS) we are focusing on
populations with a known demographic history and specific environmental
exposures to identify genetic and environmental factors contributing to
clinical variables used as indicators of health status. Populations from the
County of Västerbotten and Norrbotten in Northern Sweden have been chosen on
the basis of the availability of complete genealogical information through
the digitized church books and the unique exposures in terms of diet (high
intake of game and fish) and lifestyle (reindeer herding versus other
occupations). A population-based health survey has been used to collect
medical information (e.g. BMI, blood pressure, bone densitometry,
spirometry, lipid profile, hormonal status), medical history, detailed diet
and lifestyle information (occupation, physical activity, work-related
damages). Analysis of genes identified as risk factors in other populations
is performed using SNP arrays and hypothesis-free search for risk QTLs is
conducted using genome scanning. Parallel studies are performed in
populations from the Adriatic Sea, Orkney Islands, Italian Alps and the
Netherlands through the EUROSPAN project. Cross-population comparisons are
used to study the genetic risk factor profile and environmental factors
between populations differing widely in origin and environmental conditions.
View Presentation.
Background.
Breast cancer (BC)
is the most common cancer for women in the western world that have been
increasing since 1940. The established BC risk factors can only explain less
than one third of all cases. The risk of BC is thought to be modified by
lifestyle and environment. In Denmark approximately each 10th of
women develop breast cancer, and the incidence has doubled the last 30 years
– also in Greenland a clear increasing incidence was observed. Before 1966
BC was reported absent from the western and central Canadian Arctic, whereas
studies over a 20-year period (1969-88) in Inuit the circumpolar region
showed an increase of approximately 10%.
Our hypothesis
is that BC risk in
Inuit is interplay among changes in diet, increase and changes in profile of
persistent organic pollutants (POPs), and decreases in certain trace
elements and marine fatty acids, and genetic polymorphisms.
The aim
of the project is to undertake an epidemiological case-control investigation
of the risk of BC in relation to exposure to POPs carried out on samples
from BC cases taken from Greenlandic women. Data of cases will be compared
to matched controls with respect to e.g. age and lifestyle, and evaluated
for correlations to blood level and hormone disrupting bioactivity of POPs
including new biomarkers such as PFCs (perfluorinated compounds), serum
trace elements, fatty acids and hormone metabolites in urine. Genetic
susceptibility will be analysed by gene polymorphism relevant for POP
excretion and BC risk.
Perspectives. To our knowledge this is the first study to include multiple
exposure assessment tools and hypothesis-generating toxicological studies
and believe that the study can contribute to prophylactic and preventive
actions. View
Presentation.
Soloviev, Andrey, Khargova, Olga, Chervina, Natalia
and Sidorov, Pavel
Russia Alcohol abuse is one
of the main social problem for the population health in the European North
of Russia. The combination with measures for counteraction to spreading of
alcohol and other psychoactive substances in children’s and adolescents’
environment has to based on a concrete situation typical for a given
locality. We have worked out a new form of preventive work for an outlying
working district of Arkhangelsk that has distinguished special
social-economic troubles. The program urgency on territory is connected with
a lot of social risk factors. The aim of the program is to bring preventive
addictological aid near to the population through raising the role of
involvement of adolescents and families in this work and creation of an
interdisciplinary team of specialists – psychiatrists, general
practitioners, medical nurses, specialists in social work, psychologists and
teachers. The novelty of the program consists of: interdepartmental approach
in the sphere of addictological preventology; joint realization of the
project by students and schoolchildren; active interaction of specialists,
parents and schoolchildren with raising of the independent role of
adolescents; implementation of monitoring of addictological situation on the
territory; development of new forms of anti-alcohol, anti-tobacco and
anti-narcotic work at schools. Actual realization of the program is not
finished with its formal finish. The effect of
self-development takes place.
View Presentation.
Mulvad, Gert
Rautio, Arja
Abstract
Food
security is to have “physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and
nutritious food that meet the dietary needs and food preferences for an
active and healthy life” (World summit on Food Security, 2003) Food security
is a world wide challenge as states not least in the Arctic region.
Many
groups work with food security in the Arctic and we invite to this workshop
planed by the National Board of Nutrition and Environment in Greenland.
Some of the food security challenges in Greenland.
In the
middle of “the Arctic dilemma” - recommendations of food and food security
in Greenland
The
traditional diet in Greenland is to a large extent based upon marine animals
and fish, but in the last generations has the diet been a mixture of
traditional and imported foods. Even if about one quarter of the energy
consumption still comes from the intake of from seafood, fish or sea animals
are the imported foods expected to increase its share of the energy
consumption in the future.
How food
is produced, prepared and consumed is a major part of the culture in any
community and is thereby of great importance to our identity as individuals
and to the way people come together. Food is much more than just getting the
necessary nutrition; it is also essential for our social life and the ways
families’ function. Since an increasing part of our food is imported and
arrive in full or almost full fabricated forms the quality of nutrition
changes, affecting not only public health but also changing the social and
cultural aspects of eating and preparing the meals.
Food
security is to have “physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and
nutritious food that meet the dietary needs and food preferences for an
active and healthy life”. Food security is a world-wide challenge not least
in the Arctic region. The traditional diet in Greenland is to a large
extent based upon marine animals and fish, but in the last generations has
the diet been a mixture of traditional and imported foods. Even if about one
quarter of the energy consumption still comes from the intake of from
seafood, fish or sea animals are the imported foods expected to increase its
share of the energy consumption in the future.
How food
is produced, prepared and consumed is a major part of the culture in any
community and is thereby of great importance to our identity as individuals
and to the way people come together. Food is much more than just getting the
necessary nutrition; it is also essential for our social life and the ways
families’ function. Since an increasing part of our food is imported and
arrive in full or almost full fabricated forms the quality of nutrition
changes, affecting not only public health but also changing the social and
cultural aspects of eating and preparing the meals.
The
pollution of the local foods with contaminants that are transported to the
Arctic from the western countries has reached a level that is of public
concern due to their potential negative health effects but the local diet
are also rich in unsaturated fat, like n-3 fatty acids.
The
National Board of Nutrition in Greenland is proposing its recommendations in
due respect to a balance between the positive and negative elements in the
traditional diet and imported foods taking the epidemiological changes in
disease pattern, the cultural traditions and general westernisation of the
life style, the food security and the economics into consideration.
View Presentation.
This paper
examines personal food sharing networks among Inuit hunters in Ulukhaktok,
NT, Canada. Using Egonet, Inuit were asked to report on networks of
exchanges with other households in the community. Of particular interest
were exchanges of country (hunted) food, sharing of meals, and exchanges of
money. Preliminary analysis of these food and resource networks in the
community suggests some important changes over time in the construction and
maintenance of sharing relationships between households. The most
significant of these changes is the decline of the “traditional” Copper
Eskimo pattern, which emphasized the primacy of social and economic ties
with age mates at the expense of ties with more senior households. In the
contemporary settlement, food and resource exchanges tend to be restricted
within nuclear-family household groups, with senior households acting as the
nexus of social relations. Why this apparent change is of interest here,
and the paper examines contemporary network patterns in the context of
significant social-structural changes to the community over the past three
decades. View
Presentation.
Dean, Libby and Furgal, Christopher
Inuit are
sustained by animals, birds, plants and fish in their region. Research has
shown that they are exposed to contaminants via their traditional diet of
these wildfoods. Contaminants (chemicals/compounds related to global
industrial and agricultural activities) are present in the local ecosystem
and food web, eventually being consumed by humans. The levels of
contaminants in wildfood and the potential health effects they may have are
of concern to Inuit in Nunatsiavut. These concerns threaten confidence in
the safety and value of wildfood. Meanwhile, social and cultural benefits
associated with a traditional diet and related activities are important to
the fabric of community life. Therefore it is vital that communication
about potential risks of contaminant exposure be accurate, while recognizing
the possibility of raising unnecessary fears. Poor risk communication has
been linked to confusion, mistrust, and in some cases negative changes in
diet behaviour.
This study
reviewed risk communication processes and networks in Nunatsiavut for the
dissemination of information related to environmental contaminants exposure
through traditional food consumption. The project used key informant
interviews, focus groups and document review to identify existing
communication pathways (formal/informal) delivering contaminants information
and health promotion messages, and to gather information on the experience
of young women regarding communication about health and nutrition issues.
This
research will inform new strategies for communicating about health
priorities with Inuit communities, so that they can make informed and
balanced decisions that can positively influence their health. The results
will interest circumpolar communities who are facing similar
communication/education challenges.
Counil, Émilie, Bernard, Nick, Sidi, Elhadji A.L. and Dewailly, Eric
The Inuit
dietary transition is interrelated with a range of other social, cultural
and economic factors that cannot be measured through classical dietary
surveys and may significantly impact both cardiovascular and mental health
in Arctic populations.
Objectives: Develop a culture-sensitive
score of «dietary well-being» in indigenous populations
in transition that take into account the biological (nutritional), cultural
and economical dimensions of food and nutrition.
Methods:
We use the baseline survey of the Inuit Health in Transition Cohort Study
that was conducted in the 14 communities (888 Inuit participants) of
Northern Québec (Nunavik) in 2004. We complement that individual information
by data available for each Nunavik village.
Results:
We develop a multi-level
model that integrates at the individual level: a diet quality score,
biological levels of relevant nutrients, the proportion of daily energy from
country food, perceptions of store-bought-foods, practice of hunting and
fishing, use of a community freezer, information on food security, income
and education; at the household level: presence of a hunter, average income;
and at the village level: availability of hunting and fishing equipments,
store-bought food supply (frequency, diversity, quality, freshness) and
other indicators of food vulnerability.
Discussion: We discuss the possible association between this «dietary
well-being» score and cardiovascular and wellness outcomes. The changing
role of food in terms of its meaning for the Inuit family and community -
e.g. the dietary acculturation and its correlates - is very likely to play a
significant role in the Inuit health transition beyond its strictly
biological dimension. View Presentation.
Food security is both about economic and practical access to
nutritious and healthy foods. In 2006 the Health Behavior in School-aged
Children investigation in Greenland focused on eating and eating habits as
did the first investigation. In 2002 the investigation found that many
schoolchildren did not eat breakfast and that more than 10% went hungry to
bed or to school ”often” or ”always”. HBSC is an international WHO supported
school survey performed every fourth year as a self completed questionnaire.
In 2006 it was found that about 63% of school children did eat breakfast on
4 to 5 schooldays, this were mostly among the youngest children and in the
capital. More children in the capital and in towns did eat vegetables
everyday (32-42%) and fruit everyday (12-20%), but many children still had a
low consumption of vegetables and more children had a daily intake of candy
and soft drinks. Most children ate native foods, but with major variations
between regions and between the capital, towns, and villages, i.e. 11% of
children in Nuuk did eat seal every week, it was 36% in the villages. In
2008 the same investigation will be carried out among High school students
and the results will be compared with prior results. The data from the
investigation is discussed in relation to national recommendations from the
Greenlandic Board of Nutrition. Furthermore time of delivery and prices for
the recommended food supply will be investigated to see if there is any
connection between these factors and eating habits.
View Presentation.
Vitamin D Security in
Northern Norway in Relation to Traditional Sea Food
and UV-B Light
Brustad, Magritt, Sandanger, T., Englesen, O.
and Edvardsen, K.
Vitamin D
is essential for natural bone metabolism and also suggested to protect
against some diseases for example cancer. The vitamin is obtained either
from the skin when exposed to ultraviolet radiation (UV-B light) or through
dietary sources. Since natural sources of vitamin D are limited in number
(fatty fish, fish liver, cod-liver oil), UV-B light has long been recognized
as the principal source of vitamin D for humans. Because of seasonal
variation in UV-B radiation, absence of cutaneous vitamin D production
occurs during part of the winter for latitudes of 50 degrees north and
higher. The length of the “vitamin D winter” increases with latitude. The
population in northern Norway (65 to 710 N) are therefore
dependent on dietary sources of vitamin D to have their biological needs met
during a considerably part of the year. The food traditions in coastal
northern Norway are rich in vitamin D. Thus, for populations with high
intake of traditional sea-food, vitamin D status remains relatively stable
throughout the year despite seasonal variation in sun-light. The vitamin D
rich sea-food in particular fish liver is also a source to persistent
organic pollutants (POPs). However, POPs levels in blood have not been found
to be explained by liver intake in a coastal population in northern Norway.
Consumption of traditional sea food in northern Norway prevents vitamin D
levels to drop considerably during winter and contributes to maintain good
vitamin D status in the population.
View Presentation.
Traditional food patterns protect against iron deficiency in a multiethnic
population in mid and northern Norway. The SAMINOR study To evaluate the
association between s-ferritin as a marker of iron status and dietary
patterns, in connection with ethnicity, geographic settlement and lifestyle
factors. In 2003-2004 a cross sectional study of health and living
conditions, SAMINOR, was performed in northern Norway. A total of 16 323 men
and women between the ages of 36 - 79 yr participated. A questionnaire had
among other things, questions about ethnicity and food habits. Principal
component analysis was utilized to assess the association variables. Seven
principal components were then used as input in a cluster analysis. Among
the food component, five dietary patterns were identified and labelled
"reindeer", "fish", "average", "fruit and vegetables", and "westernized,
traditional marine". These dietary patterns are used to assess the effect of
food habits on iron stores. The dietary pattern labelled "reindeer" had
significantly higher mean s-ferritin. This pattern was highly represented by
subjects with three generations of Sámi language (Sámi I). The prevalence of
depleted iron stores, s-ferritin < 13 µg/l, was lowest in the reindeer
pattern in both genders. Obesity was positively associated with s-ferritin
in both genders. The differences in iron levels between inland Sámi and
non-Sámi can be explained by food habits, age and obesity. In men,
traditional food habits with intake of reindeer meat eliminate the
association of ethnicity. In women food habits reduce the association
between s-ferritin and ethnicity. Traditional food with high levels of
bioavailable iron, seem to protect against depleted iron stores in both
genders. View
Presentation.
Møller, Suzanne
Abstract
The
purpose of this session is to engage in a discussion of strategies and
experiences of competency development and health research related to both
education, care and clinical practice of nurses as a way of establishing
nursing as a new research tradition in Greenland. The session is open to
anyone who wishes to participate.
The
recent development in the Greenlandic university structure has brought on a
comprehensive change in terms of the education of teachers, social workers
and nurses transforming into academic research based studies. This raises
new challenges in terms of establishing a research environment and in this
context the Department of Health and Nursing is working to develop nursing
in Greenland as a research field. This requires a strategy of general
competency development of nurses in Greenland and a discussion of what
should be the object of such research.
An over
all object of nursing as a research field in Greenland could be to analyse
the relation between health in Greenland and nursing through better
knowledge of how nurses in the Arctic practice nursing. This kind of
research should address issues relevant for nurses working in different
cities and settlements in Greenland and focus on the nurses’ role as
guarantor and promoter of health through care and clinical practice. In this
session we would like to open up for a wide discussion of subjects
considered central to nursing and health care in the Arctic as a potentially
growing research field in Greenland.
The purpose
of this session is to engage in a discussion of strategies and experiences
of competency development and health research related to both education care
and clinical practice of nurses as a way of establishing nursing as a new
research tradition in Greenland. The session is open to anyone who wishes to
participate.
The recent
development in the Greenlandic University structure has brought on a
comprehensive change in terms of the education of teachers, social workers
and nurses transforming into academic research based studies. This raises
new challenges in terms of establishing a research environment and in this
context the Department of Health and Nursing is working to develop nursing
in Greenland as a research field. This requires a strategy of general
competency development of nurses in Greenland and a discussion of what
should be the object of such research.
An over all
object of nursing as a research field in Greenland could be to analyze the
relation between health in Greenland and nursing through better knowledge of
how nurses in the Arctic practice nursing. This kind of research should
address issues relevant for nurses working in different cities and
settlements in Greenland and focus on the nurses’ role as guarantor and
promoter of health through care and clinical practice. In this session we
would like to open up for a wide discussion of subjects considered central
to nursing and health care in the Arctic as a potentially growing research
field in Greenland.
View Presentation.
The nursing
schools and healthcare systems in Greenland and Iqaluit educate and employ
Inuit Nurses. These institutions, however, are dominated by Danish and
EuroCanadain culture and language while the mother tongue of the nurses,
students, and the majority of the people they care for is Greenlandic/
Inuktitut and their cultural background is in the Arctic.
The focus of
this paper is the experiences of the Inuit nurses and nursing students. What
does it mean to be educated and practice in a language and culture other
than your own while caring for people who share your mother tongue and
cultural background?
Questions
such as preferred language of instruction and pedagogy and the effect of the
ways and values of Danish and Greenlandic educators and health practitioners
on students, patients and cross-cultural collaboration is discussed.
The aim of
this study is to assess the extent of nurse encounters with patients who
have not been diagnosed by other practitioners in district hospitals, health
centers, nursing stations and physician offices in Greenland. It will
identify circumstances in which nurses feel most competent and will assess
whether they have sufficient access to clinical guidelines.
The study
design takes the form of an internal audit (APO methodology) and will be
conducted by a nursing group who will also be responsible for registering
patient encounters during a defined time-frame and providing an assessment
of encounter proceedings. In parallel, participating nurses will provide
information regarding recruitment circumstances, amongst other details. In
the first instance, the study will be conducted as a pilot to test whether
the design will satisfy the questions raised in the project description.
The pilot
study results will describe the reasons for the patient encounters with the
nurses. Furthermore, the study will show under which circumstances the nurse
uses specific clinical procedures and test results and how often she
independently closes a case. The results will uncover how often it is
necessary to involve the doctor in diagnosing and/or treating as well as the
extent of the doctor’s intervention (either via telephone or in person).
The nurse’s
area of responsibility and own competency experience as a spokesperson, care
assessor and practitioner can only be described on the backdrop of patient
encounter experiences. The internal audit is expected to impact the
identification of future qualifying nursing study programs as well as the
scope of clinical guidelines.
“Three children on one bike”
An Anthropological Study with Focus on what
Children are Capable of and what Children Want.
In
Greenland today children may be classified as: relatively poor, implicitly
poor, need estimatedly poor and many other classifications. All these
classifications children must bear without knowing it themselves. Adults
give these classifications to children, but how do children look at
themselves? Are they aware of these classifications or are other factors and
values involved?
This
study focuses on children’s resources and competences instead of on
privation or social inequality. The study deals with what children are
concerned about and looks at children as interpreters of their own lives.
Our study
has been in progress since November 2007 and is not finished yet. In this
presentation we would like to show you our pathways up to now.
We want to show, how we are
applying qualitative anthropological methods like participant observation,
interviews and observations in our fieldwork. We will take you to the places
where we find the children. Pictures from our fieldwork will be helpers in
the presentation.
View Presentation.
Greenland
has a long tradition of child adoption, child gift and collective child
care. In small societies, a strategy for survival is a strong, stable
community, where collective child care can be an integrated part of the
social system. Nowadays, child gift and adoption without accept from legal
authorities is no longer permitted. However, a large number of children are
moving ‘in and out’ of different placements – with no evidence that these
movements are the effect of the legislation. Some sources argue that child
neglect is the reverse side of Greenland, and that social problems make it
difficult for parents to ensure a safe childhood for their children. The
exact figures of children raised by other people, than their birth parents,
are unknown. In the period 1988-2005, 389 children ≤ 10 years old have been
legally adopted. Compared with adoptees in Denmark, this amount is 70 times
higher.
International research indicates, that children relinquished for
international adoption have a poorer health status than children raised by
their birth parents, and that children adopted in-country have a better life
than children placed at institutions. At the IASSA-conference, August 2008,
we will present the first register results: the psychiatric data related to
adoptees and non-adoptees. The data material is collected from Center for
Psychiatric Research with data from Nuuk and Denmark. Other variables are
family status (living with parents or not), settlement (Nuuk, town or
village), age and gender.
View Presentation.
Thorleifsen, Daniel
Abstract
External
influences lead to major processes of change in the Arctic effecting
indigenous societies, their material culture included. Recently, global
warming influences life in the Arctic in general but may also have impact on
the availability of materials, the objects people make and use and might
lead to unexpected changes. In this session we would like to investigate
external influences that caused (historical) changes in material (and the
interrelated immaterial) culture, such as colonization and baptism. The
session focuses also on recent processes of change on objects that people
make, such as the tourist branch (tourist art and kayak tourism etc), the
art market, nation building and globalization, climate change and global
warming.
Since before the time of first
contact, items of Euro-American material culture were making their way into
the inventory of materiel on the North Slope. The pace accelerated after
contact. Despite the very wide adoption of Western items, the immediate
(and even the long-term) impact on the Inupiaq culture was not as profound
as some might expect. This paper describes several cases where such items
have been recovered archaeologically, including a house which was built from
materiel recovered from shipwrecks, which was the subject of extensive
testing by the Maritime Archaeological Project at Pingusuruk (Pt. Franklin),
Alaska. The Nuvuk Archaeological Project at Point Barrow, Alaska, has
excavated portions of a well-preserved activity area from the period of
initial Iñupiat adoption of Yankee whaling technology. Shipwreck materiel
is still collected to make weapons today on Alaska’s North Slope. It is
suggested that initially Euro-American goods were absorbed into the
technologically-oriented Inupiaq culture primarily as improved raw material
(better lumber, metal) with items replacing as replacements for their
indigenous functional equivalents once they became readily available when
they were superior and/or more cost effective.
Material culture has many stories to tell. Artefacts are
related to various discourses. A long tradition of collection testifies to a
fascination with objects and the questions they pose. Researchers and
indigenous peoples increasingly engage in dialogues on objects preserved in
museums and the related knowledge they share. These dialogues challenge the
common museum practice to deal with things as ‘objects’. Objects convey
messages that have to be heard or read. Mary Meade, a Yup’ik from Alaska,
wrote in a discussion of the parka: “The parka is a
book. In our non-writing society the designs and symbols on the parka are
our way of writing pertinent and important information. They are our way of
connecting not only with each other but with our environment and our world.
The parka is like a declaration and expression of our will and desire to
continue our culture.” (1990:230)
Recently, the term ‘agency’ became central in the study of art and material
culture. According to Graburn (2005) not only a person can be an agent, but
also art and clothing can ‘possess’ agency as well. (See also Gell 1998;
Layton 2005; Lee 2005.) Objects in museums witness to these abilities and
native researchers and Inuit visitors are often aware of the ‘power’ they
enact. Clothing and material culture could ‘do’ something, it could ‘act’ in
a chain of events. What kind of relatedness is connected to the material
culture of East Greenland?
In the 19th century religious or spiritual aspects prevailed.
Relational, social and adaptive aspects were involved as well. The elaborate
ornamentation on dress and hunting gear was also related to the competition
among hunters and their families (Pierre Robbe 2005). Tunumiit mentioned the
aspect of ‘showing off’. The material culture of the Tunumiit changed
rapidly from the turn of the century to the end of World War II. In this
period West Greenlandic style was adopted and garments were now made out of
fabrics. New objects, such as masks, were related to the demand of the
Danish colonizers, priest and laborers working at the trading post. After
the Second World War indigenous East Greenlandic objects and clothing were
replaced by West Greenlandic and European material culture and techniques.
In the period in which Greenland gained self-government a new Greenlandic
identity was created. The national costume developed and ivory and bone
sculpture tupilat became emblems for Greenlandic identity. A silver
necklace called ‘Thule man’ can be bought at a shop in East Greenland. A
Tunumiit informant explained: “It is now for all Greenlanders, it stands for
Greenlandic identity”. Is this necklace with Thule emblem worn by a Tunumeeq
an ‘agent’ in revealing reactions? Is it related to various discourses? The
relationships between Danes, West Greenlanders and East Greenlanders played
a major role in the development of society and material culture. Garments
and objects are used as emblems of identity and are visual representations
of one's social group or one’s social position. Graburn (2005b) emphasized
the similarities between clothing and art. “(…) art [and clothing] is always
created to be used as part of a network of social relations to do
something, i.e., it has agency.” (2005a:48.) In many cases
the names of the Greenlandic makers and the users of material culture now in
museums were documented. Persons by name and kinship-relations can be found
in the collection of objects and photographs. In a sense these collections
can be defined as ‘related objects’. It is this relatedness that the
Greenlanders are now most interested in. This personal information seems to
be of great interest for the local community. The museums in Greenland and
the Netherlands have also a ‘relationship’ through these ‘shared’
collections. Therefore a joint project and cooperation with local
counterparts in Greenland and in the Netherlands is going to be organized
starting this year. It will be an IPY-project and a pilot for future
cooperation between both parties. What influence do recent developments like
globalization, increasing tourism and climate change have on material
culture of East Greenland? What do these collections mean to the people were
they came from? Are they still of interest for a modern Greenlandic
community with e-mail and Internet?
View Presentation.
Russian
North (over 60% of the Russian territory) has actually been a storehouse of
cheap resources for ages. The spontaneous development of natural resources
leads to contradictions in the ecology of nature but likewise in the
ecology of culture. Therefore, the Russian North is now a territory
of cultural collisions:
-
the native culture is under the threat of absorption by
‘omnivorous’ strangers; and
-
the culture of newcomers struggles for existence against the
aggression of the nature.
With regard
to Western Siberia, a new orientation to sustainable development (including
the establishment of a transport network here) should involve ‘reprofiling’
from ‘the world’s storehouse’ into a special tourism area and
revitalization.
The aim of
this paper is to explore the touristic potential of the region and to
suggest a new way of developing touristic products by linking tangible
things and intangible feelings by means of design. This is demonstrated with
a case study: Design Model of Transport System for Northern Tourism.
The main
conclusion of this study is that the notion of Northern touristic
transport requires a new approach to transport network design and
transport vehicle design.
View Presentation.
Buckets were
important household items for people of northwestern Alaska. They often show
multiple signs of repair and were probably transmitted down the generations.
The earliest known bentwood bucket in Alaska was found in an 800 years old
archaeological site of the Yukon delta. While this example and other finds
from early Thule contexts show that bentwood techniques were known, most
buckets throughout the Thule period were made by inserting a wooden base
into a baleen rim. In the Point Barrow area, there is a documented shift, in
the 19th century, from these baleen-sided buckets to bentwood
sided buckets. John Murdoch (1892) attributes this shift to the high
commercial value of baleen at the end of the 19th century.
Buckets changed from being locally made to being imported. Inupiaq people
preferred selling their baleen rather than using it and shifted to acquiring
their buckets through trade with the interior Nunamiut people who made
bentwood sided buckets from live trees. Technologically speaking, making a
bentwood rim requires using a piece of wood which has good resistance to
both tensile and compression stresses. Wood with such qualities is rare in
the driftwood of northern Alaska and the islands of Bering Strait. This
paper presents these buckets in terms of technology and availability of the
appropriate raw material and identifies other areas where such shift may
have occurred. It discusses the relative value of the different raw
materials and explores the larger implications of this technological and
relational change on 19th century Inupiaq culture.
Early German Participation in
Exploring the Arctic – The nearly forgotten First German North Polar
Expedition in 1868
In early
1868 the First German North Polar Expedition set sail bound for
East-Greenland. Because of severe lack of funding this very first German
participation in marine Arctic exploration was done only with a comparable
small sized sailing vessel of 60ft, the 1867 built GROENLAND, and with a
crew more or less completely lacking experience in the Arctic.
Initiated by
the German geographer August Petermann, the expedition should prove his
hypothesis of an open circumpolar sea surrounded only by an ice-belt, and
finally try to reach the North Pole itself. Although none of the primary
goals could be reached, the expedition was a success, not only because
GROENLAND reached the northernmost position ever recorded for a sailing
vessel without an auxiliary engine, but furthermore because knowledge about
sailing in the Arctic could be gathered that is still relevant for today’s
Arctic (and Antarctic research).
The proposed
paper will demonstrate why German researchers became interested in the
Arctic and how there interests were related to German unification and
colonial interests in Germany. Furthermore it will explain how the crew of a
small sized research vessel adapted themselves to Arctic conditions more or
less completely without knowledge about this area. It will follow the
expedition itself and based on reports by the master of the GROENLAND and
drawings of her first mate explain the living conditions onboard the
GROENLAND.
Finally the
political claim for the Arctic made by Petermann will be discussed in the
context of the colonial history of the North Atlantic with a special focus
on other claims for the same Arctic regions and Petermann’s approach to
local communities or indigenous populations.
View Presentation.
During
the thousand years of their presence in the Arctic, the Inuit developed
specific implements and unique hunting techniques adapted to the different
kinds of game they pursued on land and in the sea. Then, little by little
they adopted the firearms brought up North by explorers, whalers and
traders. The impact of firearms on Inuit societies has been far-reaching and
complex. New hunting skills, knowledge and terminology have appeared while
others have been abandoned and some seem definitively lost; the ritual
relationship with animals has also changed.
Guns seem
to be fully appropriated by present-day Inuit and completely integrated into
their culture. They are much more sophisticated than those of the past, but
do the Inuit consider themselves better hunters in terms of hunting
successes? Today's guns are very efficient but what is their global
effectiveness from the Inuit perspective? The Inuit have a lot to say about
this phenomenon, showing that they are fully conscious of its complexity.
View Presentation.
Modern
Greenlandic painters are trying to establish themselves as artists, but at
the same time they often are understood as primarily Greenlandic. There
seems to be a tendency that art from non-western or 4th world
countries are seen primarily as culture representing objects rather than as
work of art. The artists produce works which often both are very
international in their expressions and very locally bound in their content.
At the same time the Greenlandic institution of art is well developed and
shows most of the characteristics of art institutions of western countries.
In this
respect the works of art both reflect the local processes in Greenland and
the processes normally understood as globalization. But they also fit in
with colonial and postcolonial theories, where the generation born or raised
around or after independence is looking for inspiration equally from the
cultural expressions of the local past, the mixed culture of the colonial
period, and the former (?) dominating western world.
The paper
deals with topics dealt with in my recently finished PhD.-project, funded by
The Commission for Scientific Research in Greenland (KVUG).
View Presentation.
Berger,
Paul, Lakehead University
Session abstract
not yet submitted. It will be added to the website version when accepted.
In this
session ‘The Impact of Climate change on Society and Education in Arctic
Communities’ the talk will show how a changing climate influences society
and education. For centuries traditional subsistence living in the Arctic
has been dependent on the passing down of knowledge of weather and
environment. In recent years, however, climate change has affected the
knowledge base needed to survive in an Arctic subsistence community.
The qualitative research presented reveals how changes to
sea ice, glaciers, temperature, precipitation, have affected peoples’ lives
differently in the two regions, and the subsequent implications for
traditional education; participants believe that due to climate change
formal education may have a new role to play.
The research was conducted in Qaanaaq, in the north of
Greenland, and in Tiniteqilaaq, a settlement on the east coast of
Greenland; it rested primarily on observation and
interviews with local hunters and teachers. Participants’ observations and
experiences were put into a global perspective through scientific research
presented primarily in the ACIA report and assessment reports from IPCC,
which leads to recommendations for education in Greenland facing a future
affected by climate change.
View Presentation.
This paper
reports on an ethnographic case study of Inuit visions for schooling in one
Nunavut community. Community members want more Inuit culture in schools,
more and better teaching of Inuktitut, the inclusion of Inuit Elders, and
the raising of academic standards. These results resonate with other recent
findings across Nunavut. Why, 50 years after its inception, is schooling in
Nunavut still a very EuroCanadian institution, despite Inuit wishes and
Government of Nunavut rhetoric? I argue that Eurocentrism at multiple levels
impedes change. From prejudice in the attitudes of White teachers to
impotent local Department of Education sponsored consultations and
inadequate funding from the Government of Canada, many barriers slow or stop
progress. As strong as these forces of colonialism remain, the results of
this study show that Inuit in Nunavut are still unwilling to acquiesce and
become White. Participants said that maintaining Inuit culture and language
could coexist with rigorous preparation for western academic success.
Hirschberg, Diane,
University of Alaska, Anchorage, hirshberg@uaa.alaska.edu
Abstract
The paper proposals for ICASS
VI are submitted as a group, and together comprise a session on “Issues in
Alaska Native Education Past and Present.”
From the
early 1900s to the 1970s Alaska Natives were taken from rural communities
that lacked secondary schools and sent to boarding schools run by the U.S.
Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), by private churches or, later, by Alaska’s
state government. Some were lived in boarding homes and attended school in
urban communities. In 2004 and 2005 ISER researchers interviewed 60 Alaska
Native adults who attended boarding schools or participated in the boarding
home program from the late 1940s through the early 1980s.We asked two
questions: What were the experiences of Alaska Natives in these boarding
schools and boarding homes, and what were the long-term effects of these
experiences on individuals and their communities?
In this
presentation, I will share the findings of our study. Many of those we
interviewed spoke with ambivalence about their boarding school experience,
finding both good and bad elements. Some of the good experiences included
attending schools with high expectations, learning about the world beyond
village boundaries and developing lasting friendships with people from all
over Alaska. But for others, the boarding school education had a huge cost.
For some, the experience included abuse, both physical and sexual. For
others, the cost was a disconnect from family and community, and the loss of
language, culture and identity. In Alaska, there is now a debate about the
cost and quality of rural schools, and whether Native children might be
better off in boarding schools. Our findings caution policymakers to
consider carefully the consequences of such decisions.
View Presentation.
Alaska
Native college attendance and attainment has increased over the last three
decades However, it lags behind the increase in college attendance and
attainment by non-native Alaskans. The percentage of Alaska Natives 19 and
older with a four year degree increased from 1% in 1970 to 6% in 2000.
Still, too few Alaska Natives have the degrees needed for the professional
positions that are central to the well-being of all Alaskans; they remain
underrepresented in professions ranging from teaching to healthcare to
business.
Alaska
Natives are the fastest growing ethnic group on the University of Alaska
Anchorage (UAA) campuses. However, the “Alaska Native cohort is at most risk
of all ethnic groups. Although nearly 4 in 10 students continue for their
second year, only 6 percent receive a degree, either associate or
baccalaureate, in five years.” (Rice, 2001). While the numbers are
improving, in 2007 only 4.8% of students earning bachelors degrees were
Alaska Native.
In this
study, we set out to understand what factors contributed to the successful
completion of a four year degree at UAA by Alaska Natives in the first
generation of their family to attend college. We interviewed twenty three
Alaska Natives who received their baccalaureate degree between 1975 and
2005. These alumni told us about the key people, events, activities and
relationships from kindergarten through college that helped them to and
through their degree. They described the resources and strategies they used
to achieve their degree and why a college degree was important to them.
View Presentation.
Mt.
Edgecumbe High School is a State-operated boarding school located in Sitka,
Alaska. Originally established by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) in
1947, Mt. Edgecumbe was the only public secondary school within Alaska
available to rural children from 1947 to 1965. The BIA closed Mt. Edgecumbe
in 1983 after educating more than 9,000 Alaska Natives. The school was
reopened by the State of Alaska in 1985, in response to lobbying from Alaska
Native alumni and leaders. Today, Mt. Edgecumbe looks drastically different
than it did thirty years ago. The student body is smaller and more diverse,
though still predominately Alaska Native, with over 400 students from more
than 100 Alaskan communities. Most importantly, Mt. Edgecumbe is now a
school of choice. It offers many students a broader curriculum, more
specialized teachers, extracurricular activities, and preparation for
postsecondary education than might be available in their home communities.
This study
focuses on those who have attended Mt. Edgecumbe High School since its
reopening, and attempts to capture their experiences while at Mt. Edgecumbe,
and the impacts it has had in their lives. Through surveys and interviews
with alumni and interviews with key informants such as former and current
teachers and administrators, we address the following questions:
- Why
did graduates choose to attend Mt. Edgecumbe High School?
- What
were the educational, social, and cultural experiences of students who
attended Mt. Edgecumbe?
- What
role has Mt. Edgecumbe played in the lives of graduates since they
completed high school?
View Presentation.
Abstract
This
session will focus on Indigenous Peoples and Research, examining research
projects and programs developed for and by Indigenous Peoples. There have
been numerous studies and millions of dollars spent on research in the
Arctic yet their remains a gap between the research conducted and the Arctic
Peoples. To overcome this gap many Arctic Indigenous Nations are developing
their own research programs, empowering themselves to be in control of the
research for and about them thus moving away from the concept of “being
studied” into the mode of full participation as active participants in the
research. The session includes topics of collaborative and participatory
research and examines good working models and “best practices” methods.
Some
presenters will be speaking about social issues of Arctic Peoples and how
the culture and lifestyle of Indigenous Peoples plays an important role in
their long-term identity and sustainability as a people. The identity of
young people and prominence of elders is part of this discussion as well.
The paper
addresses some of the problems inherent in speaking for others. This has a
direct bearing on my own work, being Danish and writing about Greenland.
Wrestling with the problems of speaking for others and the always
accompanying (but not always acknowledged) issues of colonialism and mastery
has led me through various constructions of speaking positions within
different disciplines as well as various theorizations of the problems.
Especially the work of renowned anthropologist Deborah Bird Rose, who works
among the Australian aboriginal people, has forced me to address my own
position as one of power and ask the question posed by Laurel Richardson’s
Fields of play. Constructing an academic life: ‘How does our writing,
including this writing, reproduce a system of domination and how does it
challenge that system? For whom do we speak and to whom do we speak, with
what voice, to what end, using what criteria?’ This has led me to the
conclusion that working within any corner of the field of indigenous
studies, reflecting on one’s speaking position is an ethical urgency as well
as a general scholarly responsibility.
Important
and exciting new relationships are linking museums, anthropology and
Indigenous communities. Contemporary practice prioritizes Indigenous
knowledge and self-representation. The shared goal is to build new
connections between present day source communities and museum collections
that represent Indigenous history, heritage and cultural identity. An
example this new relationship-building is the Sharing Knowledge project,
which represents a coalition of the Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center,
regional Alaska Native cultural organizations, the Anchorage Museum and two
Smithsonian museums in Washington D.C. — the National Museum of Natural
History and National Museum of the American Indian. The purpose of the
project is to increase Alaskan access, knowledge and use of the Smithsonian
collections. At the core of the process is collaboration with Alaska Native
Elders, tribal representatives, scholars and artists. The results of this
cultural heritage project include a new Smithsonian website and gallery
opening in 2010 at the Anchorage Museum in Alaska. In scope, the Sharing
Knowledge project encompasses traditional Native knowledge, oral history,
language studies, anthropology, cultural education and museum exhibition
through undertaking research and documentation of cultural heritage objects.
In the
Arctic, both western science and Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK)
inform understanding of changes in ecosystems and inform the policies for
managing the natural resources important for subsistence. Understanding from
TEK is deeply embedded in indigenous politics and rights issues while in
turn, western science is conducted within its own institutions. This often
makes the "synthesis" of these approaches difficult. Native and non-Native
stakeholders often have conflicting interests around natural resource use
because Arctic peoples engage in subsistence, cash, and mixed economies,
each with special demands on the management or protection of natural
resources. We argue that the critical policy information on environmental
change in the Arctic will come from interdisciplinary studies of climate
change which take into account the contributions of both TEK and western
science. We present a framework for considering the opportunities and
challenges of training advanced students in the science and human dimensions
of polar environmental change from multiple perspectives (e.g., western
science, economic models, and traditional ecological knowledge). A key
component to this training is that students learn to make distinctions
between research formulated for the benefit of specific communities and that
research done for a general scientific purpose. New and innovative
partnerships between Northern institutions, indigenous people and
researchers, and research universities and students of "the south" will be
required to create the synthesis envisioned that build upon the needs and
strengths of all stakeholders.
View Presentation.
The
purpose of this paper is to describe certain facets
of the social life and family relationships of Siberian pastoralist, Sakha,
particular, by focusing on the relationship between the father and the
child. Through the Sakha perspective of the concept of the “father” both in
traditional and contemporary settings, I will discuss the contemporary
aspects of their society from the perspective of the experience of being a
male during the periods of Sovietization-post-Sovietization. Previous
studies on gender issues in Soviet-post-Soviet society have pointed out that
under the socialist regime, the realization of a masculine identity was
possible only as a worker, and not as a father. In this paper, it is
strongly suggested that the realization of a masculine identity as a father
was possible, and that it has been transmitted through the generations, even
during the socialist era. The characteristics of manhood as a father are
explored and the reasons for this possibility are given by examining their
cultural histories and various field voices. Hunting as a minor subsistence
and the related physical capabilities and perception of the socio-ecological
environment has been crucial for the preservation of manhood among the
Sakha. In order to appreciate this, it is important to understand that
historically, their socio-ecological environment consisted of the “northern”
and the “southern” Siberian cultural backgrounds.
View Presentation.
The United
Chiefs and Councils of Manitoulin’s Aboriginal Diabetes Care and Prevention
Project is a collaborative research program involving a partnership between
three Aboriginal health organizations, six First Nations, four medical
centres and academic researchers. Within less than three years this project
has evolved significantly from its modest beginnings of an Indigenous
community research consultation project. Following up on the community
recommendations, the research project is now focusing on (a) bridging
Indigenous and medical epistemologies and ethics; (b) the impact of
spiritual, emotional and social wellness on the development of diabetes and
secondary complications in Aboriginal people; (c) difference in disease
progression and health care provided to Indigenous and non-Indigenous people
in rural northern Ontario, Canada; and d) monitoring regional health status.
In this
presentation, I will describe the realities of employing a participatory
action research process with Indigenous stakeholders, health care providers
and university based researchers. The focus will be on ethical challenges
related to research with Indigenous peoples, strategies for successful
collaboration with multiple and diverse stakeholders, and benefits and
challenges related to the participatory approach.
View Presentation.
Over the
last decade, Arctic residents and indigenous peoples have been increasingly
involved in, and taking control of, research. Arctic
communities have made significant contributions to
understanding recent environmental change, and
community-based research, including traditional knowledge research and
community-based monitoring, are an important part of IPY activities and the
Arctic Observing Network (AON).
One of
the greatest challenges of local and traditional knowledge (LTK) research
and community-based monitoring to date has been effective and appropriate
means of recording, storing, and managing data and information. It has been
a challenge to find effective means of making community-based data and
information available to Arctic residents and researchers, as well as other
interested groups such as teachers, students, and policy makers. Without a
network and data management to support LTK and community-based research, a
number of problems have arisen such as: misplacement or loss of extremely
precious data (e.g. information from Elders who have passed away); lack of
awareness of previous studies and repetition of research in the same
communities resulting in research fatigue and waste of resources; a
reluctance or inability to initiate or maintain community-based research or
monitoring without a data management system available. There is an urgent
need for useful and useable means of recording, preserving, and sharing data
and information being collected in Arctic communities. ELOKA seeks to fill
this gap.
Ruotsala, Helena,
University of Turku, Cultural Heritage
Studies
Abstract
Ethnographic fieldwork is a very common research method to create material
in many fields even though the researchers have not studied how to do
ethnographic fieldwork. In this workshop we discuss questions concerning
fieldwork in the northern regions. In Canada and Alaska there are clear
regulations how to start and conduct fieldwork in northern communities, but
in Scandinavia and Russia there are no such regulations and conventions.
However, researchers conducting fieldwork face the same problems in both
situations. Fields have often multiple voices, which cause special questions
in conducting fieldwork. Each researcher has to reach different voices
during the fieldwork, and later again, when listening tapes/audio files or
studying archives. How do we succeed to hear the multivocality of the
field(s) and how do the different voices effect on our interpretations. From
the epistemological point of view researcher’s duty is to describe the goal
of the research from many angles, but the ethical frames of the study decide
the interpretations and suitable ways to use the material. This space
between the researcher and those been studied is called as ‘ethical space’.
In
addition to the multivocality of the field we’d like raise questions
concerning entering the field. Some of the field researches use so called
cultural mediators to get acquaintance to the field. What is the role of
them and how do their opinions effect on the researchers' fieldwork and
later on the results? Recently there have been co-researchers; local people
have participated as co-researchers in the fieldwork. How does it e.g.
prevent the gap between researchers and those been studied?
The third
topic is the competence of the field researchers: especially is the
knowledge of language and culture. How sensitive a person is to small
cultural features even though one knows language? In northern cultures
silence is one way of communication between people.
We invite
researchers – both anthropologists and natural scientists as well as native
and non-native researchers to share their experiences and expertise and
discuss methodological and epistemological questions concerning fieldwork
among northern people.
For us
ethnologists and anthropologists ethnographic fieldwork is a very common
research method to create material. It is an important and essential part of
our expertise. We are also sharing our knowledge of fieldwork when we are
teaching our students to conduct fieldwork in different fields and in
different conditions. Some of us are doing field work at home, others “out
there”. However, researchers conducting fieldwork face the same problems in
both situations. Fields have often multiple voices, which cause special
questions in conducting fieldwork. Each researcher has to reach different
voices during the fieldwork, and later again, when listening tapes/audio
files or studying archives. How do we succeed to hear the multivocality of
the field(s) and how do the different voices effect our interpretations.
From the epistemological point of view researcher’s duty is to describe the
target of the research from many angles, but the ethical frames of the study
decide the interpretations and suitable ways to use the material. This space
between the researcher and those been studied is called as ethical space (by
Barblo Klein 2005).
My aim is to
study the questions and problems in hearing the multiple voices of the
field. I will compare my experiences from two the field cases, one from my
own home field and the other from the Kola Peninsula in Russia. Both
examples are from reindeer herding communities. View
Presentation.
Linguistic fieldwork in endangered languages’ communities
and especially within the frames of cultural linguistics (Palmer 1996) and
interactional sociolingustics (Gumperz 1982) inevitably involves competing
values and conflicting beliefs. A researcher can not stay away from the
narratives she invokes, as she is their primary recipient.
My presentation deals with the process and outcomes of the
fieldwork from the perspective of a linguist with a significant experience
of doing fieldwork in various parts of the world and with representatives of
different cultures. Thus, it necessarily has a comparative and even a
typological component. The experience of working in inner Alaskan village of
Nikolai inhabited by orthodox Athabaskans shed a new light on the problems
of interactions between traditional and global cultures, on specifics of
‘Athabaskan culture’ as opposed to or derived from the ‘arctic culture’, and
‘nomadic culture’. In these cultures people get to know each other not by
talking. Silence has a different meaning. Getting a narrative in such a
culture requires that many conditions be fulfilled.
The methods
employed in the fieldwork include situational analysis of communication
failures in intercultural storytelling setting (failures and repairs, types
of misunderstanding, turn-taking and pausing), and discourse analysis of
conversational stories following (Polanyi 1989).
The latter approach attends to discourse evaluative devices such as
repetition, special lexical items, pauses, pitch, pace, etc which help to
reveal the underlying cultural schemas and potential sources for
cross-cultural misunderstanding.
View Presentation.
Adolf Erik
Nordenskiold (1832-1901), explorer and scientist, made ten expeditions to
the Northern regions in 1858-1883. During his
explorations he conducted scientific fieldwork concerning the natural
sciences like mineralogy, geology, zoology, botany etc. But, naturally, he
met the indigenous people of the explored regions, and he even made
observations and reports on them.
Nordenskiold
is most famous for founding the Northeast Passage
in 1878-79. During this voyage the steam/sailing ship “Vega” was bounded by
ice at the Chukchi Peninsula very near the Bering Strait for almost a year.
At that time, Nordenskiold and his scientific staff had very close contact
with the Chukchi people. In my paper I will discuss; how he, as a “white man
of the 19th century” met indigenous people, how he made
observations, whether he had any problems during the fieldwork, and how he
reported his observations. I will also discuss what kind of voices I, as an
environmental historian, hear from the fieldwork conducted by Nordenskiold,
and how I use this information in my environmental history research. My
sources are the texts of Nordenskiold in his book about the Vega-expedition
and his notes and diaries which are filed in the
Center for History of Science at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in
Stockholm, Sweden. Nordenskiold is one among the
very first scientists who conducted fieldwork in the Northern regions so it
is very interesting to learn how everything began.
View Presentation.
Research on
climate change impacts, vulnerability and adaptation, particularly those
aiming to contribute to practical adaptation initiatives, requires active
involvement and collaboration with community members. Arctic communities are
already experiencing and adapting to environmental and socio-cultural
changes, and researchers have practical and ethical obligations to engage
communities who are the focus of the research. Furthermore, communities
across the Canadian Arctic now require researchers to engage communities in
collaborative research. This paper draws upon the experiences of researchers
working with communities across the Canadian Arctic together with the
expertise of Inuit organizations, northern research institutes, and
community partners to outline key considerations for effectively engaging
arctic communities in collaborative research. These considerations include:
initiating early and ongoing communication with community, regional and
national contacts; working with communities to develop a research proposal;
facilitating opportunities for local involvement; and dissemination of
research findings. Examples of each consideration are drawn from
environmental change research conducted with communities in the Canadian
Arctic. View
Presentation.
Wiita, Amy
Mason,
Arthur XE "Mason, Arthur"
, University of Calgary
Paper abstract not yet submitted.
It will be added to the website version when accepted.
View Northern Research Forum
Presentation.
View Association of Polar
Early Career Scientists Presentation.
Gambling in
Greenland in a Public Health Perspective.
Background and objective: During the last 50 years
Greenland has developed from a traditional society to an industrialized and
modern society. The rapid sociocultural changes are
considered to have brought on social problems such as alcohol and drug abuse
and there is reason to believe that gambling is increasingly becoming a
problem as well. Local communities have reported an increase in social
problems related to different types of gambling like bingo and playing
cards. More generally, the association between gambling patterns and social
and health problems is being discussed in public and at a political level.
The aim
of this study is to analyse the prevalence of gambling and gambling
dependency among Inuit in Greenland and its association with socioeconomic
position. The analysis is part of a PhD-Study of the
association between gambling, social inequality and public health among
Inuit in Greenland.
Method
and material: The prevalence of four types of gambling and the amount of
time and money spent is analyzed and stratified by sex, age, residence,
education, occupation, income, household income, family size and marital
status in order to find out how gambling patterns are distributed among
different socioeconomic groups. The data is derived
from questionnaires included in the Greenlandic part of the Inuit Health in
Transition Study.
Results/Discussion: Preliminary results from the study will be presented.
The results will be discussed in a public health
perspective stating that more research in the area of gambling among Inuit
should be conducted in order to determine the significant importance of
artic living conditions to gambling patterns. This is important in order to
be able to prevent gambling problems through public health programs and to
develop individual and group-based treatment programs.
Rapid
ecological, economic, and social changes continue to take place in the
Northwest Territories, Canada. Education is one of the major links in
understanding the changes that impact Aboriginal family life. As the
educational system in Inuvialuit communities is developing ways to be more
culturally respectful and pedagogic, the Inuvialuit students low high school
graduation rate continues worry families, communities, policy makers and
employers. The goal of my research was to investigate the meaning of
education for Inuvialuit youth, their parents and their grandparents in the
community of Tuktoyaktuk. The qualitative data sources included community
participation field notes from three months field work, transcripts from a
focus youth group, and interviews with diverse multigenerational families.
The finding of the study was that in 50 years the meaning of education has
changed considerably for the Inuvialuit. It started from attending school
for a few years to obey the church and the government wishes and has
proceeded to students wanting to graduate from high school. High school
graduation is seen as a means to getting a good job and out of the small
remote community. The reasons why this dream has cut short for most of the
students is discussed in the light of individual, family and community
factors.
Pearce, Tristan
, Smit, Barry E., Duerden, Frank, Goose, Annie, Inuktalik, Robby and Kataoyak, Fred
This paper
presents research that examined the sensitivity and adaptive capacity of
people and their livelihoods to climate change in Ulukhaktok, NWT, Canada.
The case study identifies climate conditions and hazards that community
members are currently dealing with, the adaptive strategies employed to deal
with these hazards, the effectiveness of these adaptive strategies and the
capacity of the community to deal with future climate change. As a result of
climate-driven changes and changing livelihoods, community members in
Ulukhaktok are sensitive to climate hazards associated with harvesting
activities including, travel routes on the sea-ice, land and ocean, and
changes in the health and distribution of wildlife species important for
subsistence. These changes have implications for food security, household
income, health and culture. Community members are currently demonstrating
significant adaptability to changing conditions by harvesting alternative
species of wildlife, being flexible in harvesting activities (e.g. timing,
travel routes), using technologies (e.g. GPS, VHF radio, weather forecasts)
to ensure safe travel, and supplementing country foods with store-bought
foods. However, the capacity to adapt differs amongst community members as
does the desirability of adaptation options. Institutional support (e.g.
financial aid and harvesting resources) and social networks (e.g. food
sharing, knowledge sharing, equipment sharing) are identified as key
components of adaptive capacity. These sources provide strategic
opportunities to integrate adaptation planning to climate change within
existing institutions and community networks.
Alaska
Native art and culture are arguably experiencing revitalization today.
Artist workshops in schools and culture camps, community research trips to
museum collections around the world, and local exhibitions of historical and
contemporary arts have added to this movement. Although much of the
contemporary art is made for use within the culture, a significant quantity
is made for the non-Native market. While discussing the current
revitalization movement, Nadia will examine how non-Native forces are
affecting it through the market and American laws such as the Alaska Native
Land Claims Settlement Act, and the ‘Silver Hand’ program.
How Come
Denmark is Still an Arctic Superpower?
The paper
will focus on the impact of Danish colonialism on the arctic islands
situated in the northern part of the Atlantic Ocean. Greenland, Iceland and
the Faeroe Islands are former colonies of Denmark. By today Iceland has
become an independent state, while Greenland and the Faeroe Islands are
still parts of Denmark. On the background of Iceland successfully regaining
its independence and becoming one of the leading countries in the world, and
the alleged discovery of huge oil reservoirs in the territorial waters of
Greenland and the Faeroe Islands, the questions of the areas’ full
independence has become a substantive topic. The question is especially
extensively discussed on the Faeroe Islands as the islands have lately
managed to create a strong economy. The paper tries to clarify the mutual
influences of Denmark and the Faeroe Islands which have caused the Faeroe
Islands to remain under the rule of Denmark. The influences are investigated
with the help of a 4 layer model of colonialism, where the symbolic,
economic, intellectual and political aspects are collated. Currently Denmark
seems to be above all “a good colonizer”, who, by continuing to support the
Faeroe Islands economically, gathers herself symbolic capital. Although
Denmark in no way hinders the Faeroe Islands to become independent, the
Faroese have so far decided not to declare independence. Are we observing a
classical conflict between dignity and economic interests? Or could the
relations between the colonizer and the colonized be characterised as “too
successful decolonization of the colonized”?
View Presentation.
Native
American prehistoric group interaction and population movements has been the
subject of much research in the field of human evolutionary genetics for the
past decade, but little of that focus has been on the Greenland Inuit. The
Inuit migrated to the New World two thousand years ago, moving from Siberia
through the Bering Straight to Alaska, Canada and finally Greenland. The
Inuit seemingly traveled this long distance at a remarkable speed and could
have met with other human populations in the Arctic, either the Paleo
Eskimo, human populations that lived in the North 5000 years ago, or the
members of the Norse colony in Greenland.
This paper
discusses the peopling of the Arctic and prehistoric Inuit group
interaction, based on findings from a research done on the Inuit
Y-chromosome. The samples had a good geographical distribution, which gives
more information on the Inuit prehistoric dispersal pattern. The second
focus of the paper is Arctic population interaction by presenting findings
from an admixture analysis of the proportion of genetic admixture in the
Greenland Inuit gene pool. In the paper three populations are explored as
sources of the admixture found in the Inuit Males; the Paleo Eskimo, the
inhabitants of the Norse colony in Greenland and Danish colonial presence in
Greenland.
Einarsson, Niels, Stefansson Arctic Institute Akureyri
Kristjansson, Kristjan, IASC and Reykjavik University
Abstract
The
interest in the Arctic region, its environment, inhabitants and cultural
heritage has increased significantly in recent years, not least due to the
role of the Arctic in the global climatic system. A range of research
projects have been initiated that highlight the importance of understanding
the complex interplay of Arctic social and ecological systems. The
trendsetting 2005 Second International Arctic Research Planning Conference
(ICARP II) specifically pointed to a paradigm shift within Arctic research
involving the productive communication between social and natural science.
On another level, technical developments have increasingly turned the
Internet into an interactive and highly dynamic tool for dissemination. The
upcoming ICASS VI conference in Nuuk provides an excellent venue to explore
questions of interdisciplinary communication, the role of the Internet in
the dissemination and use of research as well as the promotion of
self-determination and empowerment of the region's inhabitants through
evolving networks of learning and creative capacity building.
The paper
describes ongoing project work with a multilingual web resource on the
Arctic aiming at disseminating information on Arctic cultures and
environments, moving beyond the image of the Arctic as a frozen wasteland
and peopleless wilderness. The new web resource, built on the existing
webpage,
www.thearctic.is,
is designed to provide a venue for scientific collaboration, communication
and dissemination, seeking to enhance understanding of key human dimensions
of Arctic environments. The project has the following main objectives: To
become a major multilingual education, outreach and information web
resource; to be a venue for information dissemination on Arctic issues,
especially research results and thus contributing to awareness raising and
public education on Arctic issues, not least outside of the Arctic region;
to provide curriculum content for college level studies, with emphasis on
the integration of social dimensions with historical perspectives and
environmental/biophysical processes.
View Presentation.
In the decade since the publication of the International
Directory of Arctic Social Scientists by Ernest S. Burch, Jr. and supported
by NSF (Burch 1997), several developments in Arctic social science research
make a second version of the directory necessary, including the rise in
online, interactive media. Opening the Russian Arctic for field research and
the growth in the number of indigenous research organizations has created an
explosion in Arctic social science research also mandates a second edition
of the directory. The new directory contains information on previously
underrepresented groups involved in Arctic social science research,
especially indigenous organizations and students; both among the most active
researchers in the Arctic. The resulting data base allows an understanding
of who is conducting research in which parts of the Arctic, and provides
trends in the demography, national efforts, and ethnicity involved in
current social science in the North. This paper will provide an initial
analysis of modern Arctic social science and demonstrate how others can
participate in the directory and utilize its data to create
multidisciplinary, multinational research teams that involve Northern
research organizations. The International Directory of Arctic Social
Scientists is an IPY project funded by the U.S. NSF’s Arctic Social Science
Program, and sponsored by IASSA, the Arctic Centre at the University of
Lapland, the Saami Center at the University of Umea (Sweden), the Scott
Polar Research Center, the Greenland Home Rule Government, the Barents
Center for Humanities (Kola Science Center, Russia), and the Arctic
Institute of North America (Canada).
Kruse, Jack and Poppel, Birger
Arctic
indigenous peoples have been working toward self-determination for the past
forty years. They have changed the political landscape of the north. Today
social, economic, and cultural policy makers do not just live in Washington
DC, Ottawa, Moscow, Oslo and Copenhagen. They also live in Iqaluit, Barrow,
Kautokeino, Kuujjuaq, Nuuk, and Anadyr. This achievement in
self-determination creates a new challenge: the Arctic policy community is
more dispersed today than it was 40 years ago. The 2,183 miles separating
Barrow and Kautokeino understates this dispersion: the flight path from
Barrow to Kautokeino is 8,007 miles.
Dispersion
is not the only challenge to self-determination. The effects of global
warming in the Arctic are local (e.g. the impact of loss of sea ice on
marine mammal hunting in one region versus the impact of freezing rain on
reindeer forage in another region), but solutions require the concerted
action of Arctic peoples at a global scale. How can local knowledge experts
residing in a thousand small inform dispersed policy makers? How can
dispersed policy makers discover each other and form collective approaches
to global warming?.
This paper
discusses the idea of a collaboration of international team of researchers
and Arctic indigenous organizations. Our idea is to extend
cyberinfrastructure systems to support: (1) compilation and discovery of
place and regional-based observations relevant to indigenous policy issues;
(2) attachment of meaning to these data based on local knowledge and
quantitative analysis; and (3) building community awareness and
collaborative capacity among Arctic observers and analysts.
View Presentation.
Latola, Kirsi, Snellman, Outi and Kellerud, Lars
Established
in 2001 with a goal to develop sustainable knowledge through
capacity-building in the North, the University of the Arctic (UArctic) is a
network of institutions and organizations working together to provide
Northerners with relevant and accessible higher education. UArctic is
supported by and collaborates with many international bodies, such as the
Arctic Council, the Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic
Region, and is actively involved in the International Polar Year Higher
Education and Outreach activities.
UArctic
offers a variety of programs for fulfilling the goals. One of the UArctic
programs is Thematic Networks, which encourages the institutional
cooperation on subjects of shared interest among UArctic members. Their aim
is to stimulate cooperation, sharing of resources, and they are important
tools for developing the stable relations among member institutions that
form the backbone of UArctic activities. This includes student and faculty
exchanges, joint curriculum and degree development, as well as research. In
2007 there were eleven active Thematic Networks on a variety of themes,
which deal the Arctic key topics such as global and climate change (TN on
Global Change in the Arctic) to health and wellbeing (TN on Arctic Medicine)
and on Local and Regional development. Some TNs have focus in indigenous
issues such as TN in Indigenous Arts and Crafts and Verrde, in general all
thematic networks have included indigenous views to their operation.
The
presenters will discuss the role of the Thematic Networks in the overall
structure in UArctic as places for knowledge generation and
interdisciplinary communication, as well as UArctic’s thematic involvement
in the International Polar Year and other recent outreach initiatives in the
Circumpolar North, including the Arctic online Atlas.
View Presentation.
We
present a system for time-alignment of video and text that can serve as a
basis for annotating digital video materials. In particular, it allows an
anthropologist to transcribe and annotate their field materials. (See links
below for examples.) While time-aligned multimedia has become common in
field linguistics, where it is use d for interlinear glossing, it is much
less familiar in other social sciences. The tools that linguists use (most
notably ELAN) are designed for interlinear glossing and are not well suited
for the needs of other fields. They are also desktop programs that are
unsuited for collaborative authoring. In our talk, we show both the
authoring and the browsing components of the system, including the search
application that returns a collection of relevant video segments in a
collection of clips.
Muskwa-Kechika Artist
Camp Collection: Online Repository and Virtual
Gallery
Athabasca
University (AU), located in Northern Alberta, Canada, is partnering with
Writing on the Ridge (WOTR), an arts organization, to
promote wilderness preservation and to raise awareness about one of North
America’s few remaining intact wilderness areas – the Muskwa-Kechika
Management Area (M-KMA), located in the Northern Rocky Mountains of Canada.
Writing on
the Ridge (WOTR) has created a program - the Muskwa-Kechika Artist Camp that
provides opportunities for artists to experience the natural history of the
M-KMA. The Muskwa-Kechika Artist Camps bring aboriginal and non-aboriginal
artists working in a variety of disciplines (visual art, writing,
performance art, photography) into the wilderness area. The dialogue the
artists begin, and the artwork they produce, raises awareness of the M-KMA.
AU is
developing an online repository to host each year’s artwork. High resolution
images of the artwork, and sound recordings of the literature produced will
be available to an online audience. The website will also include features
on the artists who participate, and a blog to encourage dialogue on art and
wilderness. AU will also develop a virtual gallery and capture it on a DVD.
The first DVD will be produced in 2008 to celebrate and promote
International Polar Year. It will include artwork and literature from the
2006-2007 camps, and will bring the message of preservation and land
management to an international audience.
The
PolarTREC program, funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and
managed by the Arctic Research Consortium of the U.S., is an educational
research experience for K-12 teachers, in which they participate in polar
research by working closely with scientists as a pathway to improving
science education. (www.polartrec.com).
A key component of this program is ongoing interactive online communication
by the teachers, wherever they are, with students and teachers around the
nation.
In 2007, Mr.
Kasemodel traveled aboard the USCGC Healy in the Bering Sea during the month
of March conducting public educational outreach and assisting polar
researchers for the Bering Sea Ecosystem (BEST) and the Bering Sea
Integrated Ecosystem Research Program (BSIERP) science expedition. The
research is documenting how climate change is affecting the Northern Pacific
ecosystem.
Mr.
Kasemodel broadcasted live on the Internet for a “Live from IPY” during the
cruise and maintained daily Internet journals, forums, and websites for
public outreach. In addition, Mr. Kasemodel produced several digital
products, curriculum materials, collaborated and conducted educational
outreach with villages on the Pribilof Islands and St. Lawrence Island, and
promoted polar science and research upon his return.
This paper
uses the Healy science expedition to demonstrate how PolarTREC creates
interdisciplinary educational and public outreach efforts across age groups,
bridging cultures to increase awareness of climate change, polar science,
communicating the effects on rural Alaska in urban Alaska, and sharing the
experience with scientists, educators, communities, and hundreds of students
of all ages across the globe via the internet.
View Presentation.
Alaska
EPSCoR (Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research), a program
funded by the National Science Foundation and the state of Alaska, embarked
on its third three-year phase on July 1, 2007. The current project,
“Resilience and Vulnerability in a Rapidly Changing North: The Integration
of Physical, Biological and Social Processes,” brings together researchers
from a variety of disciplines to examine social-ecological systems in the
North from an integrative perspective. This approach to science, bringing
different views to the table to reach a deeper understanding of issues, is a
growing trend both nationally and internationally. The question, though, is
how to do it? How does a program get a diverse group of researchers talking
and working together? This paper examines Alaska EPSCoR efforts as it
searches for ways to reach meaningful integration.
View Presentation.
Abstract to be added upon receipt.
View Presentation.
Bravo, Michael, Cambridge University
Sörlin, Sverker
Abstract
International field stations have become inseparable from polar research,
often serving as geopolitical symbols of political, diplomatic and economic
ambitions of the nations to which their founders belonged. Beneath the
veneer of international cooperation, there have often been scenes of
dramatic tension between national scientific traditions, with teams known to
compete over shared facilities and resources, or working covertly with their
own instruments and methods. And yet successive international polar years
have promoted the idea that international cooperation and transparency is a
precondition if the results of scientific research are to have global
validity beyond national borders. Our project recognizes that this is no
less a problem in historical and political cross-cultural understanding than
it is of calibrating experiments across time and space. The projects for
this International Polar Year for the first time acknowledge the importance
to science of the full range of stakeholders living and working in the polar
regions: local experts, settlers, technicians, as well as scientists. The
hidden labour on which the sciences depend is in fact a general feature of
both the field and laboratory sciences. Our group aims to uncover these
hidden histories across all of the international polar years, particularly
the agendas, practices, and politics of the indigenous and settler land use
and tenure around scientific field stations. By revealing the extent to
which scientific research has depended on the knowledge and support of a
wide range of groups, there is a much greater chance that research will
continue to be respected and make a positive contribution to northern
societies. Those high standards will be the measure by which international
scientific events will be judged. View
Presentation.
Over the
course of the last several decades it has become widely recognized that
global politics is in a period of transformation. The role and authority of
the inter-state system as a primary facilitator of knowledge is undergoing
considerable change. The extent and exact nature of this shift, however, are
subject to vast debate. Historically, the examination of political
institutions – namely, states - has been a common means by which to assess
and address the direction of these changes. Whether we are in fact
witnessing a decline or a renaissance of the nation-state, as some authors
argue, or new authorities will replace or enhance traditional forms of state
sovereignty, what is the case is that new and non-state economic, political
and social institutions from environmental NGOs to the European Union (EU)
have become a central focus for international relations scholars.
Polar field
stations, however, are one particular type of institution which has received
limited if any examination as a possible harbinger for global
transformation, particularly as regards the changing nature of the politics
of scientific inquiry over time. The first International Polar Year was
inaugurated with the intention of expanding our global understanding of some
of the most intricate scientific puzzles of its time (including issues of
meteorology and geophysics - answers which were believed to lie near the
Earth’s poles). Alongside the scientific aims attached to the usage and
construction of new Arctic laboratories during the first IPY, the global
political architecture at that point in history cannot be abstracted from
the ongoing construction of national narratives and efforts for territorial
expansion in which they were first designed.
Since the
initial International Polar Year, the global political context has vastly
transformed. In particular, the meaning and significance of state
territorial boundaries in relationship to the question and exercise of
sovereignty has changed. This paper will explore these changes as they have
helped lead to a larger shift in the legal meanings and practices of
science. Such changes include shifting the conceptual frontiers of
scientific thought from an ahistorical enterprise into that which is
historically dependent and socially constructed.
The history
of research, and research stations, in the Arctic has traditionally been
presented as written narratives. However, since time and space are linked,
visual and spatial views of the locations and interrelationships of research
locales are exceedingly valuable, leading to new insights and questions.
Livingstone (2003) and others have stressed that ‘where?’ matters for
understanding scientific research. For instance, spatial patterns in the
placement of camps can reflect challenges of logistics and resupply,
extensions of previous research, political motivations tacked onto
supposedly ‘pure’ scientific goals, and national styles of science. These
patterns can be described in writing, but they can best be perceived and
interpreted in maps and animations. Various visual techniques are available
to display and analyze these patterns, including geographic information
systems (GIS) for creating maps and animations. GIS analysis tools can be
used to describe spatial patterns in—and the spatial and temporal diffusion
of—research sites in the Arctic. Technologies such as Google Earth can
generate multi-dimensional visualizations, and are valuable in allowing easy
integration of spatial representations with photographs and other historical
materials. These methods support democratization by allowing users to add
information to maps with limited cost and effort. The ability to adapt the
data visualizations makes the information accessible far beyond the academic
community. Utilizing these visualization techniques, this paper explores
the locations of research stations in the first IPY and the areas where
oceanographic and fisheries research was conducted in the Bering Sea—and
will suggest what historians and other scholars can gain from geographic
approaches.
Polar
research stations can be seen as sites of field science and as “outdoor
laboratories”, and have rightly been ascribed growing significance in the
research on field and environmental sciences. Theoretical underpinnings of
the analysis have been found in Actor Network Theory, in colonial science
readings, and in anthropological investigations of stations as sites of
practice and as interstices in the spatial and cognitive relations between
local inhabitants with their knowledge traditions and scientists with their
universalizing knowledge claims. While research on the station as a site and
a place has made significant progress in recent years field stations have
also served complex roles suggestive of the sometimes very down to earth
political dimensions of the field sciences. Stations were often founded for
a multitude of reasons, some of those extra-scientific. In this paper I
shall explore the case of Norway’s Arctic and Antarctic field stations in
the early phase of the Cold War and in particular in the period immediately
before and during the International Geophysical Year 1957-58. Norway
acknowledged the role of science and of the permanent or semi-permanent
presence of scientists at field stations and consciously used science as a
method of building bridgeheads in new territories. With the Arctic acquiring
a significant role as a theatre of war in the strategic planning of the
United States and the Soviet Union after WWII Norway’s politics of field
stations changed as well.
View Presentation.
Polar
weather data collection during the International
Geophysical Year (1957-59) instigated a continuous sphere of data exchange
from Pole to Pole, and thereby created the first global meteorological model
of climate circulation. Integral to the process of gathering data was the
role of weather stations, and in particular the centralisation of systematic
synoptic weather and atmospheric observations at polar field stations that
rationalised the production, synchronisation and distribution of weather
data. Importantly, when this weather data was consolidated with world-wide
maps, scientists could study the effects of cold air mass on atmospheric
circulation, both north and south of the equator. The author will argue that
the establishment of a networked polar weather system during the IGY
integrated the poles into an infrastructural globalism that came to define
the configuration of climate change today. Research questions to be tested
through long-term weather observations during the IGY included the
prediction that in 50 years time Arctic waters may become navigable in the
summer time and that world-wide warming was greatly effected by polar
warming. The legacy of this weather work during the IGY was to provide
baseline data for the contemporary scientific-environmental phenomena of
climate change, ozone depletion and albedo. Arguably, it was the garnering
of these “facts on the ground” (and in the air) at weather stations that
secured the polar environment as crucial to earth systems and global models.
View Presentation.
Larsen, Christina
V. L., National Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark,
Denmark / Greenland
Canada’s
most recent Territory, Nunavut, is facing and is expected to continue to see
increasing economic opportunity come its way in the near future. A very real
question is to what degree Nunavut’s inhabitants (Nunavummiut) are ready to
take advantage of this? This research seeks to assess the ability of
residents of Nunavut to harness prospects for economic prosperity. In
particular, entrepreneurial aptitude and entrepreneurial activity are
examined.
Entrepreneurial behaviour represents the foundation for economic growth
(Schumpeter 1950). Whether value-creating activities take place in a small
business or a large multinational enterprise (e.g., mining company) both
lead to job creation and generate wealth. However, evidence across time and
space suggests that economies – whether small town, or continent such as
Europe, Africa, or North America – experience the greatest benefit from
capitalist acts that take place at a fundamental level. Small businesses
generate the majority of jobs and wealth (Birch 1979, Haltiwanger 2006).
Business ownership leads to self-determination, esteem, and impacts other
indicators of social welfare, including health and a stable, cohesive
community.
Our research
agenda unfolds in two parts. In Study 1, entrepreneurial aptitude is
assessed. This will involve voluntary participation of Nunavummiut to take a
standard test to gauge predisposition toward self-employment. In Study 2,
specific instances of entrepreneurship will be recorded in detail through
face-to-face interview. These actual small business owners’ experiences
(e.g., successes, failures, and challenges) will give depth to our
understanding.
NSERC-SSHRC
(2000: 17) states “Young people in the North need to be provided with new,
varied, and ongoing opportunities.” With a burgeoning young population, the
Nunavut Economic Development Strategy (2003: 27) isolates “economic
development for our youth” as a priority.
This poster
presents the author’s findings obtained within the framework of a major
research project undertaken by a group of Master’s Degree students at the
Ural State Academy of Architecture and Arts, Yekaterinburg, Russia, in
2005-2007 with the aim of exploring the touristic potential of the
Western-Siberian North. The study is about the potential input of design
profession into the tourism industry and is an attempt to take an external
look at interdisciplinary cooperation. More specifically, the aim of this
poster is to present a hypothetical model of touristic transport network
developed by designers.
The logic of
the research is based on studying the theoretical fundamentals of tourism
consistently, identifying the regional touristic resources (based on the
data from literature analysis and field expeditions), detecting the
operating conditions of the regional tourism industry with regard to
transportation and developing a design model as an output, which contains a
concentrated description of internal and external patterns of the Northern
touristic transport system.
THE MAIN
RESEARCH RESULTS
Northern
tourism is clearly defined as a special area which required a tailored
approach; A way of assessing and classifying the recreational potential of
the Russian North is offered; A model of the Northern user and the forms of
presenting a Northern touristic service are proposed; The recreational
strategy of the region is proposed, involving the creation of a transport
network adapted to the needs of the tourism industry; A design model of the
regional tourism transport system is developed (with justification of the
priority of inland water transport); and the design properties (functional
and image-making) of transport vehicles for northern tourism are identified.
Gagnon, Catherine A.
XE "Gagnon, Catherine A."
and Berteaux, Dominique XE
"Berteaux, Dominique"
Many
Arctic communities are characterised by their close cultural and economical
ties to wildlife. Humans and wildlife in the Arctic are components of a
social-ecological system that is fast changing due to global pressures such
as climate change and economical development. Entire regional systems will
be transformed. For example, climatic changes will affect the abundance and
distribution of several wildlife species, which in turn will impact the food
security of Arctic indigenous people. Thus, wildlife resources are a central
component to consider when assessing the resilience and vulnerability of
Arctic social-ecological systems in the face of 21st century
changes. A focus on wildlife raises the following questions: what are the
main factors causing changes in wildlife patterns? How much can we project
and anticipate in the future regarding wildlife patterns? What are the
likely consequences in terms of vulnerability/opportunities for human
communities? How do management institutions influence these vulnerability/
opportunities? How can local knowledge and scientific knowledge interact
when dealing with the above questions? This poster presents the planning
phase of a project performed in collaboration with the communities of Pond
Inlet (Nunavut, Canada) and Aklavik (Northwest Territories, Canada). Using a
collaborative research approach, we will combine local and scientific
knowledge to document changes (and their drivers) in the wildlife species
most critical to communities. We will then use a combination of local
knowledge and climate projections to characterise future vulnerabilities of
the studied socio-ecosystems, and to look at how wildlife management
institutions, may influence the resilience and vulnerability of these
systems.
The
Nordic Seaweed Project had the main objective to find out if some of the 200
species of Greenland seaweed could be used as a resource for new jobs. In
many small settlements the fish factory has been closed and new ways of
income is needed. The research concerned if seaweed could be harvested and
processed in a both economical and ecological sustainable way. That seem to
be the case and hopefully commercial seaweed fishing will start next year in
Paamiut and Nanortalik.
The
project did mainly taken place in South Greenland waters, but experimental
growing of seaweed on lines took place in the Faeroe Islands.
The
poster describes a research project concerning introduction of beekeeping
among South Greenland sheep farmers.
The
project had two goals:
1) To investigate if the Nordic Honeybee/the Black Bee
could survive in South Greenland, so that a new and safe gene reserve could
be established for the threatened race of honeybee.
2) To investigate if local people could have an interest
in beekeeping.
The
project showed that the bees could live in the area and could produce so
much honey, that this new income in some households could be much higher
that the income from selling the lamb.
Gearheard, Shari
XE "Gearheard, Shari" , McNeave, Chris XE "McNeave, Chris" and Huntington,
Henry XE "Huntington, Henry"
Over the
last decade, Arctic residents and indigenous peoples have been increasingly
involved in, and taking control of, research. Arctic communities have made
significant contributions to understanding recent environmental change, and
community-based research, including traditional knowledge research and
community-based monitoring, are an important part of IPY activities and the
Arctic Observing Network (AON).
One of the
greatest challenges of local and traditional knowledge (LTK) research and
communitybased monitoring to date has been effective and appropriate means
of recording, storing, and managing data and information. It has been a
challenge to find effective means of making community-based data and
information available to Arctic residents and researchers, as well as other
interested groups such as teachers, students, and policy makers. Without a
network and data management to support LTK and community-based research, a
number of problems have arisen such as: misplacement or loss of extremely
precious data (e.g. information from Elders who have passed away); lack of
awareness of previous studies and repetition of research in the same
communities resulting in research fatigue and waste of resources; a
reluctance or inability to initiate or maintain community-based research or
monitoring without a data management system available. There is an urgent
need for useful and useable means of recording, preserving, and sharing data
and information being collected in Arctic communities. ELOKA seeks to fill
this gap.
Lund, E.,
XE "Lund, E.," Melhus, M., XE "Melhus, M.," Hansen, Ketil L., XE "Hansen,
Ketil L.," Nystad, Tove, XE "Nystad, Tove" Broderstad, Ann R., XE
"Broderstad, Ann R." Selmer, R., XE "Selmer, R.," and Lund-Larsen, P.G. XE
"Lund-Larsen, P.G."
Background
Due to a
lack of knowledge about health and living conditions of the Sámi population
in Norway, a health-screening study in areas with both Sámi and Norwegian
populations were conducted by the Centre for Sámi Health Research, in
collaboration with the Norwegian Institute of Public Health.
Material
The SAMINOR
study was carried out in 2003-2004. The study includes 24 municipalities or
selected district. Inhabitants aged 30 and 36-79 years were invited, 27,987
individuals.
The study
consists of questionnaire data, physical measures and blood analyses.
Questionnaires focus on language and ethnicity, use of and satisfaction with
health services, medical history, socioeconomic factors, discrimination and
bullying, lifestyle, social networks, identity and values. For Sámi
participants, aspects of Sámi lifestyle and traditions are addressed.
Physical measures comprise pulse recordings, blood pressure, weight, height
and waist and hip circumference. Some blood analyses are performed.
Results
Response
rate was 60.9%, 16,538 participants. Participants were organized into six
ethnic categories: Sámi language spoken by all grandparents, parents and
respondents (Sámi I), at least two Sámi-speaking grandparents (Sámi II),
others reporting Sami background) (Sámi III), Kvens, Norwegians and
Foreigners. Persons with both Sámi and Kven affiliation are considered Sámi.
The Sámi groups comprise 35.6% of the sample.
Conclusion
The SAMINOR
study will in the future be used for a wide range of studies focusing on
living conditions and diseases. By constructing three Sámi subgroups we
obtain an ethnic variable that distinguishes between strong and weak Sámi
affiliation.
Hansen, Birgit
XE "Hansen, Birgit"
, Lehmann-Larsen, Lisbeth XE "Lehmann-Larsen,
Lisbeth" , Møller, Lone N.
XE "Møller, Lone N."
Iqaluit,
Nunavut, November 29, 2007 – The Association des francophones du Nunavut is
pleased to launch the new Listening to our Past web site, which should be
very useful to Inuit students and to all those who are interested in the
Inuit culture. The site can be found at www.traditional-knowledge.ca, and is
available in French, in English and in Inuktitut.
Listening
to our Past offers online access to twelve Inuit Traditional Knowledge books
published by the Language and Culture Program of the Nunavut Arctic College.
These books provide information on various topics of the Inuit culture, such
as Traditional Law, Traditional Health, Childrearing practices, and
Shamanism, on the Development of Government Services in the Arctic, on the
Creation of Nunavut as well as on the American Military Presence in the
1950’s. Nearly 70 elders and political leaders were interviewed, and
numerous researchers, interpreters, translators, correctors and students
were involved in this project.
The
creation of the Listening to our Past web site was made possible by a
contribution of Canadian Heritage, Canadian Culture Online program. Many
more partners were instrumental in the production of the site, among which
the Nunavut Arctic College, the Qikiqtani Inuit Association, the
Interuniversity Centre for Aboriginal Studies and Research of Laval
University, Igloolik Isuma Productions, The National Research Council
Canada, Igloolik Artcirq Productions and Nunavut Sivuniksavut.
Kruse, Jack XE "Kruse, Jack" and Poppel, Birger XE
"Poppel, Birger"
Major
findings of the Survey of Living Conditions in the Arctic (SLiCA) are: (1) A
combination of traditional activities and cash employment is the prevailing
lifestyle of Arctic indigenous peoples; (2) family ties, social support of
each other, and traditional activities have a lot to do with why indigenous
people choose to remain in Arctic communities; (3) well-being is closely
related to job opportunities, locally available fish and game, and a sense
of local control. Well-being and depression (and related problems like
suicide) are flip sides of the same coin. Improving well-being may reduce
social problems; and, (4) health conditions vary widely in the Arctic:
three-in-four Greenlandic Inuit self-rate their health as at least very good
compared with one-in-two Canadian and Alaska Inuit and one-in-five Chukotka
indigenous people. Findings are based on 7,200 interviews in a probability
sample of Iñupiat settlement regions of Alaska, the four Inuit settlement
regions of Canada, all of Greenland, and the Anadyrskij, Anadyr, Shmidtovs,
Beringovskij, Chukotskij, Iujl’tinskij, Bilibinskij, Chaunskij,
Providenskij, Uel'Kal' districts of Chukotka. Indigenous people and
researchers from Greenland, Russia, Canada, the United States, Denmark,
Norway, Sweden, and Finland collaborated on all phases of the study.
Churikova, Victoria
XE "Churikova, Victoria" . Shestopalov, A.M. XE "Shestopalov, A.M." ,
Alekseev, A.Y. XE "Alekseev, A.Y." and Zabelin, V.A. XE "Zabelin, V.A."
Processes of
biodegradation of oil and oil products’ hydrocarbons are the basic ones for
many biotechnologies, which are aimed to improve the ecological conditions,
including the restoration of polluted soils and water bodies. They are
especially important on the oil producing territories and petroleum
refineries.
In extreme
conditions of the North the biological factor of oil refining plays the main
role as the less destructive one. It is necessary to use complex
technologies to accelerate a process of bioremediation on the contaminated
plots.
In 2002 the
researchers of State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology "Vector"
and “Biooil” company started collaborative work on studying mechanisms of
oil destruction in natural conditions and use of microorganisms.
To use the
results in industrial conditions in oil producing northern parts of West
Siberia we worked out some drugs “Biooil_Yugra”, “Biooil_SN”,
“Biooil_South”. So, we developed and tested the following complex technology
of bioremediation of oil contaminated soils and water in the extreme
conditions of Siberian North, which includes several stages.
1. Sampling and isolation of aboriginal psychrophilic,
mesophilic microorganisms which are oil destructors, working in a wide range
of acidity and salinity.
2. Creation of associations of non-antagonistic
microorganisms of oil-destructors for the certain soil types.
3. Industry quantities of microorganisms for working
associations were produced.
4. The application of microbial associations on the polluted
plots with introduction of necessary fertilizers.
5. Planting of shrubs and herbs to restore the natural
cover.
Centre
for Sami Health Research was established in 2001. The centre is financed by
Ministry of Health and Care in Norway and a part of Institute of Community
Medicine at University of Tromsø.
Main aim
for the centre is to promote Interdisciplinary research on health and social
wellbeing among Sami people in Norway. We want to build network to and
cooperate with other researchers, research milieu and projects who works
with research on health and living conditions among Sami in other country
and other indigenous people especially in the arctic area. We want to use
the opportunity the ICASS VI in Nuuk, give us to meet different researchers
from the arctic region and show the Centre for Sami Health Research by a
poster presentation.
Andersen, Thomas O.
XE "Andersen, Thomas O." , Lund, Eiliv XE "Lund, Eiliv" and Balsvik, Randi
R. XE "Balsvik, Randi R."
Abstract not yet submitted. It will
be added to the website version when accepted.
The
purpose of this project is assessing what climate change mean to different
generations of indigenous women in different indigenous communities. What
does climate change mean to indigenous women health and well-being? How do
indigenous women experience changes in their traditional food? It’ is
important to see the local in a global perspective, and the possible ways to
attach narratives about movements of contaminants and transport ways to
local narratives about movements and transport as a threat to health.
Indigenous women consider that they have resources, unique knowledge and
that their cultures have special values and strength. But they often feel
impoverished as a result of global processes which are out of their control
and sometime irreversible. Narrative methodology and photo voice
http://www.photovoice.com/
will be used to grasp muted voices and lived experience. Women who are
active involved in the production of traditional indigenous food will have a
photo camera available to record and reflect what change in their
traditional food mean to them. The anthropologist will take active part in
the process of selecting, contextualizing and codifying of the pictures. The
selecting process is choosing the photographs that most accurately reflect
the women’s concerns and assets. The contextualizing process is the women’s
stories what the photographs mean. The codifying process is identifying the
issues, themes, and theories that emerge.
