Dynamic Inuit social strategies in changing environment: A long term perspective

• Main Authors: Friesen, Max, Dyke, Arthur, Gendron, Daniel, Savelle, James, Ross, Julie, Norman, Lauren, Hodgetts, Lisa, Dawson, Peter, Finkelstein, Sarah
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: Canadian Cryospheric Information Network 2012
• Subjects: Archaeology; Climate change; Cultural development; Fishing; Human adaptation; Human-wildlife relationships; Indigenous peoples; Labrador; Whaling; International Polar Year-Dynamic Inuit social strategies in changing environments a long term perspective; Arctic; Nunavut; Bering Strait; Nunavik; Canada; Igloolik; Nain; Cambridge Bay; Hall Beach; Inukjuak; Taloyoak; Melville Peninsula; Arviat; International Polar Year; inuit; IPY; Alaska
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.5443/11356; https://www.polardata.ca/pdcsearch/?doi_id=11356

For the IPY project Dynamic Inuit Social Strategies in Changing Environments: A Long-Term Perspective, archaeologists and other scientists from across Canada collaborated with Inuit community and heritage organizations to better understand how Inuit culture developed and changed over the past 1,000 years. Six research teams brought together Inuit traditional knowledge, excavation of important archaeological sites, and information about changing Arctic environments. The research took place across the Canadian Arctic, with fieldwork occurring in Nunavut near the communities of Cambridge Bay, Arviat, Taloyoak, Igloolik, and Hall Beach; in Nunavik (northern Québec) near Inukjuak; and in Labrador near Nain (Figure 1). The ultimate goal of the project is to understand how outside forces, such as climate change and interaction with Europeans, were combined with complex and dynamic Inuit cultural patterns, to produce the diverse and successful societies which exist across the Canadian Arctic today. A key part of the project is its emphasis on close integration with Inuit organizations. The various research teams worked closely with community groups and cultural organizations, and a large number of Inuit elders and youth were involved in various aspects of the planning, fieldwork, and communication of knowledge gained. The results of the project will be useful to Inuit heritage organizations and educational institutions that are dedicated to connecting the past with the present, and also will provide a long-term historic perspective on issues facing modern northern communities as they deal with climate change and other challenges. Results from the fieldwork include significant new insights into the early Thule Inuit migration from Alaska through the eastern Arctic, the nature of early Inuit life in coastal regions across the Arctic, and the relationship between climate change and Inuit culture change. : Purpose: Inuit have lived in the eastern Arctic for 800-1000 years, their culture having developed in the Bering Strait region during the preceding centuries. Although the Inuit past in the eastern Arctic is complex, to some degree it can be seen to revolve around two primary processes or sets of interconnected events. First, is the migration from Alaska to the east by the earliest Inuit, known as ¿Thule¿, an apparently rapid event which replaced populations of the earlier, and culturally very different Dorset tradition. Second, is the transformation of Thule Inuit into their more diverse recent cultural forms, involving abandonment of some regions, combined with major changes in settlement patterns, artifact and architecture form, economy, and social organization. Explanations for these changes fall into two main categories: those relating to changing environments, and those relating to social and cultural factors. There is currently little agreement on the nature and relative importance of these various factors, either as they impact the Thule migration, or the Thule ¿ Recent Inuit Transition. Therefore, we are left with two primary challenges: 1) determining the relative importance of these various factors on the observed Inuit culture changes, including the relationships between factors; and 2) understanding the dynamic role of Inuit social structures and mechanisms in shaping, enabling, or in some cases constraining the Inuit perception of and responses to these various factors. The present project is addressing these questions through six programs of field research, the pooling of a variety of theoretical approaches, and the integration of traditional knowledge, paleoenvironmental data, and archaeological data. 1. Environment and Society during the Thule Migration 2. Timing and Causes of the Early Thule Migration 3. Paleoenvironments and Thule Social Change on Melville Peninsula, Nunavut 4. Thule Settlement Patterns and Seasonal Procurement Strategies in Coastal Nunavut 5. The Komaktorvik Archaeology Project: Inuit Household Economies from the Thule to Historic Periods in Northern Labrador 6. Resilience, Transformational Change, and the Origins of Caribou Inuit Culture : Summary: Human societies have traditionally had close ties to their surroundings, especially in the Arctic where the relationship between environmental conditions and cultural/social factors is a complex one. Through collaborations with Inuit community and heritage organizations, this project is investigating how Inuit culture has developed and changed over the past 1,000 years in response to environmental and social change. This is being accomplished through the analysis of Inuit knowledge and the excavation of important archaeological sites. Information is also being collected about the changing Arctic environment in the context of two major events in Inuit history, namely the migration of Inuit from west to east and once established in the east, the diversification of cultural practices.