Respect for Grizzly Bears: an Aboriginal Approach for Co-existence and Resilience

Aboriginal peoples' respect for grizzly bear (Ursus arctos) is widely acknowledged, but rarely explored, in wildlife management discourse in northern Canada. Practices of respect expressed toward bears were observed and grouped into four categories: terminology, stories, reciprocity, and ritual...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Ecology and Society
Main Authors: Douglas A. Clark, D. Scott. Slocombe
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Resilience Alliance 2009
Subjects:
bear ceremonialism
Champagne and Aishihik First Nations
Inuit
Inuvialuit
Northwest Territories
Nunavut
resilience
salmon
social-ecological system
Southern Tutchone
traditional ecological knowledge
Ursus arctos
Yukon
Biology (General)
QH301-705.5
Ecology
QH540-549.5
Canada
Champagne
Aishihik
First Nations
inuit
Tutchone
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-02892-140142
https://doaj.org/article/9a1115e771e340d58cc6790d49553eda
Description
Summary:Aboriginal peoples' respect for grizzly bear (Ursus arctos) is widely acknowledged, but rarely explored, in wildlife management discourse in northern Canada. Practices of respect expressed toward bears were observed and grouped into four categories: terminology, stories, reciprocity, and ritual. In the southwest Yukon, practices in all four categories form a coherent qualitative resource management system that may enhance the resilience of the bear-human system as a whole. This system also demonstrates the possibility of a previously unrecognized human role in maintaining productive riparian ecosystems and salmon runs, potentially providing a range of valued social-ecological outcomes. Practices of respect hold promise for new strategies to manage bear-human interactions, but such successful systems may be irreducibly small scale and place based.

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