Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T12:06:48.108Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Contributions of traditional knowledge to understanding climate change in the Canadian Arctic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 October 2009

Dyanna Riedlinger  and
Fikret Berkes
Dyanna Riedlinger
Affiliation:
Natural Resources Institute, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba R3T 2N2, Canada
Fikret Berkes
Affiliation:
Natural Resources Institute, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba R3T 2N2, Canada
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Despite much scientific research, a considerable amount of uncertainty exists concerning the rate and extent of climate change in the Arctic, and how change will affect regional climatic processes and northern ecosystems. Can an expanded scope of knowledge and inquiry augment understandings of climate change in the north? The extensive use of the land and the coastal ocean in Inuit communities provides a unique source of local environmental expertise that is guided by generations of experience. Environmental change associated with variations in weather and climate has not gone unnoticed by communities that are experiencing change firsthand. Little research has been done to explore the contributions of traditional knowledge to climate-change research. Based in part on a collaborative research project in Sachs Harbour, western Canadian Arctic, this paper discusses five areas in which traditional knowledge may complement scientific approaches to understanding climate change in the Canadian Arctic. These are the use of traditional knowledge as local-scale expertise; as a source of climate history and baseline data; in formulating research questions and hypotheses; as insight into impacts and adaptation in Arctic communities; and for long-term, communitybased monitoring. These five areas of potential convergence provide a conceptual framework for bridging the gap between traditional knowledge and western science, in the context of climate-change research.

Type
Articles
Information
Polar Record , Volume 37 , Issue 203 , October 2001 , pp. 315 - 328
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2001

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anonymous. 1992. Sachs Harbour Community Conservation Plan. Inuvik: Wildlife Management Advisory Council (NWT), Inuvialuit Game Council, and the Fisheries Joint Management Committee.Google Scholar
Arctic Borderlands Ecological Knowledge Co-op. 2000. http://www.taiga.net.Google Scholar
Arima, E.Y. 1976. An assessment of the reliability of informant recall. In: Freeman, M.M.R. (editor). Report of the Inuit land use and occupancy project. Volume II. Ottawa: Indian and Northern Affairs Canada: 31–38.Google Scholar
Babaluk, J.A., Reist, J.D., Johnson, J.D., and Johnson, L.. 2000. First records of sockeye (Oncorhynchus nerka) and pink salmon (O. gorbuscha) from Banks Island and other records of Pacific salmon in Northwest Territories, Canada. Arctic 53 (2): 161–164.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berkes, F. 1999. Sacred ecology: traditional ecological knowledge and resource management. London and Philadelphia: Taylor and Francis.Google Scholar
Berkes, F., and Folke, C. (editors). 1998. Linking social and ecological systems: management practices and social mechanisms for building resilience. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Berkes, F., Mathias, J., Kislalioglu, M., and Fast, H.. In press. The Canadian Arctic and the Oceans Act: the development of participatory environmental research and management. Ocean & Coastal Management.Google Scholar
Bielawski, E. 1995. Inuitindigenous knowledge and science in the Arctic. In: Johnson, D.R., and Peterson, D.L. (editors). Human ecology and climate change: people and resources in the far north. Washington, DC: Taylor and Francis: 219–228.Google Scholar
Bielawski, E. 1997. Aboriginal participation in global change research in the Northwest Territories of Canada. In: Oechel, W.C., Callaghan, T., Gilmanov, T., Holten, J.I., Maxwell, B., Molau, U., and Sveinbjornsson, B. (editors). Global change and Arctic terrestrial ecosystems. New York: Springer-Verlag: 475–483.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bill, L., Crozier, J., Surrendi, D., Flett, L., and MacDonald, D., 1996. A report of wisdom synthesized from the traditional knowledge component studies. Edmonton: Northern River Basins Study.Google Scholar
Chiotti, Q. 1998. An assessment of the regional impacts and opportunities from climate change in Canada. Canadian Geographer 42 (4): 380–393.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cohen, S.J. 1997. What if and so what in northwest Canada: could climate change make a difference to the future of the Mackenzie Basin? Arctic 50 (4): 293–307.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cruikshank, J. 1984. Oral tradition and scientific research: approaches to knowledge in the north. Ottawa: Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies (Occasional publication 9).Google Scholar
Cruikshank, J. 1998. The social life of stories: narrative and knowledge in the Yukon Territory. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.Google Scholar
Dickson, B. 1999. All change in the Arctic. Nature 397: 389–391.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Duerden, F., and Kuhn, R.G.. 1998. Scale, context and application of traditional knowledge of the Canadian north. Polar Record 34 (188): 31–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fabijan, M. 1998. Inuvialuit harvest study data report, January 1997–December 1997. Inuvik: Joint Secretariat – Inuvialuit Renewable Resources Committees.Google Scholar
Fast, H., Berkes, F.. 1998. Climate change, northern subsistence and land-based economies. In: Mayer, N., and Avis, W. (editors). Canada country study: climate impacts and adaptation. Volume 8: National crosscutting issues. Ottawa: Environment Canada: 206–226.Google Scholar
Ferguson, M.A.D. 1997. Arctic tundra caribou and climate change: questions of temporal and spatial scales. GeoScience Canada 23 (4): 245–252.Google Scholar
Ferguson, M.A.D., and Messier, F.. 1997. Collection and analysis of traditional ecological knowledge about a population of Arctic tundra caribou. Arctic 50 (1): 17–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ferguson, M.A.D., Williamson, R.G., and Messier, F.. 1998. Inuit knowledge of long term changes in a population of Arctic tundra caribou. Arctic 51 (3): 201–219.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feyerabend, P. 1987. Farewell to reason. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Fienup-Riordan, A. 1999. Yaqulget qaillun pilartat (what the birds do): Yup'ik Eskimo understanding of geese and those who study them. Arctic 52 (1): 1–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ford, N. 2000. Communicating climate change from the perspective of local people: a case study from Arctic Canada. Journal of Development Communication 1 (11): 93–108.Google Scholar
Fox, S. 1998. Inuit knowledge of climate and climate change. Unpublished Master's thesis. Waterloo, Ontario: Department of Geography, University of Waterloo.Google Scholar
Fox, S.L. 2000. Arctic climate change: observations of Inuit in the eastern Canadian Arctic. In: Fetterer, F., and Radionov, V. (editors). Arctic Climatology Project, Environmental Working Group Arctic meteorology and climate atlas. Boulder, CO: National Snow and Ice Data Center. CD-ROM.Google Scholar
Freeman, M.M.R. (editor). 1976. Report of the Inuit land use and occupancy project. 3 volumes. Ottawa: Department of Indian and Northern Affairs.Google Scholar
Gonzales, P., and Rodriguez, R.. 1999. NASA looks to native elders to help save the Earth. Column of the Americas, Universal Press Syndicate, 15 January 1999.Google Scholar
Harvey, D. 1984. On the history and present condition of geography: an historical materialistic manifesto. Professional Geographer 36 (1): 1–11.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ingold, T., and Kurttila, T.. 2000. Perceiving the environment in Finnish Lapland. Body and Society 6 (3): 187–200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ingram, M.J., Farmer, G., and Wigley, T.M.L.. 1981. Past climates and their impact on man: a review. In: Wigley, T.M.L., Ingram, M.J., and Farmer, G. (editors). Climate and history: studies in past climates and their impact on man. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 3–50.Google Scholar
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 1995. Climate change 1995: impacts, adaptations and mitigation of climate change: scientific technical analyses. Watson, R.T., Zinyowera, M.T., and Moss, R.H. (editors). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 1998. The regional impacts of climate change: an assessment of vulnerability: a special report of IPCC working group II for the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change. Watson, R.T., Zinyowera, M.C., and Moss, R.H. (editors). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jacobs, J.D., and Bell, T.J.. 1998. Regional perspectives on 20th century environmental change: introduction and examples from northern Canada. The Canadian Geographer 42 (4): 314–318.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johannessen, O.M., Shalina, E.V., and Miles, M.W.. 1999. Satellite evidence for an Arctic sea ice cover in transformation. Science 286: 1937–1939.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnson, T. 1999. World out of balance. Native Americas 16 (3–4): 8–25.Google Scholar
Kassi, N. 1993. Native perspectives on climate change. In: Wall, G. (editor). Impacts of climate change on resource management of the north. Waterloo, Ontario: Department of Geography, University of Waterloo (Department of Geography occasional paper 16): 43–49.Google Scholar
Kattenberg, A., Giorgi, F., Grassl, H., Meehl, G.A., Mitchell, J.F.B., Stouffer, R.J., Tokioka, T., Weaver, A.J., and Wigley, T.M.L.. 1996. Climate models – projections of future climate. In: Houghton, J.T., Filho, L.G. Meira, Callender, B.A., Harris, N., Kattenberg, A., and Maskell, K.. (editors). Climate change 1995: the science of climate change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 285–357.Google Scholar
Keddy, P.A. 1989. Competition. London: Chapman and Hall.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krupnik, I. 1993. Arctic adaptations: native whalers and reindeer herders of northern Eurasia. Hanover and London: University Press of New England.Google Scholar
Kuptana, R. 1996. Inuit perspectives on climate change. Statement by Kuptana, Rosemarie, president of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference to the second conference of the parties to the United Nations framework convention on climate change, Geneva, 16–19 July 1996. The Center for World Indigenous Studies.Google Scholar
Maslanik, J.A., Serreze, M.C., and Agnew, T.. 1999. Record reduction in western Arctic sea-ice cover in 1998: characteristics and relationships to atmospheric circulation, Geophysical Research Letters 26 (13): 1905–1908.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, B. 1980. The climate of the Canadian Arctic islands and adjacent waters. Volume 1. Downsview, Ontario: Atmospheric Environment Service (Climatological studies 30).Google Scholar
Maxwell, B. 1997. Responding to global climate change in the Arctic. Canada country study: climate impacts and adaptation. Volume 2. Ottawa: Environment Canada.Google Scholar
McDonald, M., Arragutainaq, L., and Novalinga, Z. (compilers). 1997. Voices from the bay: traditional ecological knowledge of Inuit and Cree in the Hudson Bay bioregion. Ottawa: Canadian Arctic Resources Committee.Google Scholar
McGhee, R. 1970. Speculations on climatic change and Thule culture development. Folk 11–12: 173–184.Google Scholar
McGhee, R. 1981. Archaeological evidence for climatic change during the last 5000 years. In: Wigley, T.M.L, Ingram, M.J., and Farmer, G. (editors). Climate and history: studies in past climates and their impact on man. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 162—179.Google Scholar
Nadasdy, P. 1999. The politics of TEK: power and the ‘integration’ of knowledge. Arctic Anthropology 36 (1–2): 1–18.Google Scholar
Overpeck, J., Hughen, K., Hardy, D., Bradley, R., Case, R., Douglas, M., Finney, B., Gajewski, K., Jacoby, G., Jennings, A., Lamoureux, S., Lasca, A., MacDonald, G., Moore, J., Retelle, M., Smith, S., Wolfe, A., and Zielinski, G.. 1997. Arctic environmental change of the last four centuries. Science 278: 1251–1256.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Peters, R.H. 1991. A critique for ecology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Popper, K. 1959. The logic of scientific discovery. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Riedlinger, D. 1999. Climate change and the Inuvialuit of Banks Island, NWT: using traditional environmental knowledge to complement western science. InfoNorth 52 (4): 430–432.Google Scholar
Riedlinger, D. 2000. Inuvialuit knowledge of climate change. In: Oakes, J., Riewe, R., Bennett, M., and Chisholm, B. (editors). Pushing the margins: northern and native research. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Native Studies Press: 346–355.Google Scholar
Robertson, G.J., and Gilchrist, H.G.. 1998. Evidence of population declines among common eiders breeding in the Belcher Islands, Northwest Territories. Arctic 51 (4): 378–385.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roots, E.F. 1994. Looking ahead. In: Stager, J. (editor). Canada and polar science: proceedings of a conference sponsored by the Canadian Polar Commission, Yellowknife, NWT, May 17–19, 1994. Ottawa: Canadian Polar Commission: 74–91.Google Scholar
Rothrock, D.A., Yu, Y., and Maykut, G.A.. 1999. Thinning of the Arctic sea-ice cover. Geophysical Research Letters 26 (23): 3469–3472.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shaw, J., Taylor, R.B., Solomon, S., Christian, H.A., and Forbes, D.L.. 1998. Potential impacts of global sea-level rise on Canadian coasts. Canadian Geographer 42 (4): 365–379.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smithers, J., and Smit, B.. 1997. Human adaptability to climatic variability and change. Global Environmental Change 7 (2): 129–146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Spink, J. 1969. Historic Eskimo awareness of past changes in sea level. Musk-Ox 5: 37–40.Google Scholar
Thorpe, N.L. 2000. Contributions of Inuit ecological knowledge to understanding the impacts of climate change to the Bathurst caribou herd in the Kitikmeotregion, Nunavutz. Unpublished Master's thesis in Resource Management. Vancouver: School of Resource and Environmental Management, Simon Fraser University.Google Scholar
Usher, P.J. 2000. Traditional ecological knowledge in environmental assessment and management. Arctic 53 (2): 183–193.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vinnikov, K.Y., Robock, A., Stouffer, R.J., Walsh, J.E., Parkinson, C.L, Cavalieri, D.J., Mitchell, J.F.B., Garrett, D., and Zakharov, V.F.. 1999. Global warming and northern hemisphere sea ice extent. Science 286: 1934–1937.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Weinstein, M. 1996. Traditional knowledge, impact assessment, and environmental planning. A paper prepared for the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency's BHP Diamond Mine Environmental Assessment Panel.Google Scholar
Weller, G., and Lange, M. (editors). 1999. Impacts of global climate change in the Arctic regions: report from a workshop on the impacts of global change, 25–26 April 1999, Tromse, Norway. Oslo: International Arctic Science Committee.Google Scholar
Woo, M.-K., Lewkowicz, A.G., and Rouse, W.R.. 1992. Response of the Canadian permafrost environment to climatic change. Physical Geography 13 (4): 287–317.CrossRefGoogle Scholar