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The Journals of Knud Rasmussen: The impact of Christianity among the Inuit

Published on March 19, 2006 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, Arctic / Northern Regions, indigenous people / minorities, inuit, religion cosmology

rasmussen-film

(LINKS UPDATED 30.9.2020) A new film by Inuit film maker Zacharias Kunuk (53) explores how missionaries force-fed Christianity to the Inuit in the 1920s. It’s called The Journals of Knud Rasmussen. Before its official world premier at the Toronto International Film Festival, a preview was held for Kunuks home community Igloolik, a cultural hub of the Arctic, 2,800 kilometres north of Toronto. Gayle MacDonald from The Globe and Mail has been there and reports:

The frigid temperature (30 C below) does not faze these people, who came in droves — some by prop plane from as far away as Qaanaaq, Greenland; and Nunavut’s capital, Iqaluit — to watch Kunuk’s latest cinematic creation. (…) “One of my friends left the seal hunt early so that he could get here before the show starts,” Kunuk, himself an avid hunter, adds proudly.
(…)
The shy filmmaker explains that his new film, shot in the relatively balmy months of April and May last year, is the story of explorer Knud Rasmussen, who travelled through this area in the 1920s, chronicling the conversion to Christianity of the great shaman Avva (played by local resident Pakak Innukshuk) and his willful daughter Apak (Leah Angutimarik).

The local Inuits appreciated that he took on taboo topics:

Some say they liked Atanarjuat, based on an Inuit legend, better. Others attest to being equally touched by this film, about the last great Inuit shaman, Avva. But all say they were glad Kunuk took on a taboo topic: shamanism, which the early missionaries dubbed devil worship, and which still sits uneasily with some of the town’s most religious Anglican, Roman Catholic and evangelical residents.

Kunuk’s production company, Igloolik Isuma Productions is according to the article one of the few success stories, periodically employing hundreds of local people as actors and film crew while injecting several million dollars into the economy. The people, by and large, are poor. Suicide (especially among those under 20), alcoholism, drug use and spousal abuse are rampant.

>> read the whole story in The Globe and Mail (replaced by copy)

Journals of Knud Rasmussen - trailer - IFFR 2007

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Eskimo Folk-Tales collected by Knud Rasmussen

Inuit play makes fun of anthropologists

(LINKS UPDATED 30.9.2020) A new film by Inuit film maker Zacharias Kunuk (53) explores how missionaries force-fed Christianity to the Inuit in the 1920s. It's called The Journals of Knud Rasmussen. Before its official world premier at the Toronto International…

Arctic refuge saved from oil drillers – Inuit divided

Published on December 22, 2005 by lorenz Posted in anthropology (general), anthropology in the news, Arctic / Northern Regions, ecology nature, inuit

Good news (for environmentalists) before the Christmas New Year-break: There will be no oil drilling in the Alaska’s Arctic national wildlife reserve. Republicans have battled to allow drilling in the reserve for 25 years. Although they pledged to try again next year, the defeat was expected to remove the issue from the agenda for a decade, according to The Age.

The region is home to hundreds of polar bears, and tens of thousands of caribou and other animals. Interesting how the concept of beauty differs. Alaska’s 82-year-old senator Ted Stevens is quoted. The wildlife refuge was a “barren, frozen wasteland”, with “constant tundra, no trees, no beauty at all”.

>> read the whole story

Concerning oil drilling, the Inuit are divided as ethnic US Americans: Oil of course means money, therefore Nunatsiaq wrote some years ago: Alaskan Inuit support oil drilling in the ANWR.

In an Guardian article we meet Bruce Inglangasak, an Inupiat Inuit. He describes one of the consequences of the oil drilling in another Alaskan region – it’s smog:

“When the wind blows from the west, a yellow-brown smog goes right across the horizon. In the summer, when I go fishing, it burns my eyes. It’s not just the air. Every time it rains our fish get it and our whales get it. You can feel the difference when you hold the fish now. The flesh is not as firm as it once was.”

The article goes on, telling that the oilfields have not turned out to be the ecological showpieces the Inupiat were promised:

More oil was found than expected and the drilling rigs, roads and pipelines now dominate the landscape. There is an average of more than one toxic spill a day; 43,000 tonnes of nitrogen oxides are released into the air each year, more than in Washington DC.

Nevertheless, he is not against the drilling:

For all his unease about the contamination of his ancestral lands, Mr Inglangasak needs a job. He has an eight-year-old daughter, and hunting and fishing are not enough to keep her clothed, housed and educated.

Seems to be more a problem of capitalism!

>> read the whole Guardian-story: Oil clouds gather over Alaskan eden

The Arctic is changing. An environment at risk. By Mark Nuttall (TheArctic.is)

Zebedee Nungak: Arctic Christmas – The then and now (very nostalgic column in the Windspeaker about the commercialisation of Christmas)

Good news (for environmentalists) before the Christmas New Year-break: There will be no oil drilling in the Alaska's Arctic national wildlife reserve. Republicans have battled to allow drilling in the reserve for 25 years. Although they pledged to try again…

A new word For June – or: When is the Arctic no longer the Arctic?

Published on October 20, 2005 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, Arctic / Northern Regions, ecology nature, inuit, language

Long story in the International Herald Tribune about climate change in the Arctic, sinking cities, unhappy reindeers, emaciated looking polar bears, walruses trying to climb onto white boats, mistaking them for ice floes and seasoned hunters who have been stepping in snow that should be covering ice but instead falling into water.

Traditions are changing. Here a little detail concerning Inuit language:

Take the Inuit word for June, qiqsuqqaqtuq. It refers to snow conditions, a strong crust at night. Only those traits now appear in May. Shari Gearheard, a climate researcher from Harvard, recalled the appeal of an Inuit hunter, James Qillaq, for a new word at a recent meeting in Canada.

One sentence stayed in her mind: “June isn’t really June any more.”

>> read the whole story

Fighting for the Right to be Cold: Inuit leader wins environment prize

Greenpeace activists & Sami reindeer herders want to stop the logging of forests

Published on April 22, 2005 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, Arctic / Northern Regions, ecology nature, indigenous people / minorities, Saami

Six Degrees, Finnland

Greenpeace have set up a Forest Rescue Station in Finnish Lapland to stop the logging of forests used as natural pastures by Sami reindeer herders. This action also highlights outstanding disputes concerning the land rights of the indigenous Sami in Finland. Finland is home to about 7,500 Sami.

The Sami understandably ask why the government and Finnish NGOs always seem to be ready to defend the rights of indigenous peoples in faraway countries, while failing to uphold the rights of Europe’s last first nation in their own country. This winter the Finnish government-owned forestry organisation Metsahallitus announced plans to log state-owned forests where the Sami graze their reindeer, against the wishes of local reindeer herders’ co-operatives and environmental groups. >> continue (updated link)

SEE ALSO:
The Sámi of Far Northern Europe (ArcticCircle)

Six Degrees, Finnland

Inuit leader wins environment prize

Published on April 20, 2005 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, Arctic / Northern Regions, ecology nature, indigenous people / minorities, inuit

Canadian Inuit leader Sheila Watt-Cloutier won the 2005 Sophia environment prize Wednesday for drawing attention to the impact of climate change and pollution on the traditional lifestyles of the Arctic’s indigenous people and others. Ms. Watt-Cloutier, born in Nunavik, Que., and raised in a traditional Inuit family, has been the chairwoman of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference for the past decade. Last year’s winner, Kenyan environmental activist Wangari Maathai, went on to win the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize. >> continue