NWT RESEARCH DATABASE

Regions: Inuvialuit Settlement Region, Gwich'in Settlement Area

Tags: social sciences, archaeology

Objective(s): To understand how Inuvialuit communities experience and understand gender and its material expression in terms of both archaeological and everyday objects from their traditional territories.

Project Description: This project will use ethnographic methods to document the relationships that descendant communities and heritage professionals have with gendered objects, both archaeological and modern. Historically, archaeologists have created and maintained a simplistic and binary understanding of gender in their documentation of Inuvialuit cultural history, without considering their own role in the creation of these binaries. Moreover, archaeologists have rarely discussed concepts of gender with the living descendants of arctic archaeological cultures. The research questions for this project are: 1) How do Inuvialuit communities experience and understand gender and its material expression in terms of both archaeological and everyday objects from their traditional territories? 2) How do archaeologists and other heritage professionals interpret Inuvialuit gender through the material record in their own work? There are two components to the study methodology: 1) focus groups with Inuvialuit residents of the Inuvialuit Settlement Region (ISR); and, 2) semi- structured interviews with both Inuvialuit residents of the ISR and arctic heritage professionals. The Principal Investigator will invite Inuvialuit community members to participate in hour-long focus groups to reflect on their understandings of the relationship between gender and objects (past and present). During these focus groups the PI will provide individuals with stereotypically gendered cultural material and ask participants to reflect on these objects. These stereotypically gendered objects will fall into a number of "gendered work" categories although the exact list of objects will depend of the material available to the project. Stereotypically male gendered objects fall into the hunting and wood working/tool creation categories (ex. harpoon heads, drills) and stereotypically female gendered objects fall into the cooking and skin clothing production categories (ex. lamps, needles). The PI will travel to Inuvik in summer of 2018 to undertake a maximum of 50 semi-structured interviews with Inuvialuit participants. Participants will be asked to respond to various examples of stereotypically gendered and ungendered (ie. women’s knives vs. fishing gear) objects. These interviews will also ask participants questions related to their understandings of both modern and past gender, maleness and femaleness. Interviews may also take place at other locations within the ISR, and with Inuvialuit in Yellowknife, if the opportunity arises. The PI will also conduct participant observation at the Great Northern Arts Festival or another public venue in Inuvik, such as the Inuvialuit Cultural Resource Centre, where the project will set up a display with artifacts and information about the project. The PI will document how Inuvialuit community members engage with a variety of archaeological artifacts and replicas displayed at the booth. Based on participation in this portion of the project, the PI may also recruit more Inuvialuit adults to participate in focus groups and interviews in Inuvik during this visit. In addition to the interviews with Inuvialuit community members, the PI will undertake a maximum of 50 semi-structured interviews with arctic archaeologists and other heritage professionals. Additional semi-structured interviews with arctic heritage professionals will be conducted in person and via telephone at the participants’ convenience. These semi-structured interviews will ask arctic heritage professionals to discuss archaeological evidence of gender. Goodwin will ask participants to discuss how and when they identify, describe and analyze gender in the archaeological record. Participants will also be asked whether and how gender has informed or remained absent from their research questions. This project is associated with the Inuvialuit Living History Project, a research partnership between Western University, the Inuvialuit Cultural Resource Centre (ICRC), Parks Canada and Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre. The knowledge and insights gains during this project will contribute to the understanding of Inuvialuit history and culture. With permission of the participants, the transcripts will be held on file at the ICRC and can contribute to the preservation of Inuvialuit oral history. Furthermore the knowledge gained during interviews with descendant community members will help to include Inuvialuit perspectives on the past in educational materials being developed by the Inuvialuit Living History Project (for online and classroom use) and in academic discourse. The results of this research and requests for feedback will be disseminated to the communities in a variety of ways. The results may be presented during community meetings in Inuvik and a summary of the results will be made available to interested parties on the website for the Inuvialuit Living History Project (http://www.inuvialuitlivinghistory.ca/) through blog updates or on a page dedicated to the research. The Inuvialuit Living History Project publishes a biannual newsletter, which is distributed to all the ISR communities and shared electronically through the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation social media outlets. The results of this research will be shared in the newsletter. Finally, past experience suggests that the research will be of interest to northern media outlets. The research team will take every opportunity to solicit feedback and disseminate the results through TV, radio and print media. All participants will have access to the finished PhD dissertation through a link provided to them upon completion. With participants’ permission, copies of the interviews may be kept on file at the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation's (IRC) Inuvialuit Cultural Resource Centre (ICRC). The fieldwork for this study will be conducted from July 11, 2018 to July 31, 2018.