Uqalurait: An Oral History of Nunavut (review)

This impressive compilation contains hundreds of accounts of traditional Inuit life as remembered by Canadian Inuit elders of Nunavut in the last few decades or as described by earlier Inuit in published accounts up to 130 years ago. These lively first-person accounts range from one or two lines to five or six pages, interspersed by the editors' explanatory paragraphs. Topics covered include almost everything, from family, marriage, and adoption, through manifold facets of the spiritual world, to incredibly sophisticated techniques of hunting, transportation, and clothing. These twenty-one chapters cover the commonalities of traditional Inuit culture, whereas the next five chapters recount in detail the annual cycles of four regional Inuit groups of Central Nunavut, differing in climate, geography, and demography.

Almost as important in illuminating the historic Inuit past are the nearly one hundred illustrations, half of which are Inuit artistic depictions of that past. The other half are classic black and white photographs, going back to 1889, by explorers, anthropologists, missionaries, and rcmp, including the famous post–Second World War photographs by Richard Harrington of the starving Ahiarmiut of Keewatin and those by pioneer Inuit photographer Peter Pitsiulak. There are also fifteen colour plates of Inuit graphic recollections of their past, two-thirds from Baker Lake and one-third from Cape Dorset. The book also contains eight maps, an extensive but uneven glossary, a useful bibliography, and a long list of Elders quoted in the text. A perusal of this list and of the accounts reveals a distribution which raises some questions. Over one-third of the quotes are from Igloolik-area Inuit, with those from Pangnirtung and North Baffin next, followed by the 'Barren lands' (Inuit now in Baker Lake and Arviat), and then the Aivilingmiut (of Repulse Bay and Coral Harbour).

While it is understandable that an oral history of Nunavut would omit the Inuit of Nunavik (Nouveau Québec) and Labrador, as well as Holman Island, Paulatak, and the Mackenzie Delta (all in the nwt), Cape Dorset is hardly represented and there is almost nothing from the people of Sanikilluak (the Belchers), Kimmirut, and Iqaluit. Reasons for these choices include: (1) the presence of knowledgeable elders and hence good information on the past; (2) the magnificent researches of Boas (1880) in Pangnirtung and Knud Rasmussen's much-quoted Fifth Thule Expedition (1921–24) in North Baffin and the Igloolik areas; and (3) that these central Arctic areas were home to most of the organizing committee of Suzanne Evaloakjuk, Peter Irniq, Uriash Puququak, and David Serkoak (and deceased members John Maksagak and Geela Giroux) who guided the compiler-editors John Bennett (former editor of the journal Inuktitut) and Susan Rowley (anthropological archaeologist at UBC).

The title word uqalurait is a double pun: it literally means a direction-giving snow-drift shaped like a tongue which, like the French word langue, is the same word as 'language' in inuttitut, referring of course to this spoken/oral history. The editors point out that this book does not dwell on dates and other absolutes but, like any good history, 'brings to life an era that is past,' an era that came after the Inuit traded and acquired firearms but before they adopted Christianity. Though the very oldest accounts might go back that far, most Elders remembered that early period only as small children and often recounted what they had heard from their elders. This is usually called the 'contact-traditional' period; obviously there would be no photographs if there were no contacts, and recollections of such pasts are typically called 'salvage ethnography' as attempts to 'save the past.'

This book is a major compilation of stories of Inuit life and Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (traditional or former knowledge), preserving them before they are lost. It differs from earlier examples such as Weyer's classic The Eskimo: Their Environment and Folkways (1932) and Saladin d'Anglure's penetrating Être et renaître inuit: home, femme ou chamane (2006) not so much in content or photographs...