Inuvialuit Cultural Life Out On the Land - Cassandra Elliott

For the Inuvialuit, harvesting wildlife and plants has been essential to survival in the Canadian Arctic since time immemorial. The primary importance of harvesting is often explained to be food security. There are many aspects of harvest and harvesting that contribute positivity to an Inuvialuit’s way of life, but these have not been captured holistically in a research project before. For this project, 113 Inuvialuit participants were

interviewed from the six communities in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region: Aklavik, Inuvik, Tuktoyaktuk, Sachs Harbour, Ulukhaktok, and Paulatuk. Results from the project outline how time spent out on the land harvesting not only contributes to an individual’s subsistence, but also to education, culture and lifestyle, wellbeing including both mental health and physical health, and relationships with both family and community. Inuvialuit Cultural Life Out on the Land is the first regional research project that provides a complete analysis of how harvesting is not just an activity for Inuvialuit, but a way of life.