Village People

Native folks on the North Slope refer to their way of life as Subsistence, a term that refers to existence itself, as well as the basic means of life. Subsistence for the Inupiaq is whaling, fishing, berry picking, and hunting for caribou and birds-- true living off of the wild.

Subsistence depends on navigation and the ability to read the landscape and the weather. Here climate change is an obvious fact with direct consequences for livelihood and the preservation of culture. Warmer sea temperatures result in thinner arctic ice, which increases the dangers of whaling. Changed seasons and weather patterns effect caribou migration patterns and the prevalence and health of birds and fish.

The opposite to subsistence is cash economy, where people cannot do without money. In the little village store a 2 1/2 pound pot roast costs $44.



Sharing and avoidance of conflict are considered fundamental cultural values. Any time of day and you’ll be offered a cup of hot coffee, fresh from the microwave.

The CB radio is always on—its airwaves are the village’s main public space. First thing in the morning the shout outs begin. Someone will say “Good morning, good morning,” and another will respond “Good morning, good morning.” Off and on for hours, the people say good morning to their community, and only the occasional flight report or “Johnny are you headed home?” type of question breaks the pattern.

At twelve the message changes to “Good afternoon, good afternoon."




I suppose that you can figure out what happens in the evening.

Tundra Moonshine

I’m certain that the good people of Atqasuk have many reasons to be wary of visiting academics, so it’s hard not to feel rapturous gratitude for their willingness to share stories and wisdom with us. Add to that rapture my tendency to fall in love with spunky older folks, and to view my nature-loving brethren with inordinate admiration, and you’ll understand why I’m an enthusiastic proponent of feminist revisions of “scientific objectivity.” As the great anthropologist Edmund Carpenter said, it’s best to expect and acknowledge one’s own biases, to work with them rather than against them.


A few nights ago we interviewed Joseph, age 78, and Joshua, 71, about changes they’ve noticed in the landscape. We’d met them both at the Wednesday night church singalong, where Joshua played mandolin and Joseph played guitar. Joseph is a small man with a sunken jaw, twinkling eyes, and thick salt and pepper hair combed straight back in an impressive pompadour. When we gave him the consent form to sign before our interview began, he turned to our translator Ethel and for a minute or so spoke a passionate streak in Inupiaq. Ethel told us that Joseph wanted to know if we were all U.S. citizens. He was uncomfortable sharing information with foreigners. Joshua added in English that our country is in a sacred time right now because we are at war. Well, who could argue with that? Wendy, John, and I jumped up and grabbed our driver’s licenses, grabbed the opportunity to seal a nationalist bond with our delightful subjects.

Am I a fickle radical? I would have gladly sung the Star Spangled Banner at the top of my lungs if it would have made Joseph happy.

That night the winds kicked up with the full moon, and I felt the pull of a strange seductive lunacy arrive with the midnight sunset. I got lost in the thumping of my own heart, knew in my bones how easy it would be to lose every reference point, to care only about what’s right in front of me.

Our interview with Peter, suntanned and smiling and built like a bear, was filled with good food talk. A search and rescue team member and highly respected hunter and fisherman, Peter described the power of native food, how eating seal, whale, and caribou keeps the body warm on the tundra. “You eat some frozen walrus out of the cellar and you’ll stay warm for hours. Eat store-bought food and you’ll freeze out there in no time.” When I asked him about search and rescue, he said the main rule is that if you break down, don’t leave your snowmobile, “We always find the machine first.”

I was fueled by the tofu and zucchini I’d brought up from the grocery store in Barrow. Even in high-tech thermal underwear I suppose I’d freeze pretty easily in the right conditions. Some bear would rip into me and examine the contents of my vegetarian stomach and think, Well, No Wonder.

In these interviews we keep hearing that the sun and stars are not where they’ve always been, that the earth has shifted on its axis. Best to stay close to my machine. If the lunacy really takes over you’ll find me here, still clinging to my laptop.

Meeting with Hillary

Karen and I got home from the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival at 4:30 in the morning, so I had a few hours to nap, do laundry, and repack my bag before catching the afternoon flight to Anchorage. My friends Wendy Eisner and Ken Hinkel (UC geographers) and I got a grant to interview Inupiaq Eskimo elders about climate and environmental changes on Alaska’s North Slope, so I was tundra bound.

I zonked out for most of the ten hour flight, and arrived at the scuzzy Inlet Inn in downtown Anchorage close to midnight, sans clean clothes and toothbrush (the airline lost my bag). Got up again before the crack of dawn to catch the six am flight to Barrow-- the northernmost point in Alaska, and home base for the wealth of biological, geophysical, and oceanic science conducted on the North Slope year round. Ken met me at the little airport, and we headed for the research center.

BARC, the Barrow Area Research Center, was abuzz with anticipation. Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and two other senators (Susan Collins from Maine, and Lindsey Graham from South Carolina, both republicans) were visiting for the day, to learn about research on climate change. Wendy was told that they’re working on legislation to circumvent Bush resistance to the Kyoto Protocol, and to allow the U.S. to join to rest of the world in efforts to curtail global warming. Well, if they wanted to learn about climate change, we had some information to share.

Climate change is not a very speculative matter in the North Slope-- coastline is eroding, lakes are draining, and permafrost is thawing all around the Arctic. Inupiaq hunters tell us they can no longer rely on traditional methods of navigation and weather prediction, and that changes in temperatures and the seasons have disrupted animals’ feeding and migration patterns. Nearly everyone we’ve interviewed says the tundra is changing dramatically due to general warming trends, and contamination and seismic activity from oil drilling and excavation. Still, our project is a hopeful one-- Inupiaq elders and community leaders know their expertise about the landscape can help their communities adjust to new realities, and they also know that they can contribute to scientific understanding of the causes and effects of climate change, and perhaps to the prevention of further damage.



Less jazzed than I was about the prospect of schmoozing with Hillary, Wendy had already left for Atqasuk (population 250, accessible only by air or snowmobile), where we conduct our interviews. Her skepticism was justified-- when Ken and I arrived at BARC, we learned that there wouldn’t be any real opportunity to discuss research with the senators. Instead, they’d be joining everyone for an hour over lunch. My horror over the fact that I might meet HRC wearing the t-shirt I’d had on since I left Cincinnati (which I’d also slept in) began to fade. At least the staff had hung up research posters around the dining room, and ours, "Past, Present, and Future Climate Change in Arctic Alaska: Combining Inupiat Elders’ Knowledge with Scientific Approaches," was prominently displayed.

Ken and I arrived in the dining room just in time to see John McCain emerge from the food line, hunched over his cafeteria tray, looking rather sickly and small. Hillary followed a moment later, alert and energetic, in pretty blue North country fashion. French fries and mac&cheese sat happily on her lunch tray. After a second’s pause a ring of local politicos ushered the distinguished visitors to a corner table in the back of the room. But though they settled down right next to our poster, it appeared increasingly unlikely that we’d have an opportunity to talk to the senators at all.

I found a good vantage point-- Hillary looked great, and she had fresh funky highlights in her hair-- and Ken and I ate our lunch and gossiped with a group of soil scientists from California. The hour was almost up, and I knew that if I didn’t try to get closer to the power center, I’d kick myself later for wimping out. “Go on over there Chris,” Ken said, giving me the nudge I needed. I noticed an open space at the corner table, grabbed a chair, and sidled on over to where Hillary sat, surrounded by dudes.

One guy, the director of a major research environmental center, was droning on about the prospect of lots of people in China and India driving cars like we do, droning on and on about his own ecological pessimism. “I was talking with Al Gore the other day, and he believes there’s some hope for greater efficiency, but I just don’t see it happening. I really don’t see a solution to these problems.” When he mentioned the lack of leadership in Washington, McCain snorted and mumbled agreement that “they don’t know what they’re talking about, they can hardly even pass an energy bill.”

This did not seem to be a very productive use of Hillary’s attention, so I butted in. “Well, it seems that if we are looking for big overarching solutions to the problem of climate change we are going to be easily discouraged. That’s why it’s so wondeful that you're visiting the North Slope today, because what we see here at the local level are some really unique and positive opportunities. The communities up here are already dramatically affected by global warming, so there are great incentives for cooperation and collaborative problem solving. For example, in the research project that we’re working on (dramatic sweep of the arm as I pointed to our cool poster), we are bringing local Eskimo elders together with scientists who work on the tundra, to better understand the sources of climate change, and to predict future changes.”

“Yes,” said Hillary, “we were in the Yukon yesterday, and it’s really interesting to see how willing the native communities are to work with scientists and politicians…” We exchanged a few other comments before HRC’s aide came over to end lunch and initiate the move onward to the next phase of their visit—a helicopter tour of the tundra.

As a group of students gathered around HRC for photos I backed away to find Susan Collins, the senator who recently cosponsored a resolution encouraging the Transitional National Assembly of Iraq to adopt a constitution granting women equal rights under the law, and to work to protect such rights. I wanted to thank her for her efforts, and to ask what sort of support might be helpful. Collins seemed sweet, and truly concerned about the women of Iraq. Not bad for a republican.

When Hillary passed me on her way out, I reached out to give her aide an envelope containing some information about our project. “That’s great, thank you!” Hillary said as she snatched the envelope from my hands herself, and headed out toward the chopper.