The essays in this collection explore a wide variety of topics broadly related to cultural renewal and representation, oral history, heritage, and social change among the Inuit of Igloolik, in Nunavut’s northern Qikiqtani Region.

This is an eclectic collection of essays written and compiled in recognition of Leah Aksaajuq Otak.

Leah was a skilled oral historian and linguist from Igloolik, whose essential contribution to scientific research in Nunavut inspired those who knew and worked with her. During the last two decades of her life, Leah Otak worked at the Igloolik Research Centre, where she played a crucial role facilitating the fieldwork of visiting researchers from near and far. Her collaboration with researchers, particularly in the social sciences, together with her extensive work documenting Inuit oral histories, ensured that Inuit traditional knowledge and perspectives informed and were reflected in much of the resulting research.

Contributors to the volume include:

Eva Aariak; George Qulaut; Hugh Brody; Kenn Harper; Louis-Jacques Dorais; Susan Rowley; Claudio Aporta; Jack Hicks; Sheena Kennedy Dalseg; Bernadette Driscoll Engelstad; Jonathan King; Sylvie LeBlanc; John MacDonald; Birgit Pauksztat; Willem Rasing; Noah Richler; and Nancy Wachowich.

John MacDonald spent most of his working life in the Canadian Arctic, including twenty-five years as co-ordinator of the Igloolik Research Centre in Igloolik, Nunavut, where he worked closely with Inuit elders participating in the community’s oral history project. He is the author of The Arctic Sky and co-editor of The Hands’ Measure (Nunavut Arctic College Media), a work highlighting the urgency of recording and documenting Indigenous oral histories and traditional knowledge.

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Nancy Wachowich is a Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. Her collaborative work, Saqiyuq: Stories from the Lives of Three Inuit Women, written with Apphia Agalakti Awa, Rhoda Kaukjak Katsak, and Sandra Pikujak Katsak, was awarded the 1999 Canadian Historical Association’s Clio Award for the North and the 2000 Oral History Association (USA) Award for Best Project. Nancy Wachowich’s friendship with Leah Aksaajuq Otak began in 1997, when she was living in Igloolik and conducting doctoral research. Leah’s insights into Arctic colonial histories and women’s skin sewing traditions have been an ongoing source of inspiration since that time. Nancy is co-founder, with Sheila Katsak, of the Mittimatalik Arnait Miqsuqtuit Collective, a women’s collective that is creating a digital archive of skin sewing skills and promoting the sustainability of the art form.

Nancy Wachowich's profile page