Living the Change:
Engaging with Arctic Communities
The Arctic is home to many different communities in Russia, Greenland, Alaska, Canada and northern Scandinavia. These films highlight traditional knowledge and allow insights in tradition and culture of these Arctic communities.
The films
Svalbard film v7
Short film (4:04), general audience, Svalbard, history, climate change, ice melt, glaciers
Oct 2015 in Svalbard. This film is about a female polar bear guide in Svalbard who narrates a short film about the climate changes she is witnessing compared to the stories of polar explorers of the past. The film is more poetic than a strict storytelling-based film.
Dr. Tyler Robert Jones
INSTAAR, University of Colorado
Hivunikhavut - Our Future
Film (11:49), general audience, Community-collaborative; Participatory; Future; Marine; Sustainability
The film "Hivunikhavut - Our Future" presents a transdisciplinary research project that explored the future of the Kitikmeot Marine Region of Nunavut, Canada, by 2050.
Using participatory scenario planning, we designed scenarios of this rapidly changing marine region under different trends of marine development, climate change and governance. Scenarios are plausible stories of the future. These stories bridge different types of information and ways of knowing, from Indigenous and local knowledge to climate models, to help explore uncertain aspects of the future and guide today’s planning. This scenario planning project brought together Inuit community members, managers and scientists to co-produce scenarios that explore the impacts of future trends on the region's marine ecosystem, and the implications for coastal communities.
A film produced by Marianne Falardeau as part of her doctoral research at McGill University (Montreal, Canada), with help from Victor Massicot for video editing and music. This project was mentored by Drs. Elena Bennett and Ciara Raudsepp-Hearne. We are grateful to the community of Cambridge Bay, the Ekaluktutiak Hunters and Trappers Organization (EHTO), and to everyone who contributed.
The Water is Wide - An Excerpt
Film (13:45), general audience, Alaska; climate change; permafrost; land loss; indigenous community
For Season 2 of Threshold (an environmental podcast), we traveled to each of the 8 arctic countries to find out how climate change is being experienced by the people who live there. This movie contains audio clips from our episode on Shishmaref, Alaska, which is just shy of the arctic circle. We wanted to find out how visible and impactful climate change is in this part of the world, and how the community there is adjusting to the changes that are happening so quickly.
Threshold, Amy Martin, Nick Mott, and the Pulitzer Center
Children of the Dig
Film (19:58), general audience, Alaska; archaeology; permafrost
In 2009, a 500-year-old artifact was discovered on the beach outside of Quinhagak, Alaska, opening the door to the most productive archaeological dig in Arctic history with 60,000 artifacts recovered so far. In 2009, the site was 50 feet from the ocean. Today it is ten.
Joshua A. Branstetter. Children of the Dig is a Branstetter Film production produced in collaboration with the Nunnaleq Project, Qanirtuuq, Inc., the Village of Quinhagak, and the University of Aberdeen with support from the Arts and Humanities Research Council.