Self-Governance in Nunavut: Traditional and Contemporary Perspectives

Submitted by Carla Browning
Phone: (907) 474-7778
04/15/03

The dynamic transition of the Canadian territory of Nunavut to self-governance will be the topic discussed at a symposium at the University of Alaska Fairbanks this week. Self-Governance in Nunavut: Traditional and Contemporary Perspectives, is scheduled for April 17-18, 2003.

UAF will host two invited speakers from Nunavut, to be joined by local Canadian scholars and UAF faculty with expertise on Nunavut. A public presentation on campus Thursday, April 17 in the Regents’ Conference room in the Butrovich Building will be followed by a more in-depth panel discussion among faculty and students April 18 in the Brooks Building Gathering Room.

Nunavut’s dynamic transition in 1999 offers unique perspectives for Alaskans because of a range of shared cultural, ecological, political and economic issues.

"We anticipate that this symposium will primarily introduce the new territory to the UAF community, with attention to the evolving synthesis of Inuit culture, Canadian political administration, and circumpolar issues represented by Nunavut," said Amy Lovecraft, assistant professor with UAF’s political science department.

Invited speakers will represent diverse perspectives of the territory and its first four years of development. This event is sponsored in part by the Canadian government.

Speakers include:
Jack Hicks is a director in the Department of Executive & Intergovernmental Affairs. Hicks moved to what is now Nunavut in 1984 and worked with several Inuit communities on issues of local and regional concern. From 1991-1994 he worked for the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, the national Inuit organization, as a policy analyst, coordinator of special projects and executive director designing and managing the participation of Inuit organizations in the work of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples. In 1994 he moved to Iqaluit to serve as director of research for the Nunavut Implementation Commission, the federal government commission mandated to advise on the creation of the government of Nunavut. Since its creation Hicks has been the government’s director of evaluation and statistics.

Eva Aariak is commissioner of official languages. She has been a teacher, educator and, for four years, was the Inuktitut book publishing coordinator for the Baffin Divisional Education Council, working to ensure that stories written by Inuit throughout the North found their way into children’s schoolbooks. She has also worked for the CBC as a radio and TV reporter, headed public affairs for the Office of the Interim Commissioner of Nunavut and, for a short period, was the director of training and development division with the government of Nunavut’s Department of Human Resources. In December 1999, Eva was appointed languages commissioner of Nunavut by a vote of the Legislative Assembly. As the first person to hold this office, she looks for new ways to protect and promote Nunavut’s official languages.

Julian Tomlinson, has worked extensively with communities in Nunavut and teaches at Aurora College in Canada’s Northwest Territories.

CONTACT: Amy Lovecraft, UAF political science department, at (907) 474-2688 for more information.