At the beginning of the workshop recognized Professor Julie Cruikshank from the University of British Columbia Canada, holder of many awards and honours for her groundbreaking work on oral history, will give a lecture entitled “Are glaciers‘ good to think with?”.

“In the twenty-first century, the terms indigenous and knowledge have each become contested, internationally and locally. My questions are: What is not recognized as knowledge in dominant regimes? What is lost when local knowledge in Canada is trimmed and transformed to fit the requirements of science, policy and governance? Strikingly, ethnographies from northern Canada that give weight to ontology, values, social relations and meaning are taken up and developed theoretically and in public and political forums in South America (Viveiros de Castro, Blaser, de la Cadena) with implications for subarctic regions”, says Professor emerita Julie Cruikshank.

After the session, the Orhelia project welcomes all participants to continue the discussion by an “Arctic grilling” at a laavu.

Information about the lecturer:
Dr. Julie Cruikshank is professor emerita at University of British Columbia, Canada.

Her research focuses on practical and theoretical developments in the study of oral tradition and history, specifically how competing forms of knowledge become enmeshed in struggles for legitimacy. Her book published in 2005 “Do Glaciers Listen? Local Knowledge, Colonial Encounters, and Social Imagination” has been awarded several times: K.D. Srivastava Prize in 2005 by University of British Columbia, Julian Steward Book Award and Victor Turner Prize by American Anthropological Association in 2006, and a Clio Award from the Canadian Historical Association in 2007.

More recently, she has investigated historical and contemporary encounters among environmental earth sciences and indigenous oral traditions within the recently designated World Heritage Site that spans the borderlands of Yukon, northwest British Columbia and Alaska. In 2012, Dr. Cruikshank was awarded the Order of Canada, one of the highest civilian honours in the country, for her documentation of indigenous oral histories in northern Canada.

More information:
Senior Researcher, Dr. Anna Stammler-Gossmann
Social Anthropology
Tel. +358 400 882065
astammle (at) ulapland.fi

ULapland/Arctic Centre/JL