Inuvialuit Nautchiangit

Relationships between People and Plants

Rarely will you find a more beautiful book about the land. It overflows with brilliant photographs of trees and flowers, shining landscapes and enticing close-ups, smiling faces and working hands. The writing is clear, spacious and multi-layered with fascinating facts, practical wisdom, and a multitude of local voices. But the central beauty of this book is the relationship it celebrates between the Inuvialuit people and the green neighbours with whom they share their natural home.

Crack this book open and the first words you read on the inside jacket capture the intimate spirit of this relationship. “People and plants are very alike,” says Jimmy Memogana of Ulukhaktok. “We both grow on the land.”

The book’s preface puts this relationship on centre stage. “In a relationship wrestled from one of the earth’s most demanding landscapes, the Inuvialuit have not just occupied this land, they have flourished in it. The words and thoughts of Inuvialuit elders in this book are a link to this hard-earned relationship. Plant names, medicinal uses, harvesting techniques, culinary delicacies – all point to where they have come from, to prepare those who travel ahead.”

At the official launch of this book, held on Thursday September 9th 2010, at the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation (IRC) building in Inuvik, Nellie Cournoyea, Chair of the IRC conveys “Inuvialuit Nautchiangit is a book that took a long time to go over and over. It started in the fall of 2002 thanks to the support of the three project partners, IRC, the Aurora Research Institute, and Parks Canada. This book is an answer to a lot of the questions we have as Inuvialuit: What do we use [on the land]? How do we give information to our young people as they learn the traditional knowledge held by elders? How are we going to make sure that this knowledge is passed on?”

Steering the project from start to finish consisted of over fourty elders, who all played an influential role in bringing the book together along with the project researcher Robert Bandringa, an ethnobotanist from the University of British Columbia, and major financial sponsors, including Esso Imperial Oil, BP Canada, and Conoco-Phillips Canada.

Plants as traditional foods, teas, medicines, building materials, fuel, tools, dyes, fibres, glues, fragrances, ornaments, toys, games, shamanic amulets, and yes, snuff – this book’s got it all! Want to learn how to make a muskrat caller with a willow branch and » birch bark? How to start a tundra campfire with fuzz from a woolly lousewort? Or how to make “Eskimo ice-cream” out of cranberries and caribou fat? Look no further. This book even includes a section on the simple joys of sticking a plant between your teeth and just plain chewing.

Plants as traditional foods, teas, medicines, building materials, fuel, tools, dyes, fibres, glues, fragrances, ornaments, toys, games, shamanic amulets, and yes, snuff – this book’s got it all!

This book taught me that since the Inuvialuit first walked this land, they have been chewing on various plant parts for both nourishment and pleasure. These include the sweet, juicy springtime shoots of uqpik or willows, the tart red stems of quaqqat or Arctic dock, and the long fleshy roots of qunguliq or Arctic sorrel.

So popular is willow chewing in Aklavik, to this day, that resident Barbara Allen observes that, “In the springtime, many are seen with little cuts on either side of their mouths from pulling and eating so many willows. When the kids start eating ipsaq (willow sap), they can’t stop!”

Elder Rosie Albert told Tusaayaksat about the enduring value of plants in Inuvialuit life. When asked what kind of plants are still used today, she declared, “All kinds! Some for eating, some for medicine, some for dyeing. For instance, if you shoot your seal, you can dye it any kind of colour that suits you for making your kamiks.”

The tangy gum from spruce trees, generally known as napaaqtuq, is another traditional chewing favourite. Like most Inuvialuit who retain a strong relationship with local plants, Rosie credits her parents for teaching her what she knows about them. “If we were going to go to Kendell Island for the summer, they’d take a lot of gum from spruce trees just in case somebody got cut. I went through that myself when I had a boil in my knee at the whaling camp. So my mother put that spruce gum on my boil then put some old bread on that and wrapped it around with clean cloth and left it there for a week. No matter how sore it was, I had to suffer the pain until it went away. By then it was perfectly clear. Still works today!”

Inuvialuit Nautchiangit touches on all aspects of daily life from diet, medicine, technology, traditional beliefs, arts and crafts to associating with animals on the land. A complex concept to grasp when looked with foreign eyes; however for the Inuvialuit it is a model that defined their existence for generations and continues to do so today. It has the spirit and intent of the Inuvialuit, and the information and knowledge they can pass on – not only to the Inuvialuit but also to other people who are interested in their culture.∞

Staying

warm,

being S afe & f eeling cozy

Alici A l ennie we A ring Muskr A t p A rk A with blue fox tri M Made by Winnie Co C kney.

Mukluks with flor A l e M broidery.

Made by b illie l ennie.

By Jamie Bastedo