This paper came out of the Social Economy Research Network of Northern Canada (SERNNoCa) established 2006. The network encouraged research in communities such as Délı̨nę, where a project on social economy was conducted from 2009 to 2011, co-occurring with projects on the Délı̨nę Knowledge Centre and Port Radium. The authors unpack Indigenous social economy in Délı̨nę as a case study of intersecting models: “non-commodified kinship based subsistence production and sharing…, wage labour, government subsidies, commodified goods and services, and imported social economy institutions” (254).

They also question the value of functionalist analyses of social economies as based around economic needs, when Indigenous communities may define their own goals and aspirations that do not fit into typical models. Using Dene Ts’ı̨lı̨ (being Dene) as a conceptual starting point, the authors analyze social economy using language and oral traditions. Délı̨nę community members identified four key research needs: caribou knowledge and stewardship, audio documentation of Sahtú spirituality and well-being, climate change and community responses, and youth knowledge.

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Simmons, Deborah, Walter Bayha, Ingeborg Fink, Sarah Gordon, Keren Rice, and Doris Taneton. “Gúlú Agot’ı T’á Kǝ Gotsúhɂa Gha (Learning about Changes): Rethinking Indigenous Social Economy in Délı̨nę, Northwest Territories.” In Northern Communities Working Together: The Social Economy of Canada’s North, edited by Chris Southcott, 253-274. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2015.

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