From Introduction: "In March 2013, elders, Dene language specialists and others got together for a workshop to talk about how the story of species at risk can be understood through the language and stories of Dene and Métis. They agreed that the main people who need to work on these things are the present and future youth of the Sahtú Region. This book is dedicated to the workshop participants, and to the youth who are the future stewards of the land.

The first part of this book is a story, Remember the Promise, with Dene words. The meanings of those words can be found in the glossary (page 18). The second part includes more details about the workshop and the terms that were worked on in the dialects of Délı̨nę, Tulı́t’a, and K’asho Got’ı̨nę. The last part has more information about species at risk in the NWT.

Keeping the Dene language alive is part of keeping alive people’s sacred and respectful relationships with other living things. We hope that this book will encourage people to speak and understand the language of this land, the language of the ancestors. Through the language, we are sure to remember the promise."

Read more about this project, and access the full text in multiple languages, on the Remember the Promise page on the SRRB site. 

Sahtú Renewable Resources Board. Kǝdǝ Nıt’ǫ Benats’adı́, Remember the Promise. Compiled by Betty Harnum and Deborah Simmons, with a foreword by Michael Neyelle, 2014.

The Sahtú Land Use Plan is the culmination of all of the mapping, consultation, and research that went into outlining the activities appropriate for the Sahtú Settlement Area following the SDMCLCA. The plan discusses conservation and development, and does not restrict or direct harvesting of Sahtú Dene and Métis. It pays special attention to the socio-cultural as well as the economic wellbeing of Sahtú residents, focusing on water resources as well as land use.

Access this Resource:

The Land Use Plan is available to the public on the Planning Board website.

Sahtú Land Use Planning Board. Sahtú Land Use Plan.Fort Good Hope, 2013.

From Abstract:

This thesis examines how community hunting strategies and food-sharing networks facilitate social-ecological resilience to a decreased availability of barren-ground caribou in the K’asho Got’ine region of the Sahtú Settlement Area. It is based on collaborative research carried out with the Fort Good Hope Renewable Resources Council, including participant observation and interviews. I demonstrate that organizers of autumn community hunts (2007-2010) responded flexibly to ecological conditions (i.e. the availability of different species of game), and to community perspectives about the hunts, while working to address the broader needs of traditional knowledge education for youth and the food security of vulnerable demographics. A tradition of food-sharing has always been an important mechanism by which the latter need is met. Based on a comparison of two hunts in 2009 (a community hunt versus a series of household hunts), I find that vulnerable groups received meat to a greater extent after the community hunt in part through their exercising their eligibility for it through requests.

Access this Resource:

The University of Alberta has made this thesis accessible to the public.

McMillan, Roger C. Resilience to Ecological Change: Contemporary Harvesting and Food-Sharing Dynamics in the K’asho Got’ine community of Fort Good Hope, Northwest Territories. Master’s Thesis, University of Alberta, 2012.

This paper describes the process of developing the NWT Ice Patch Study with Elders from Tulı́t’a, and the researchers’ efforts to incorporate traditional knowledge into their interpretation of archeological data. They interviewed Elders, ran science camps with Elders and youth, and involved oral histories and traditional land-use mapping in their fieldwork. The team spatially recorded oral traditions about hunting caribou in the mountains and on ice patches, contextualizing these histories with maps of place names, trails, hunting areas, resource-gathering areas, etc. Ice patches were of particular interest for the archaeological remnants of both historical caribou and their hunters.

During the study, the researchers recorded a number of Dene terms about Ice Patch conditions and other snow/ice terms (p 39).

Conditions of snow (zha)

zhahdewé                    “big snow,” a deep blanket of snow from a storm (a)

k’ahbahchoré              “ptarmigan feathers,” light, fluffy snow (a)

shiré                              dry, flaky top layer of snow (a)

fileh                              loose, crystalline snow layer below shiré (a)

náegah                         powdery snow (a)

tahsilé                          hard snow (a)

zhaaɂurééłįh               melting snow (a)

zhahtsele                     heavy, wet snow (a)

įzé                                 slushy snow (a)

dazhá                           snow on tree branches (a)

zhatú                           water from melted snow (a)

Ice or snow features

zhaayáfelah                ice patch (a)

łubee                           glacier (a)

łuugháh                      rough, broken ice on a river, making it difficult for travel (a)

p’enii                           frozen overflow, where water from below the snow or ice has seeped to surface and frozen (a)

tegahtú                       wet overflow (a)

Access this Resource:

Thomas D. Andrews, Glen MacKay, Leon Andrew, Wendy Stephenson, Amy Barker, Claire Alix and the Shúhtagot’ine Elders of Tulita. “Alpine Ice Patches and Shúhtagot’ine Land Use in the Mackenzie and Selwyn Mountains, Northwest Territories, Canada.” Arctic 65, no. 1 (2012): 22-42.

The speakers begin by introducing themselves in their own languages. Fibbie introduces Délı̨nę, the community, geography, population, and other characteristics such as subsistence. She then moves to a discussion of Sahtú Dene language, and the age differences in language use. The community tries to mitigate intergenerational language loss with on the land programs for their children, both formal and informal, community-driven. Going on to the land during the summer is often lead by families, who still do a lot of harvesting on the land in their traditional regions. Ingeborg then discusses how people in Délı̨nę talk about place, from the point of view of a linguist. Tatti and Fink worked with several Elders and three youth participants to run a workshop in Délı̨nę in November 2012. The workshop had intergenerational participants work with audiovisual recording technology and Google Earth to record place name knowledge.

Abstract:

This paper highlights the benefits of a community-based approach (see Czaykowska-Higgins, 2009; Vallejos, 2014) in a language documentation project in the Dene community of Délı̨nę, Canada. It describes the collaborative efforts of a community researcher and an outside linguist to develop joint research interests and ground them with other community members in the specific cultural setting in order to benefit all parties. We first outline our project and the factors that contributed to the success of our research approach, focusing on an inter-generational workshop. We then introduce our results and demonstrate how the setup of the research brought forward crucial insights to the specific knowledge of place in Dene. 

After identifying with elders of the community historically and culturally important geographic locations, including the traditional name attached to each location, we learned from the elders the stories behind the name of each location. The deeper meanings of these stories are known to people who lived on the land but are often unknown to younger generations. We developed a methodology bringing together elders and younger generations in an inter-generational workshop and actively engaging both in the research process in order to contribute to capacity building in language documentation and revitalization. The workshop was facilitated by a community researcher and held in Dene to enable the documentation of interactional patterns and communicative practices. At the same time the outside linguist trained youth participants in language documentation methodology (eg. multi-media recording, Google Earth), which they were able to perform independently by the end of the workshop. Since many of the younger generation are not fluent in Dene, English summaries were given throughout the workshop. These summaries allowed the younger generation to follow the content of the stories while also witnessing cultural protocols. Despite the challenges of the language barrier, the presence of the younger generation highly contributed to the motivation of the elders.

In analyzing the complex relationships between an outside researcher and community researchers from diverse generations and backgrounds as well as among community researchers we conclude that it was the research set up and the reciprocal relationships, as well as the observation of cultural protocols that proved to be crucial in the production and analysis of natural, reliable and validated language materials. In giving concrete examples and reflecting the challenges of our approach this paper contributes to the theory of developing effective research approaches that engage citizen scientists from various backgrounds.

Access this Resource:

Tatti, Fibbie and Ingeborg Fink. “Towards a multi-layered understanding of place in Dene: An inter-generational and inter-disciplinary approach to Dene narratives.” Presented at the 4^th International Conference on Language Documentation and Conservation (ICLDC), 12 March 2015.

From Abstract:

In the Northwest Territories (NWT), land claims created tripartite co-management boards, a power-sharing mechanism between Aboriginal organizations, territorial, and federal governments. Land use planning is overseen by such boards and is intended to be a community driven process but Aboriginal organizations and communities have difficulty participating at the same level as their government counterparts. The Great Bear Rainforest (GBR) agreement in British Columbia was considered as a "success" case study on Aboriginal participation in land use planning. Interviews with Aboriginal leadership and non-Aboriginal resource people were conducted in the GBR, the Dehcho and Sahtu for "lessons learned", and to identify ways to create enabling conditions for Aboriginal participation. Three spheres of influence were identified. Aboriginal leadership can create enabling conditions by influencing the technical planning process, exhibiting strong leadership and by adopting good governance practices and structures.

Access this Resource:

Collections Canada has made this resource available for free online. 

Mak, Ida. Enhancing Aboriginal Participation in Northern Land Use Planning. Master’s Thesis, Royal Roads University, 2011.

This paper is based on an evaluation of Dechinta, Bush University’s first semester, run by Thea Luig in 2010. The evaluation consisted of semi-structured interviews with instructors and students, along with a critical reflection from the founder and manager of Dechinta (second and third authors, respectively). Dechinta aims to promote experiential, land-based learning based on “Indigenous values and ways of relating to the environment” (14).

From the variety of evidence collected from their evaluation, the authors conclude that Dechinta has enormous potential to be a model of land-based instruction. Students have personal, embodied, and experiential learning experiences that lead to “unique understanding… tangible skills, personal growth, and high knowledge retention” (21). It faces the challenge of funding, and dogmatic understandings of what higher education entails. In addition, the authors call for further research to understand learning and well-being in relational contexts.

Abstract:

In June 2010 “Dechinta” - Bush University Centre for Research and Learning ran their first semester of land-based and university-accredited courses. During a three-week pilot session at a remote location in the Canadian Northwest Territories, students from Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal background learned about health promotion, the history of their people, governance, creative writing, and sustainable technologies. Resident Elders, cultural experts, university professors, and artists taught in collaboration through fireside lecturing, writing, and speaking assignments, travelling out on the land, gathering wood, harvesting, moose hide tanning, making dry fish, and more. Experiential learning that engaged students on intellectual, emotional, and physical levels created awareness of various emotional difficulties, their causes, and their effects on health among participants. The experience of interrelatedness with the land and the group, sharing these experiences in storytelling and writing, working and being on the land proved effective in addressing and emotionally integrating these issues. The Elders present contributed to this process by modeling appropriate behaviour in the face of difficulties and conflict. This paper intends to show the varied relationships between the pedagogy of northern Aboriginal people and the promotion of lifelong well-being. It will relate the experience of Dechinta with a theoretical discussion drawing on critical pedagogy, cultural anthropology, and psychology.

Access this Resource:

This PDF is not available open access, but can be purchased from the Journal in its bookstore. 

DOI: https://doi.org/10.18848/2156-8960/CGP/v01i03/41181

Luig, Thea, Erin Freelnd Ballantyne, Kyla Kakfwi Scott. “Promoting Well-Being through Land-Based Pedagogy.” The International Journal of Health, Wellness and Society 1, no. 3 (2011):13-26.

This paper comes out of 2009 workshop at the Northern Governance Policy Research Conference called Research the Indigenous Way. It addresses the 22 participants’ sharing circle input on how “alternative” Indigenous research can support Indigenous governance. Specifically, this refers to an Indigenous research paradigm that does not subscribe to or perpetuate “colonial concepts of governance.” (102)

The authors point to the Mackenzie Valley pipeline challenge as a beginning of Indigenous research in the north. They go on to outline the somewhat exploitative and extractive relationship between Indigenous peoples in the north and southern Canadian scholars. While “Indigenous research” is filled with diversity, it shares a common emphasis on relationships “to the environment, the land, and the ancestors” (106). Additionally, participants talked about the role of traditional knowledge, stories and their lessons for environment and governance, suggesting “the stories in themselves are governance… it is not necessary to distil these into abstract policy governance” (112). A young participant acknowledges the difficulty of being an Indigenous researcher and learning from elders if they cannot speak their language (114). Some other defining characteristics of Indigenous research in this paper include reaching out to one’s heritage, working with an eye to continuity over time, and its need to be recognized as a credible foundation for Indigenous self-determination. (118) Furthermore, in an ideal context, Indigenous researchers will have support from non-Indigenous researchers as resource people, rather than vice versa.

Abstract:

This paper is based on experiences, views, and stories shared by the 22 participants who spoke at the Research the Indigenous Way workshop at the Northern Governance Policy Research Conference in November 2009. The paper does not address all the issues raised, but rather focuses specifically on how the workshop sheds new light on the nature of alternative Indigenous research that would support Indigenous governance. The sharing circle format of the workshop is considered as a model reflecting the research paradigm being talked about. This paradigm requires a critique of past northern “Indigenous” research that perpetuates colonial concepts of governance. Key messages from the groundbreaking work of the Traditional Knowledge Practitioners Group in 2008–2009 are combined with narratives from the workshop to provide a picture of current thinking about Indigenous research in the North, and practical considerations in applying this paradigm. Indigenous people have always been engaged in research processes as part of their ethical “responsibility to keep the land alive.”

Access this Resource:

Pimatisiwin: A Journal of Aboriginal and Indigenous Community Health has made this article available online here. 

The full text is also available on ResearchGate.

McGregor, Deborah, Water Bayha, and Deborah Simmons. “‘Our Responsibility to Keep the Land Alive’: Voices of Northern Indigenous Researchers.” Pimatisiwin: A Journal of Aboriginal and Indigenous Community Health 8, no. 1 (2010): 101-123.

From Abstract:

This dissertation examines the ways in which three Aboriginal communities in the Sahtu Region of the Northwest Territories are participating in decisions and activities related to non-renewable resource extraction on Sahtu lands.

Carly Dokis' dissertation was later turned into a book, Where the Rivers Meet. Read about the book and access the Google Book preview on its own item page in this catalogue.   

Access this Resource:

Read the dissertation on the Collections Canada website. 

Read the dissertation from the University of Alberta online repository. 

DOI: https://doi.org/10.7939/R3H12M

Dokis, Carly A. People, Land, and Pipelines: Perspectives of Resource Decision Making Processes in the Sahtu Region, Northwest Territories. Doctoral Thesis, University of Alberta, 2010.

Abstract: 

The empirical setting and context for this contribution is the Hare Indian land in the Northwest Territories in Canada. The author opposes a purely taxonomic approach to ethnobiology. The main focus is on the Hare Indian trappers’ knowledge about prey animals, most notably the marten. This knowledge is based on experiences involving both practical and emotional engagement as well as narrative communication. It is argued that this knowledge is converted to actual trapping strategies. The same knowledge also has implications for identity management, because it is regarded as a prerequisite in order to feel at home in a Hare Indian Space, and it is also linked to how places are invested with emotion. Thus the trappers’ behavior and action is not only invested with, but also motivated by, emotion. Based on empirical information, it is suggested that feelings about the nature of nature and what it contains are generated by how associations are tied to clusters of significant observations and ideas.

Access this Resource: 

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/08003830902951540

Broch, Harald. "Tracks that Matter: On Space, Place and Hare Indian Ethnobiology with special reference to the Marten." Acta Borealia 26, no. 1 (2009): 77-95.