BOOKS - Quaqtaq: Modernity and Identity in an Inuit Community
US $6.50
962448
962448
Quaqtaq: Modernity and Identity in an Inuit Community
Author: Louis-Jacques Dorais
Year: May 17, 1997
Format: PDF
File size: PDF 7.3 MB
Language: English
Year: May 17, 1997
Format: PDF
File size: PDF 7.3 MB
Language: English
How, in a world that is drastically changing, can the Inuit preserve their identity? Louis-Jacques Dorais explores this question in Quaqtaq , the first ethnography of a contemporary Canadian Inuit community to be published in over twenty-five years. The community of Quaqtaq is a small village on Hudson Strait where hunting and gathering are still the mainstays of life. In this description of Quaqtaq, based on data collected over a thirty-year period, we get a glimpse of its early cultural history, its development into a settled community, and its present realities. Dorais identifies three principal manifestations of local identity - kinship, religion, and language - that persist despite the brutal intrusion of modernity. He concludes by examining the role politics and education have played in the relationship between Quaqtaq and the outside world. Quaqtaq is a unique and important study that will be of interest to scholars, administrators, and citizens of Inuit and other native communities.