This report was commissioned to study these issues, review the reports and report back to the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. It concluded that the main reason for the relocation was a concern to improve the living conditions of the Inuit population of northern Quebec, and that while mistakes were made, the projects should be viewed as a limited success story.
The High Arctic relocations of the 1950s involved the relocation of Inuit from Inukjuak, in northern Quebec, to Craig Harbour on Ellesmere Island and Resolute Bay on Cornwallis Island. The seven chapters following the introduction examine the cultural context for the relocation, the Inuit view of the relocation, the historical context for the relocation scheme and the scheme itself, the planning and implementation of the scheme, the consequences of the relocation, sovereignty as a reason for the relocation, and the various responses to the relocatees' complaints. The final three chapters set out the Commission's conclusions, evaluate the government's responsibilities, and contain the Commission's recommendations.
Study of the Canadian government's Inuit relocation experiment in the eastern high Arctic. The study deals mainly with the relocation in 1953 and 1955 from Port Harrison to Grise Fiord and Resolute Bay examining the reasons for, execution of, and consequences for the Inuit of the relocation.
Inuit Women is the definitive study of the Inuit during a time of rapid change. Based on fourteen years of research and fieldwork, this analysis focuses on the challenges facing Inuit women as they enter the twenty-first century. Written shortly after the creation of Nunavut, a new province carved out of traditional Inuit homelands in the Canadian North, this compelling book combines conclusions drawn from the authors' ethnographic research with the stories of Inuit women and men, told in their own words. In addition to their presentation of the personal portraits and voices of many Inuit respondents, Janet Mancini Billson and Kyra Mancini explore global issues: the impact of rapid social change and Canadian resettlement policy on Inuit culture; women's roles in society; and gender relations in Baffin Island, in the Eastern Arctic. They also include an extensive section on how the newly created territory of Nunavut is impacting the lives of Inuit women and their families. Working from a research approach grounded in feminist theory, the authors involve their Inuit interviewees as full participants in the process. This book stands alone in its attention to Inuit women's issues and lives and should be read by everyone interested in gender relations, development, modernization, globalization, and Inuit culture.
Living conditions on the east coast of Hudson Bay forty years ago were desperate. In 1953, a number of Inuit families were moved by the Canadian government for that coast in Northern Quebec and Baffin Island to the high Arctic Islands of Ellesmere and Cornwallis. The reason for the moves as stated by the government at the time was to take the Inuit away from destitution in Northern Quebec and to relocate them in an area of better game and fur trapping potential. In the 1970's, Inuit spokepersons began to make representations to the effect that the people had been moved against their will from a place of abundance to a place of harshness and suffering in order to protect Canadian sovereignty in the Arctic. Today, in the 1990's, they are claiming a $10,000,000 settlement to compensate for wrongdoing and suffering -- from Preface.
