This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).
The magnification of climate warming in high-latitude ecosystems poses a variety of challenges to arctic peoples. In Alaska and elsewhere in the Arctic, climate change have been linked to reduced subsistence opportunities and increased difficulties of predicting environmental conditions that are critical for the livelihood of residents of these regions. In particular, changes in snow cover and ice distribution has generally had a negative impact on travel and subsistence activities. This research team seeks to build a partnership among scientific disciplines (social and natural science) and indigenous peoples with a long tradition of environmental observations. A multi- disciplinary project is planned to examine human perspectives on river ice conditions during the winter season from freeze-up through break-up in interior Alaska.
The objectives of the project are to document dangerous ice conditions throughout the winter and to produce videography and oral records of observations made by long-term local river travelers and physical scientists. The documentation consists of oral descriptions and video recordings of conditions. These serve as a reference for analyzing both the physical conditions and the way participants call upon experience and training to frame their descriptions and evaluate conditions. A second objective is to record the observations on an existing on-line data base to extend the longitudinal record of locations with dangerous ice that affect the safety of winter travelers.
In fostering a partnership between academic disciplines (social and natural science) the investigators seek to obtain a broader framework for interpreting both natural phenomena and human interpretations of these phenomena. The researchers hope that the information gathered here and the collaborations between researchers and local people will influence other observation efforts across the Arctic.
