Postcards from the (not so) frozen North: talking about climate change in Alaska

doi:10.1017/CBO9780511535871.011

8 - Postcards from the (not so) frozen North: talking about climate change in Alaska

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 August 2009

Shannon McNeeley and

Orville Huntington

Edited by

Susanne C. Moser and

Lisa Dilling

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Shannon McNeeley: Affiliation:
University of Alaska–Fairbanks, National Center for Atmospheric Research
Orville Huntington: Affiliation:
Alaska Native Science Commission
Susanne C. Moser: Affiliation:
National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder
Lisa Dilling: Affiliation:
University of Colorado, Boulder

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Summary

In May 2003 and again in January of 2004 a small group of climate change researchers and educators, we among them, met with Alaska Natives in the remote Koyukon Athabascan village of Huslia. We gathered in the log community hall to discuss local and regional impacts of climate change and wildfire. The Huslia Tribal Council hosted the workshop, called in response to concerns heard from Elders from the region about the recent changes seen in the weather, the animals, and the landscape. These were not the expected variations in the climate – something these people had been adapting to as long as they inhabited the region. Rather, these were changes never seen before or told of in their traditional stories passed down for generations. The weather and its spirit, the Elders said, had become different, less predictable.

A long time ago our Elders used to be able to tell the weather, but nowadays they can't even tell weather. My grandfather and my grandfather before that, they said once man starts fooling around with the moon, the weather's going to change. Well, the weather did change …. We're not having the weather we usually have … and it affects the wildlife too … I'm sure a lot of the Elders here have the same question that I'm asking right now – what's happening to our Earth's atmosphere? What's going on out there with this crazy weather? We had a warm winter – no 80 below in the last 3 years, never got more than 40 below. […]

Type: Chapter
Information: Creating a Climate for Change
Communicating Climate Change and Facilitating Social Change
, pp. 139 - 152

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511535871.011 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2007

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