For people living in the Arctic, climate change means shifts in subsistence practices, travel safety and infrastructure. But it also means the need to tell a story of adaptation – the story that locals are the best to tell.
Roberta Tuurraq Glenn completed her master's degree at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and, as a part of her thesis project, built a storymap that communicates the effects of climate change from the perspective of local observers. The website she created – which can be found at https://bit.ly/GlennStoryMap – summarizes observations from the North Slope, Northwest Alaska and Bristol Bay communities who speak about warmer temperatures, changing winds, coastal storms and sea ice shifts, as well as the practical implications of these changes.
The storymap includes photos taken by observers, audio recordings and text observations. The narrative aspect of the map aligns with the values of storytelling in the Inupiaq culture and in indigenous communities, Glenn said.
"I wanted to create a product that tells their story: It's not really something that should be delivered in a technical report. You won't be able to capture the holistic understanding and feelings, you know, real feelings that the observers have on these changes," she said. "My hope is that this can be an example of making an effort to capture a community perspective that's not really well represented in the wider media."
http://www.thearcticsounder.com/.../2234inupiaq...
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