NEGOTIATING NORTHERN PASTS: ONE ARCHAEOLOGIST'S REFLECTIONS ON LEARNING TO TEACH HISTORY IN NUNAVUT.

Over the last decade in Nunavut, the discipline of archaeology has been strongly encouraged to reconsider its practices and narratives concerning the past so as to better align with contemporary Inuit politics, culture and society. While archaeologists are open to new approaches for engaging Nunavut populations, there exist few tools within the discipline's repertoire for understanding history beyond the excavation and interpretation of material remains. This has become particularly apparent in situations where archaeologists use their trade to educate Inuit about their own history. This paper is a personal reflection on the act of teaching Arctic history, and describes my own attempts to better understand the greater context of history in the community of Cambridge Bay, Nunavut. This is ultimately accomplished by de-emphasizing the pedagogic value of material artifacts, and developing more grounded research methodologies to incorporate local understandings of how and why historical learning takes place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]