Author: Kunuk Inutiq

One of the senses that I think that has been suppressed since the introduction of western thinking is intuition. Intuition in all it’s forms, including tapping into loved ones far away.

Growing up clairsentience (gut feeling), claircognizance (knowing) and precognition (foreseeing future) were part of common conversation. They still exist but it is not as common in conversation, with the introduced western thinking expectation there is nothing beyond the physical world.

Inuit are deeply spiritual. We are sensitive to our surroundings and energies, so many are easily spooked. Look where we live: expansive quiet spaces, so much space shared with other humans or animals, it is wide open to be able to see long distances, to bring awareness to our size compared to the universe. It makes one more aware of our body and spirit, and how that relates to other being and our surroundings. Our cold makes us feel our breath and breathing, our life. It is an environment for intuitive making. All of nature is really, we’ve just largely disconnected with it.

Still now Inuit rely heavily on social intuition, the ability to understand body language, cues and emotions. Many of us do not mind silence among company. We are sensitive to sighs, hyperness and sudden movements. Much of our socializing is not small talk (in fact many of us can’t stand small talk) but enjoy having silence too, as we can read emotional cues. We have grown unaccostumed to long silence though. Much of our ‘communication’ is through reading people and giving cues. There is comfort in just sharing calm energy.

I remember a story of someone visiting an Elder – I think it was my late ittuq Aariaq who did not say much like my grandfather – having tea, sitting a while, not saying anything and leaving with no words exchanged.

There is also shared intuition where someone will sense something is off and ask others who confirm they sense the same thing. Usually a prediction in a death or bad incident but not always.

Observant intuition is our super power as Inuit (Indigenous people) attuned to their environment, especially avid hunters who are out on the land frequently. They will notice subtle cues and patterns in their surroundings and make judgements accordingly. This is why it is important hunters are given opportunity to be out as frequently as they can, because being attuned to the environment is so important and tapping into that subconscious observation and intuitiveness which allows good judgment in our arctic environment which can lead to danger quickly. It provides safety.

The last few years there have been incidences of me tapping into people at an intuitive state. I have shared this with a friend not wanting it to be too out there. It happened again yesterday while on a conference call hence this post, I’ll get back to this.

The one that touched my heart so deeply a few years back was when I was reading the book From the Ashes by Jessie Thistle. Normally I cannot read books that speak about addictions as it is triggering having lived as a teen with the chaos and unpredictability of a parent with trauma and addictions. For some reason I could read Jessie Thistle’s book and it gave me such deep sympathy for the sources of addictions. What ended up happening was, in the second last chapter I started to predict what he will say next. It was the clearest and longest intuitive tapping into someone I’ve ever experienced.

So yesterday I’m on a conference call with amazing people doing amazing work. Including with someone whose work and thinking I deeply respect – I have so many intellectual heroes and am so lucky I get to work with so many of them.

As the call develops we started to have a really good conversation, and being of one mind. After a while when I thought of something one of two people I felt connected to on the call (and know in person) would speak my thoughts aloud. Then I started to predict what one of them would say next. All I thought was ‘oh nice’.

I really felt in that moment that when we allow space to be ourselves as Inuit, doing work to make our society flourish all our senses including our inuition can guide our spirit for good judgment. However that comes through.

I was a bit hesitant to share this, as part of my Inuit spiritual belief is that over sharing can dissolve intent or energy. But felt it important to have conversation about working from a deeper intuitive level. As we have now been taught to distrust anything outside the physical world. So many of our efforts ‘at work’ are surface and can in fact be disempowering. Imagine, doing affirming work and tapping deep into ourselves and connecting with others there too. What power that is!

Combatting deficit thinking doesn’t have to mean ignoring issues and avoiding systemic shifts.

In our politics and policy development, where is the idea that we should only be talking about good things happening coming from? Are people over simplifying strength-based approach? Which end up ignoring social issues that are the products of colonialism and structural racism? This then getting in the way of making structural changes that are much needed to shift power and deal with our issues on our terms?

We now recognize that deficit base thinking or view that we have inherent deficiencies is a problem. How some organizations have approached this is shifting the conversation to coming from strength base, but the problem is that this is still ignoring or overlooking structural issues. Are these ideas getting conflated or confused?

We live with structural barriers and social inequality that inhibit us protecting our culture and language, and generally representing ourselves on our terms to deal with legacy of colonialism that create poverty, addictions, self -harm, violence, poor educational attainment, and so on. The idea we should not think ‘badly’ about Inuit to avoid deficit thinking then gets interpreted as we should not talk about social issues.

Do we then assume we have to think that everything is fine and ignore all the issues that exist? It seems colonialism or structural racism and deficit thinking are two interconnected concepts that can perpetuate and maybe even exacerbate each other by forcing us to ignore them.

So let’s try to unpack this…

First, what is deficit thinking? Deficit thinking is a mindset that attributes the struggles or shortcomings of individuals or groups to inherent deficiencies or inadequacies within themselves, rather than considering external structural or systemic factors. An example is people saying ‘Inuit are lazy and don’t want to work’ hence the high rate of Inuit unemployment, rather than seeing the system has barriers for Inuit to enter and stay in employment.

Deficit thinking then blames the individual or group for their circumstances, focuses on their shortcomings whether it is their skills, capabilities, knowledge, language or culture. Deficit thinking downplays or ignores systemic barriers, inequalities, the impact of historical and ongoing racism and discrimination because is about fixing people rather than oppressive systems.

So let’s talk about these systemic barriers…

Colonialism is built on structural racism. Structural racism, also known as systemic racism, refers to the ways in which racial discrimination and inequality are built into and perpetuated by the social, economic, and political structures of western institutions, policies, and practices. Examples of structural racism include unequal access to quality education and healthcare, and discriminatory hiring practices, as said previously, and wage disparities.

A perfect example of unequal access to quality education is how the territorial government continues to fail at delivering Inuktut medium of education, assuming our language will take away from a superior colonial language. We then look at it from a deficit lens of our shortcomings as Inuit of having an inferior language, rather than looking at it as a systemic barrier to delivering Inuktut medium of education.

Structural racism also ignores the harm of atrocities, acculturation, and linguicide of colonialism, the trauma, emotional and psychological damage that we live within our families and communities.

Deficit thinking can reinforce social inequality by blaming marginalized groups for their circumstances. It distracts from addressing systemic issues and hinders efforts to address inequality and promote social justice. In order to combat deficit thinking and address social inequality we have to recognize and challenge assumptions, acknowledge systemic and structural barriers.

Even though a strength-based approach is on the right path to challenging deficit thinking, it is still not going far enough in challenging systems that perpetuate disempowerment. We tend to oversimplify issues to very binary way of thinking of good and bad. Deficit thinking bad, strength based good. When it is a bigger structural issue and nuanced maybe. How do we distinguish deficit thinking and structural issues? One, is the focus, is the focus on structural issue or individual or group deficiencies. Two, is causality, recognizing it is structural racism acknowledges external factors, whereas deficit thinking attributes problems to internal shortcomings. Third, is how the solution is oriented, addressing structural racism requires policy changes and systemic reforms, whereas deficit thinking often leads to individual-level interventions.

Not coming from deficit thinking should not lead to ignoring issues and power dynamics. Even though, acknowledging these mean more work and ignoring them means not having to acknowledge the disempowerment and the amount of work we need to do. We cannot continue to ignore the denial, deflection and distraction from the truth of structural racism therefore accountability to it.

It has taken me a bit of time to process my time at Saarrut camp, partaking in the Reclaiming the Whole woman program the other week. I went as part of a team of people I have been working with to create a new philanthropic organization called Indigenous Peoples Initiative. The hope is to design the organization to support Inuit and Saami self-determination. Part of the process of working to create this organization is experiencing and witnessing self-determination in practice such as Pirurvik’s Makimaniq/Wellness programs.

I have always wanted to take part in Pirurvik programs. My circumstances have not aligned for it to happen until this summer. I have witnessed Pirurvik Centre working with Elders, language and cultural leaders developing and delivering their programs with Liina Ivik at the helm of it all. I have seen people transformed by the enriching experience they’ve had at Pirurvik. The immeasurable aspect to our language and cultural programs that uplift people and redirect them to a more prideful path.

Shortly before going I was ever so excited, but also nervous knowing growing experiences can have an aspect of discomfort and unsettledness. I was ready to face the uncomfortable. Admittedly I had moments of doubt if I should go – making excuses in my mind of maybe why I should not go, sometimes my social anxiety overtaking me. Luckily, these were short lived, trusting in the goodness of Pirurvik. So off I went with an amazing group of people.

Once in the camp it doesn’t take long to get assigned a place, get settled in and get oriented. You are given a chore sign up sheet for everyday while there. Camp life and the program is explained.

There are different options for programs. We had two mandatory programs. One major part of Reclaiming the Whole Woman program is working on seal skins, the 16 steps to preparing the seal skin to be project ready for use to make garments or projects. As Liina explains, it is a right of passage for women. The other mandatory project was to sew a marnguti, a container for your qulliq wick material, as it is an essential part of owning a qulliq and being able to tend to it.

I had no idea if my body and mind would remember my early years of practicing working on seal skins. I spent the first 11 years of my life living in homes where hunting and processing skins were a normal part of life. I would be a helper learning as I helped. Then at age 11 when I moved to Iqaluit my exposure to this life almost completely stopped, including my language development. I only spoke Inuktitut to my mom and the odd person here and there. At the time it was embarrassing to speak a different dialect in Iqaluit. I would be teased that I speak a harsh dialect, so I spoke English mostly. That is why to this day the dialect I speak is still from my hometown. I have never spoken enough Inuktitut in Iqaluit to convert dialects. Which means, I am 11 years old in my Inuit skills development, including my language development (I may be 13 now in my language development, I haven’t learned adult talk yet. Ha!).

The thing about taking part in any kind of language and cultural reclamation is that you feel so emotionally vulnerable. You feel completely exposed to what you know and what you don’t know. You are also confronted by the shame of not knowing what you feel you should automatically know.  You almost need to self-talk yourself and ask ‘how was I to learn it? I am where I am’ to let go of the shame and sense of vulnerability. I can also see how people can get stuck here in their learning journey, not being able to move beyond the shame and face their vulnerability.

The grief of not knowing what you feel you should know is also very real. Allowing for the emotions to grieve our language and cultural loss is so important and feeling safe to do so. Understanding that how grief surfaces is different for everyone. For me, it came out as grief for late loved ones who tried to teach me these skills. The cutting off of opportunity to learn from them. And appreciating so deeply what they tried to teach me, so that I could be set for life with skills and intelligence, including emotional intelligence.

Inuit know learning physical skills also teaches emotional and intellectual skills. Seal skin processing will teach you meticulousness, patience and endurance. Which can be applied in so many settings in life. Always striving for a better product, and learning something new every time you apply your skill.

Feeling vulnerable to learn and expose what you do not know in order to learn, necessitates being in a safe environment to learn. As soon as I felt my ulu scrape the seal skin it brought back a flood of memories of love and security, and tears started to flow. My Elder instructor helped me pause, reassured me it is fine to cry, stayed silent sitting next to me as I worked through my emotions.  It showed the importance of emotional safe spaces to learn.

Unfortunately, we often face lecturing type settings in learning environments or social settings. Where advice or knowledge sharing seems naggy and judgy, veering on lateral violence. I know too often I have gotten unsolicited advice by well meaning older people or peers. As if I need their piece of wisdom, because I need to be told – sometimes I question if they are trying to put me in my place because I have formal education. The sharing coming from a place of ego and sense of competitiveness. I am also aware I may be being sensitive to the ‘telling”. I often ask in my head ‘who are you to tell me?’.

My thought on unsolicited advice is that: we used to be taught in family settings; our whole knowledge systems have been undermined by the colonial project; which means we did not learn as much as we could on our language and cultural knowledge; and our sense of security of our knowledge has been rocked, we hold a lot of insecurity around it; so whatever we need to learn has to be in a safe space or safe people. We cannot assume we are automatically safe people.

Pirurvik instructors certainly felt safe. They are so supportive and understanding. It felt like a loving environment, like in a family setting.  It made me think about people in my life who have felt safe to be vulnerable to grow.

The learning environment reminded me of our former Inuit law Professor, late Ukaliannuk. He shared that as a child he would be told as he is being shown a new skill ‘learn these so that you will become a very capable adult’. And that he worked excitedly to make things for the first time or practiced making them, as he did so would imagine being a capable adult providing for his family. he said the vision of himself was beautiful. He also shared that in order for us to thrive, we all need nagliktigiji/person or people who loves us unconditionally. Again, speaking to the need to be unjudged emotional safety to learn and thrive in order to grow healthy and capable.

As we worked on the seal skins, the Elder instructors would tell us not to rush. To slow down and practice applying the skill. It was a reminder to appreciate the process, and  being in the moment. It was also a reminder for me that the source of a lot of my anxiety is the capitalistic value of ‘hurry and finish, next’ work ethic. It reminded me that the process is as, or maybe more important than the end product. So many of Inuit production are meditative, and ease the mind. Which is the opposite of how we work in capitalist systems.

We had such a rich five days at Saarrut. We arrived to fresh maktaaq, had fresh fish and seal the next day, a seal that was a first catch by one of the students, and fresh caribou on the final day. Our team worked well getting chores done and helping each other out at the camp. We had fits of laughter, crying, storytelling, sharing, listening to music, and being in each other’s company in silence. Most touching and amazing moment was to be there when the young workers caught their tuktu, and walking to them to help them carry it. We had them walk ahead so that the Elders would first greet them at the camp with their joyous gratitude. They were so tired but it was a beautiful soulful moment.

At the  end of the program we got to light a qulliq, each student, instructor and staff get to share their thoughts from the week. It is fair to say we all left feeling more complete than ever, feeling so much gratitude for the growth at Pirurvik! Qujalivunga!

Today, it has been thirty years since people sat in the Inuksuk high school gym to witness an agreement between Inuit of Nunavut and the Prime Minister of Canada (and others). During that event there was so much hope and expectation exhumed in the room and all of Nunavut. It was our day, as Inuit! A monumental moment. So much work had been done to lead up to this work, decades of negotiating. Even though I had not voted in favor of the agreement (believing there was not enough focus on education to prepare us to take over) I too was excited at the new turn of page. After all this was what Inuit leaders worked towards and voted for. The expectation was that Inuit will now be the decision makers, we will now control our own affairs, our way of life will now be protected including our language.

Thirty years later, have those expectations been realized or is the vision still the primary focus of our energy in the governance systems we’ve adopted?

I have written extensively about the social inequities that exist in Nunavut and racial tension so I will not go deeply into them here (if you want to see them, you can look up my name on Yellowhead Institute’s website).

Even with my critical views I express, I am still hopeful and see people living their true selves, inspiring and supporting others to do the same. It’s important that hope for a better future exists, otherwise, we have lost ourselves.

One of the biggest lessons we have learned in Nunavut with our Inuit employment rates is that in order to protect our culture, language and way of life, we have to do it ourselves. We cannot rely on or trust incomers who are only interested in personal economic benefits from Nunavut and maintaining the system to benefit that economic interest. We have seen the strong resistance to changing this. Where even a Premier was ousted trying to replace a non Inuk staff with an Inuk staff.

What that situation also told us is that there are Inuit strongly upholding the very system that oppresses them. Even though we have almost all Inuit political and leadership positions, the administration still clearly has a grip on our territorial government with key people in political system protecting it with them.

Even if we are to achieve Inuit leading the majority in administrative drivers seat it is still not enough. We have to do it in the context of explicitly shedding colonialism and its grip. We also have to do it with allies of non-Inuit serving the same objective as us (see Qanak Collective’s list of ‘How To Be a Good Ally’ on their Facebook page). We must define the relationship with non-Inuit on our terms while defining the agenda for Nunavut. This is our homeland. We have to be aware of how colonial systems maintain power dynamics not in our favor and work diligently to reverse that. This means education and awareness to our colonial past, how it works, and continually asking how the system is working against us and what taking charge of our own lives means for us because conditions and society changes. So do colonial forces!

The education and awareness to colonialism has to recognise how conformity is maintained. How is it that we are made to just go along with the colonial or neo-liberal agenda? Conformity has three elements: informational signals, who are the trusted experts or sources of information, including who defines what success means; reputational signals, social pressures and standards to be accepted by our social grouping(s); social cascades, which is social movements. (These are from a book called Conformity by Cass R. Sunstein). A very strong part of conformity for us is how we obtain and maintain privilege being proximity to whiteness, a whole other discussion in itself.

Remember that great efforts were made to make us conform to the colonial cause. Shifting everything from education of our children, labour, land, mobility, knowledge, spirituality to serve monarchy and state. It will have to take as much effort to reverse conformity, and reverse power dynamics so that we are serving ourselves. Gate keepers to colonial system include Inuit and non-Inuit. It is very difficult to deal with our own who are gatekeeping to make sure the system is maintained as it is. We also have Inuit and non-Inuit alike who are skilled at denying, deflecting and distracting from our truth therefore accountability to shift power dynamics and serving in our favor. We need to learn to call these out collectively.

So, today what are we conforming to? One way of looking at whether systems are representative of Inuit is to look at it from an inclusion and exclusion terms. Even though it is over-simplistic, it still poses a good basis for questioning of whether people feel included or excluded from their government in the policies, programs and services they receive. When I speak about government I mean our Inuit organizations, territorial, federal and municipal governments.

Part of the issue though looking at it from inclusion and exclusion lens, is that we have not recognized fully how marginalized we are because we have a history of colonialism and with that have always had substandard level or no government policies, service, programs and policies that represent us.

Some examples are: not having doctors or dental care in communities; not having daycare or school systems fully in our language, protected and supported by the system; not having hunting as an option for a livelihood; not having basic infrastructure like buildings, housing, roads and marine; or more broadly only having policing and correctional systems rather than ensuring children have the best opportunity to succeed in life that will not lead them to criminalization.

If we were to think from an Inuit policy making stance we’d focus on minimising and removing risk for despair, self-loathing, mental illness and create protective factors of culture, language and identity at individual, social and societal level to set our children up to succeed and develop healthy coping skills and strong character to achieve great things.

How do we create a governance or decision-making processes that ensure safe and healthy conversations on where we need to go? What we have is not working. It seems to fragment leadership more than help to create unity. We cannot afford to do this anymore.

The colonial systems are adept at appearing fair and equitable when it is not. For example, our parliamentary system in Nunavut is touted as being a great example of working together because it is a ‘consensus’ government. It is a consensus government because there are no political parties. When it is still a Westminster style government that is based on adversaries where the opposing side sit opposite the leadership, practicing the western way of holding others accountable asking adversarial questions. Which is in the end antithesis to consensus based decision-making.

Our Inuit organizations too run as adversarial system even if to a lesser degree, with their Robert’s rules of order. The outcome to these adversarial systems is red tape to protecting our culture, language and way of life. These priorities end up being treated as a bonus or add-ons because leadership are so busy asking questions to appear legitimate, when system stays the same serving the same interests.

Once we start questioning how the colonial system maintains power, and start to know better, we will do better to protect and serve our interests. But let’s ask these tough questions without tearing each other down.

Really, we are still maintaining systems of destruction on our people. One of the saddest effects of social inequity and widening social and economic gap between Inuit and non-Inuit in Nunavut is the visible increase in substance use and mental health problems. We are seeing it in our families and communities. It is very distressing dealing with it and to be exposed to it constantly.  We too might experience mental health issues. The mental health and substance use also leads to self-harm and criminalization of people needing help. With the housing and food security crisis, many families are experiencing the pressure cooker effect. Sadly, often it is Elders who are left to deal with mental, physical and economic abuse.

The proposed treatment centre and the increasing Inuit centered counselling approaches are signs of hope.  However, we are still not having the discussion of what recovery from colonialism means and what wellness means for us in this context.

If we are to define looking after ourselves on our terms what would this look like? To start planning in a systematic way, a wellness and healing plan. Part of this process is the need to deal with the legacy of sexual abuse by teachers and priests. You just need to look at the crime rates, mental health issues and suicide rates in communities to know which ones have been most impacted by not only these ugly legacies but sexual abuse in general.

Adding to the pressure cooker dynamic is our housing crisis. This seems to be a current political priority with promises of building more houses. We will see if it will meet the needs and release some of the pressure that lack of housing leads to.

Another is that Nunavut has the highest food insecurity in Canada, three quarters of children go hungry every day. How are we not seeing this as an emergency? It is a staggering statistic!

The most important aspect to food security is the economic means to feed ourselves. Handouts and charity are not a sustainable and dignified way to deal with food insecurity.

This leads to a discussion about economy, and what it means for us. If we are to define our own economy, what could this look like? So that we’re not just passively responding to the outside defining what our economy should be i.e. exploiting and destroying our lands, and waiting for outside companies to open mines that will only peripherally benefit us (compared to the companies).

Economy should center on Inuit protecting tgeir way of like and being self-sufficient to get food, not just from the grocery store but also access to country food. Including having the means to go hunting, harvesting and fishing. Also shifting to making country food more accessible in communities.

There is really no good reason we cannot go and buy fish or seal meat by the pound somewhere in our community. Imagine if all our hunters and trappers had social enterprise arm that sold and distributed country food? Or have a tannery so we can access fur or pelts, sewing and hunting supplies including major items like machines and boats at a reasonable price?

Even with the system still set up to destroy us, there is still so much beauty in Nunavut. Through the people, who look after each other, inspire and encourage each other, and tap into the land to center themselves. Those that create art, tools, businesses, and projects centered on Inuitness are slowly becoming a critical mass. When I am away from home I miss the sense of community, often through food sharing. It is still so strong in defining who we are. Nunavut is a beautiful dream, to protect our culture, language and way of life and be our true selves, let’s not lose sight of it.

Her home is on the bottom of the ocean. She rules this fluid world, taking care of all it’s creatures big and small in her embrace – where she ends and they start it is not clear. She is their keeper, they are hers. In a world where equilibrium depends on all the elements within the ocean and out it, she controls their surroundings to protect them, protect herself.

She was revered and held in high esteem at one point. Feared like a loving anaanatsiaq (grandmother) – if you give her devotion, she will return it multiplied. However, you do not want to upset her, as you only hurt your source of affection, means of nourishment. Treatment of her, is a reflection of yourself.

We are starting to forget her. The role of maintaining balance in all our connections with all the animate branches of what sustains life. Forgetting the importance of our relationships with her and other universe’s great forces. Including between genders, as hunters, who are predominantly men must appease her. Instead we are lost in ego, greed and consumerism. Departure from our center ominously filled with gloom and depression, eating at us within. The more we stray from her, the more we move towards habits of self-destruction.

All the food sources we rely on are part of her: her fingers are the seals; her palm, walruses; forearm the whales. When she gives us food, we savor in gratitude, becoming her, and she becoming us – in one entity that is the universe. All the goodness and evil blurred allowing us just to be. Still, calm, heart beating, breathing, gratified, content. We are water!

She is magnificent and fierce, an Inuk woman. When she is upset she holds animals back, entangled in her shiny thick black hair. She will only release them when she is appeased by an offering, a song or a spiritual visit from one who will untangle her hair, hair that is floating freely in the currents – as she cannot do it herself not having any fingers.

She is known throughout the Inuit world as sanna (sedna), sanaji, nuliajuq, talilajuq, takannaaluk, or the one who should not be named. The force of the ocean!