Kaare Sikuaq Erickson leads Ikaaġun Engagement, which provides education and orientation services to Arctic scientists and rural educators. Ikaaġun is based in Unalakleet and Anchorage, Alaska. Sikuaq was raised on the Bering Sea coast and has family scattered across northern Alaska from Unalakleet to Shishmaref to Utqiaġvik. Sikuaq was taught to provide for his communities through subsistence and leadership. His upbringing taught him to be aware of problems facing Arctic communities and to find creative, realistic, and effective ways to alleviate or solve these issues.
Clint Carroll is an associate professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado Boulder. A citizen of the Cherokee Nation, he works closely with Cherokee people in Oklahoma on issues of land conservation and the perpetuation of land-based knowledge and ways of life. Clint’s current projects include co-directing (with a group of elders and wisdom-keepers) a land education program for five Cherokee students and serving as principal investigator on a related study about Cherokee plant gathering access in rural northeastern Oklahoma.
Born on Kamchatka land, Russia, Tatiana Degai was raised on the traditional grounds with the Itelmen people. Her life, work, and research are inspired by a rich heritage, worldviews, and wisdom of her people and Indigenous communities, whose traditional lands she had the honor to visit and live on. Her formal education is in Anthropology from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, and a doctorate of American Indian Studies at University of Arizona.
Mellisa Maktuayaq Johnson is Iñupiaq born and raised from Nome, Alaska. As a tribal member of Nome Eskimo Community, Mellisa has a strong passion for protecting, respecting, advocating and maintaining traditional Indigenous ways of life. Inspired by Elders, community members, and her family, Mellisa works to share with others the importance of maintaining culture and heritage in language revitalization efforts, climate advocacy, and incorporation of Indigenous knowledge into different systems.
“After the Ice” video series
A collaborative project captures the voices of Alaskan Indigenous communities facing a changing Bering Sea.
The Bering Sea is home to over 70 Indigenous communities of the Iñupiat, Central Yup’ik, Cup’ik, St. Lawrence Island Yupik, Unangan, and Chukchi Peoples. In recent years, the Bering Sea has experienced unprecedented declines in sea ice, threatening community food security, infrastructure, and travel. In winters 2018 and 2019, sea ice coverage was by far the lowest observed in at least the last 160 years.
The Greenlandic Perspectives on Climate Change Survey report provides the first national estimates of residents’ climate change beliefs, experiences, risk-opportunity perceptions and emotional responses, as well as views on recent sea ice changes, glacial changes, climate change impacts, societal adaptation, and climate and environment policy preferences.
For centuries, Indigenous peoples across Eurasia and North American have maintained harmonious relations with bears with whom they share the world, honoring this relationship through elaborate ceremonies. At present, this website describes the bear ceremonies of Siberian people, the Mansi and the Khanty, through a rich narrative illustrated by photos, videos, and audio recordings. The content is in both English and Russian.