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An Arctic Whaling Diary. the Journal of Captain George Comer In 84 REVIEWS water content of clouds determined at 20 GHz and this effect were While describing well the main aspects of the seal hunt and the used to locate atmospheric fronts. The possibility of using these data bonding that occurs and continuesbetween participants, the scope of to forecast the movement of cyclones and the determination of sea the work suffers from a lack of broader perspective, especially one roughness parameters using the two-dimensional spectral analysis of grounded in a cultural ecological approach. Wright touches in this radar images using side-locking radar was explored. The extra noise direction when heasks the question “Why Do Sealers Seal?” in observed when the sea is stormingwas found to be reduced by signal chapter seven, but by limiting the discussion primarily to examplesof averaging. Power spectral analysis wasused to develop empirical individuals with whom he shipped, he has lost the social context of a models that can be used to distinguishbetween separate wave systems whole society. Thus while providing analyticaldepth to the research, and can be correlated with direct sea roughness measurements. The along the way he removes some of the power fromhis counter-protest role of wind speed was explored. The morphology and dynamics of arguments. the five typesof sea ice cover werestudied on amacroscopic scale and These criticisms, however,should not detract from a basicallywell- related to a variety of weather conditions ranging from strong anti- conceived and executed research project, which was ambitious for a cyclonic to strong cyclonic. Dielectricand elastic measurements were master’s candidate. As already noted, the field methods used were performed on the various icetypes and correlated with other physical most appropriate; indeed, many candidates bound for the field could parametersand temperatures from - 1 to - 15°C. Icecovered well take notes here. Wright also provides a three-dimensional por- 7440% of the study region and was only one year old or younger. trait of a micro-society,which has been lacking so far in the scholarly Clearly, very comprehensive measurements were made within the literature. Finally,in chapter sevensome extremely importantinsights study area of all the physical and meteorological factors thatcould af- are offered into the Newfoundland society from which these sealers fect satellite microwave radiometric scanningof the earth’s surfacein come.One last point concernsthe appendices. The last, Paul the Arctic Ocean region. The results of these cooperative scientific Watson’s letter to the sealersof Newfoundland, does not do justice to studies made significant contributions to the stateof our knowledge of the varied and deeply thought-out views held within the animal rights satellite imaging ten years ago. Today they are primarily a historical movement. record of this state at a time when there was a thaw in relations be- Wright has written an important contribution to our understanding tween the U.S.A. and the U.S.S.R. of the sealer’s position within the current controversy. Along with Coish and Lamson, Sons and Seals helps form a reference core for the H.A. Buckmuster better understanding of a key area in an expanding confrontational Professor of Physics situation. The University of Calgary Calgary, Alberta, Canada REFERENCES IN4 RN BERGER, T.R. 1977 Northern Frontiers Northern Homeland: Report of the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry.Vol. I. Ottawa: Department of Supply and Services. COISH, C. 1979. Season of the Seal: The International Storm Over Canada’s Seal Hunt. St. John’s, Newfoundland: Breakwater Books. SONS AND SEALS: A VOYAGE TO THE ICE. By GUY WRIGHT. LAMSON, C. 1979. “Bloody Decks and a Bumper Crop”: The Rhetoric of Newfoundland Social and Economic Studies No. 29. Institute of Sealing Counter-Protest. Socialand Economic Studies No. 24. Institute of Social and Economic Research.St. John’s, Newfoundland: Social andEconomic Research. St. John’s Newfoundland: Memorial Memorial University of Newfoundland, 1984. ISBN 0-919666- University of Newfoundland. 45-0. ix + 126 p. incl. annotated bib., 3 appendices. Softcover. No price indicated. George W. Wenzel Center for Northern Studies Sons and Seals is the most recent additionto a still small, but grow- Wolcott, Vermont, 05680 ing, body of social science literature concernedwith the effects and U.S. A. wnsequences of the anti-seal hunting-animal rights movement on northern and Maritime rural and native communities in Canada. As most readers ofWright’s work are aware, the spring hunt for harpand hooded seals off Canada’s coast has become the focus of widespread public and scientific discussion. The larger reality, however, is that AN ARCTIC WHALING DIARY. THE JOURNAL OF CAPTAIN the controversy extends beyond the immediate geographic area and GEORGE COMER IN HUDSON BAY 1903-1905. Edited by W. hunt discussed by Wright and others (see Coish, 1979; Lamson, 1979) GILLIES ROSS. Toronto: The University of Toronto Press, 1984. to include communities where a primary subsistence-secondary xi all 271 p. incl. maps, illus., glossary, bib., appendices. Hardcover wmmercial dual economic strategy, described by Berger (1977), is + as Cdn. $29.95. practiced. Wright, in this book, has attempted to both describe and analyze The eraof commerical whaling by whalers fromNew England and, anthropologicallythe social dynamicsof contemporary Newfoundland to a lesser extent, Scotland in northwestern Hudson Bay was really sealing and, in so doing, present a counterpoint to the arguments of quite a short-lived phenomenon in the history of the Bay, extending the hunt’s opponents suggesting thehunt is motivated by purely crass only from 1860 to 1905. Thus the whaling voyage of the Era de- commercial reasons and no longer holds any meaningful place in scribed by her captain, George Comer, in his journal was in fact the Newfoundland society. While these objectives are well aimed, Sons last to be made by a New England vessel to theBay. The causesof the and Seals is not wholly successful on either count. collapse of this fishery were the almost complete extirpation of the The anthropological technique employed by Wright is one well stocks of bowhead whales (Bahena mysticetus), combined with the known to northern ethnologists, thatof direct participant observation disappearance of the market for baleen. In publishing this edited ver- combined with a modified interview approach.Given the physical and sion of Comer’s journal,Ross has thus provided a valuable insight in- socio-cultural setting in which the research was conducted, Wright to the final phase of an extremely important chapter in the history of wisely eschewed alternative formal methods. Much of the success of the Canadian Arctic.Significant, for example, was Comer’s im- his research is attributable to hismethodological approach. The major aginative innovation of sending his whaleboats on prolonged indepen- deficiency inthis work with regardto the strength of the an- dent, self-contained cruises, often while his ship was still in winter thropological analysis and to the counter-argumentsit provides is also, quarters, in an attempt to cover the maximum possible area in search in part, due to the chosen approach. of the few remaining, elusive whales. REVIEWS 85 Although brief, the periodof commercial whaling in the bay had a with telescopes and powerfulrepting rifles, and who normally wore profound impact on the various Inuit groupsof the northernKeewatin. American trousers, shirts, jackets, hats and sunglasses. Here were It resulted in significantchanges in distributionpatterns, seasonal women who used manufactured domestic implements and containers, movements, and especially in the material culture of the Inuit. Pro- who made up clothes on sewing machines, who attended shipboard dances in imported dresses, and who bore children sired by the whale- bably the most striking fact to emerge from Comer’s journal in this men. To these people an officious, uniformed stranger was distributing connection is that whaleboats owned by and entirely manned by Inuit underwear as if it were a priceless treasure and lecturing them on were actively engaged in whaling almost on a contract basis. morals and their allegiance to a big white chief. When Moodie sug- Over the decadein which he spent repeated wintersin Hudson Bay, gested that the Eskimos might wish to travel500 miles to Churchill to Comer developed numerous close friendships among the Inuit and send joyful messages of thanks to the king,no one responded. went to considerable lengths to help them whenever possible. The I depth of his feeling for them emerges clearly from the pages of his REFERENCES journal. Although entirely self-educated in the field, Comer was a LOW, A.P. 1906. The cruise of the Neptune, 19034. Report on the Do- keen amateur anthropologist, making plaster casts of the faces and minion Government expedition to Hudson Bay and the Arctic Islands ~ hands ofmany of hisInuit friends, collecting artifacts, and taking aboardthe D.G.S. Neptune, 1903-1904. Ottawa:Government Printing some excellent photographs, from which Ross has made an excellent Bureau. selection to illustrate the journal. Comer alsopublished a number of MOODIE, J.D. 1905. Report of Superintendent J.D. Moodie on service in scientific papers on the Inuit of this area in journals such as the Hudson Bay, per S.S. Neprune, 19034. Ottawa: House of Commons(4-5 Bulletin of the American Geogmphical Society of New York and the Edward VII, Sessional Paper No. 28). 3-12. American Anthropologist and freely made his information available to -. 1906. Report of Superintendent J.D. Moodie on service in Hudson anthropologists such as Franz Boas. Bay (per S.S. Arctic, 19oQ-5). Ottawa: House of Commons (5-6 Edward One of the ironies of the political history of the Canadian Arctic is W,Sessional Paper, No. 28). 2-16. that the Canadian government awoke to thepossible dangers to Cana- ROSS, W.G. 1975. Whaling and Eskimos: Hudson Bay 1860-1915. Ottawa: dian sovereignty represented by the American whalers wintering in National Museum of Man (Publications in Ethnology, No.
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