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1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 An interdisciplinary approach to documenting knowledge: plants & their uses in 22 southern Greenland 23 24 Simone S. Whitecloud and Lenore A. Grenoble 25 26 27 28 29 Simone S. Whitecloud 30 Ecology and Evolutionary Biology 31 Department of Biology 32 Dartmouth College 33 Hanover, NH 03755 USA 34 [email protected] 35 36 Lenore A. Grenoble 37 Department of Linguistics 38 University of Chicago 39 1130 East 59th Street 40 Chicago, IL 60637 USA 41 [email protected] 2 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 An interdisciplinary approach to documenting knowledge: plants & their uses in 63 southern Greenland 64 65 66 67 68 69 3 69 70 Abstract 71 72 The native language of west Greenland, Kalaallisut, is robust with over 50,000 speakers 73 among approximately 56,000 inhabitants. However, many people in Nuuk, the capital and 74 largest city, believe traditional knowledge of plant uses has been lost due to extensive 75 Danish contact. Our findings indicate that in southern Greenland local knowledge of plant 76 uses is greater than believed, and that people use a vast number of resources to learn about 77 plants, including not only Inuit knowledge from elders, but also published European 78 sources and experimentation. We take an interdisciplinary approach to documenting this 79 knowledge: the biologist provides understanding of botanical identification, plant uses, 80 methods of collection, preparation, and storage, while the linguist provides access to the 81 linguistic identification of the plants, both in Greenland and in a pan-Inuit context, and 82 access to the historical documentation. This collaborative effort allows us to document the 83 revitalization of knowledge, passed down through oral tradition and borrowed from 84 Danish printed sources. Here we discuss our work collecting the knowledge (linguistic, 85 scientific and local) about plants in southern Greenland, and test the likelihood of this 86 knowledge reflecting the migration route of Inuit ancestors across the Arctic about 1100 87 years ago. Some plant names and uses have remained consistent across the migration 88 route, while others have been lost or changed over time. 89 90 Keywords: Greenland, Arctic, ethnobotany, linguistics, language, Inuit, local knowledge, plants 91 92 4 93 94 Аннотация: 95 Население Гренландии по данным на июль 2010 года составляет 57 600 человек. Коренное 96 население — гренландские инуиты -- составляют около 90 % целого. Остальные 10 % — 97 это в основном датчане и другие европейцы. Подавляющее большинство населения 98 владеет своим этническим языком, который по-русски называется гренландским или 99 эскимосским (Kalaallisut на местном языке, ISO 639-3 kal). 100 Часто предполагается, что сохранение традиционного образа жизни, включая и 101 традиционные знания, тесно связано с употреблением языка, и что потеря языка ведет к 102 потере культуры и знаний. В случае Гренландии ситуация выглядит по другому: язык 103 здесь сохранился хорошо, но традиционное знание лечебных и кулинарных растений 104 практически забыто из-за долгото контакта с датской культурой. 105 В настоящей статье мы предлагаем междисциплинарный подход к документированию 106 традционных знаний и их реконструкции. В основе нашего подхода лежит принцип 107 совместной работы биолога и лингвиста: биолог разбирается в биологической 108 классификации растений и изучает местные методы их собирания, подготовки и 109 сохранения, между тем как лингвист обеспечивает доступ к языковой номенклатуре и 110 классификации растений, и в синхронном, и в диахронном аспекте, как в Гренландии, так 111 и в более широком контексте инуитов. Наша совместная работа позволяет 112 документировать процессы восстановления этих так называемых традиционных знаний, 113 которые с одной стороны устно передаются из поколения в поколение, а с другой стороны 114 заимствуются из датских печатных источников. 5 115 Наша статья также выдвигает гипотезу, что названия растений отражают пути миграции 116 предков инуитов в Арктике около 1100 лет назад. Наши исследования доказывают, что 117 местные знания более устойчивы, чем предполагалось, и в настоящее время используют 118 большое количество источников, включая не только знания инуитских старейшин в 119 Гренландии, но также и европейские публикации о лекарственных и съедобных 120 растениях. Хотя многие названия таких растений изменились до неузнаваeмости или 121 совсем исчезли, некоторые из них не изменились в течение тысячелетий. 122 ключевые слова: Грeнландия, Аркитка, этноботаника, языкознание, язык, инуит, 123 растения, местное знание, традиционные знания 124 6 124 Introduction 125 The Thule people followed bowhead whales along the receding sea ice margin east 126 from Alaska approximately 1100 years ago (Fitzhugh, 2002), peopling northern Canada 127 and Greenland. This migration is evidenced by the Inuit group of the Inuit-Yupik-Aleut 128 linguistic family, with Inuit varieties spoken from Alaska (e.g. Iñupiaq) across Canada (e.g. 129 Inuktitut and Inuinnaqtun) to Greenland. Due to the circumpolar ranges of most arctic 130 species and the paucity of arctic flora (approximately 1500 vascular plant species; Walker, 131 1995), plants encountered along this route were mostly identical, making it possible that 132 both language concerning plants and knowledge of their uses was transported along the 133 migration route. 134 Presently, cultural knowledge that originally made this migration possible is still 135 strong along this migration route, but language vitality has declined dramatically in Alaska 136 and parts of Canada. Local language is relegated to certain key domains. In such 137 circumstances, its use is often associated with a traditional (usually subsistence) lifestyle, 138 traditional culture and knowledge. Unlike many other indigenous languages, Kalaallisut 139 (West Greenlandic), the official language of Greenland, enjoys a long-standing written 140 tradition and has a large number of written resources, not only reference grammars and 141 dictionaries, but there is a primary written literature in Kalaallisut. The population reads it 142 and speaks it fluently. However, after four hundred years of colonization by Denmark, 143 much traditional knowledge has been lost and Greenlanders are strongly invested in 144 modernization and attaining self-sufficiency. The recent transition to a Self-Rule 145 Government (in June 2009) provides greater autonomy for the former Danish colony and 146 the changing climate is exposing new mineral and gas reserves that could possibly make 7 147 Greenland financially independent from Denmark. While Danish presence has strongly 148 influenced many facets of Greenlandic culture, language remains strong and Greenlanders 149 still maintain a portion of their diet through traditional subsistence hunting, although 150 subsistence meats are also sold in grocery stores and specialty markets. 151 In traditional Inuit diets, meat was the primary source of nutrition, with plants 152 constituting only 5% of the diet of Inuit in the Bering Sea area (Weyer, 1932 in Porsild, 153 1953), often as sources of vitamin C during winter (Porsild, 1953). This, coupled with the 154 long Danish presence and access to produce and supplements, implied that traditional 155 knowledge of plants in Greenland was no longer necessary. Our first queries into plant uses 156 in the summer of 2009 supported this supposition: most responses were that Greenlanders 157 no longer use wild plants, that such practices were traditional and now Greenlanders are 158 modern. However, through connections with the Greenland Language Secretariat, the Inuit 159 Circumpolar Council, and KNAPK (the Hunters and Fishers Association), we were able to 160 identify a handful of people who maintained knowledge of plants. 161 Our research shows that there is knowledge of wild plants for consumption, 162 medicine, and other uses in southern Greenland, and that it is possible to infer knowledge 163 transmittance across the original migration route of the Thule people. Moreover, we find 164 that knowledge of the Kalaallisut common names of these plants is robust, underscoring 165 not only the vitality of the language but also of plant knowledge among practitioners. We 166 also discuss the influence of Danish presence and European herbalism on local knowledge. 167 168 Background: Kalaallisut 8 169 The social, political, and economic status of Kalaallisut differs significantly from 170 other Arctic Indigenous languages. The official variety is a codified language based on West 171 Greenlandic dialects. Standardization, including the creation of new lexical items, is the 172 purview of the Greenland Language Secretariat (Oqaasileriffik), which is a part of the 173 Greenland Government. As the official language, it is used in education, government, and all 174 domains of life. It is the majority language in Greenland. Although many speak Danish, the 175 colonizing language, fluently, it is a second language for the majority of the population; 176 88% claim Kalaallisut as their first language (Statistics Greenland 2010). Higher education, 177 however, continues to be in Danish, although since the institution of Self Government rule 178 in 2009, increased emphasis in the development of higher education materials in 179 Kalaallisut has become a priority. In addition, certain domains are inevitably dominated by 180 Danish. For example, television broadcasts are primarily in Danish, although KNR (the