10343 - ¿Culture is more than the 3Ds, dress, dance and diet.¿ - Competing concepts of cultural teaching among educators and ¿cultural promoters¿ in the Eastern Canadian Arctic.

When looking at cultural promotion programs and projects of non-heritage organizations that aim to support a healthy Inuit culture in Nunavut (e.g., recreation coordinators, schools, social and mental services, correction facilities, cultural days organized by the Government of Nunavut for their department staff), it becomes obvious that the majority of these programs are basically limited to one or more of the following activities that are considered to represent Inuit culture: cloth sewing (“dress”), dances and song presentations (“dance”), or workshops on a certain kind of nutrition (“diet”).

Each aspect can indeed be considered culturally relevant for East Canadian Inuit, but are these really three core aspects of Inuit culture whose promotion successfully keeps Inuit culture in Nunavut alive? What other significantly different identification markers do exist (e.g., communication patterns, learning and teaching methods, social value systems) that seem to be highly neglected by those cultural promoters but might have a stronger impact on Inuit identity and culture than the “3Ds”, and why are these other aspects mostly ignored?

Keywords: Inuit, Canada, Nunavut, heritage promotion, educator

Author: Diesel, Torsten (Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Frankfort/ Main, Germany / Deutschland)