Our Ice is Vanishing: Sikvut Nunguliqtuq: A History of Inuit, Newcomers, and Climate Change

In This engaging study, Wright, a professor of aboriginal studies at Vancouver's Langara College, takes a multi-pronged approach to explain how the effects of global warming, the history of the Inuit and Canada's desire for Arctic sovereignty present a microcosm of the ways people struggle to reconcile industrial society with environmental destruction. The Earth's climatic fate "will be ruled by what happens as the ice melts," and none recognize this fact more than the Inuit. Wright details the Inuit's near 7,000-year history and explains how Canadian sovereignty in the high Arctic may paradoxically hinge on that region's original inhabitants, whose lives are dependent on the now-vanishing ice. Alleviating Inuit poverty and establishing Canadian sovereignty necessitates the natural resource exploitation that is ultimately driving global warming%E2%80%94a situation that mirrors the problems of the broader modern world. Wright's book is an academic study that is nonetheless deeply moving, clearly written, and suitable for general readers. It is essential reading for anyone wishing to learn about how "humans are inextricably connected to the chain of life on this planet." Tackling global warming rests on us recognizing this deceptively simple fact. (Sept.)