26 March 2025 | 10:30 - 12:00 (MDT)
Open Session - HYBRID
Room: UMC Second Floor - 247
Organisers: Davin Holen (University of Alaska Fairbanks); Guangqing Chi (Pennsylvania State University)
Session Description:
Climate change is a slow-moving disaster. In the North, coastal predominately indigenous communities are experiencing climate impacts, including thawing permafrost leading to coastal land loss and disappearance of lakes, extreme storms causing land loss and coastal inundation, and declining sea ice leading to unsafe traveling and hunting conditions. One response to these challenges is to relocate the entire community, which is problematic. Complete relocation to a new location means learning about new hunting, fishing, and gathering areas, distancing the community and culture from ancestral homelands. Relocation is also prohibitively expensive. Alternatively, communities may choose to adapt in place, slowly moving to safer ground close by as funding becomes available. Coupled social and economic factors may also influence individuals and families to consider moving to urban centers. Compounding climate impacts may provide a tipping point that spurs migration. Research on Northern out-migration and relocation has been minimal, even for the most threatened communities. This session examines the drivers and processes of relocation, adapting in place, and the compounding factors influencing migration. It will also examine aspects of environmental justice in how federal and state resources for these remote, predominately Alaska Native rural communities, are not always equitably distributed. Finally, it also calls for stories and narratives of the experiences of people in the North dealing with these choices.