Description

Hunters at the Margin

Native People and Wildlife Conservation in the Northwest Territories

John Sandlos

  • Published: 2007
  • Subject Listing: Native Studies, Environmental Studies, History
  • Bibliographic information: 352 pp., 6" x 9"
  • Territorial rights: U.S. rights only
  • Distributed for: UBC Press
  • Contents

In the late nineteenth century, to the alarm of government conservationists, the North American plains bison population collapsed. Yet large herds of other big game animals still roamed the Northwest Territories, and Aboriginal people depended on them for food and clothing.

Hunters at the Margin examines the conflict in the Northwest Territories between Native hunters and conservationists over three big game species: the wood bison, the muskox, and the caribou. John Sandlos argues that the introduction of game regulations, national parks, and game sanctuaries was central to the assertion of state authority over the traditional hunting cultures of the Dene and Inuit. His archival research undermines the assumption that conservationists were motivated solely by enlightened preservationism, revealing instead that commercial interests were integral to wildlife management in Canada.

Hunters at the Margin draws on themes from Canadian, environmental, and ecological history, Northern studies, and Native studies to illuminate the intersection between the discourse of wildlife conservation and the expansion of state power in northern Canada.

John Sandlos is an assistant professor of history at Memorial University of Newfoundland.
Contents
Maps, Tables, Figures
Foreword: The Enigmatic North / Graeme Wynn
Preface
Introduction: Wildlife and Canadian History

Part 1: Bison
1. Making Space for Wood Bison
2. Control on the Range
3. Pastoral Dreams

Part 2: Muskox
4. The Polar Ox

Part 3: Caribou
5. La Foule! La Foule!
6. To Save the Wild Caribou
7. The Caribou Crisis

Conclusion
Appendix
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Reviews