User:Oceanflynn/sandbox/Inuit Land Use and Occupation Project

Inuit Land Use and Occupation Project (ILUOP) was a series of studies to record Inuit land use and occupancy in the Canadian north which was initiated by the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, (ITK) in 1973, and funded by the Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada. The final three volume report, published in 1976 which was edited by the Milton Freeman Research Limited, included extensive field work in the Western Arctic, in West-central Artic, East-central Arctic, Keewatin District, South Baffin Island and Hudson Bay/Strait and James Bay Island, North Baffin and Foxe Basin the High Arctic.

"A famous and landmark report which successfully demonstrated both use and occupancy by the Inuit of their traditional lands and waterways - thereby laying important groundwork for the Northwest Territories, Indigenous peoples and to some degree, helping to move towards a sort of Arctic "Declaration of Independence" through the Circumpolar Inuit Declaration on Arctic Sovereignty."

Context
Tagak Curley, a prominent Inuit leader in the creation of Nunavut, formed the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (Inuit Tapirisat of Canada) in 1971 as an organization that would represent Nunavut Inuit. Prior to leading the ITK, Curley had worked as a development officer with the federal Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, then known as the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND).

In 1972 and 1973 the ITK, with Curley as President, undertook preliminary discussions about research on Inuit land use and occupation. In February 1973 the ITK proposed to Jean Chrétien, then-Minister of DIAND, that "research be undertaken to produce a comprehensive and verifiable record of Inuit land use and occupancy in the Northwest Territories of Canada...to delimit the present and the past use and occupation of the land and marine environment and would categorize the uses which any particular area served. In view of the continuing role which land plays in defining the cultural and ecological circumstances of Inuit society, the research was also to provide an explicit statement - by the Inuit - of their perception of the man-made relationship." On June 18, 1973, the Milton Freeman Research Limited was incorporated on June 18, 1973 in "order to undertake research into Inuit with funds advanced by the DIAND." Then a steering committee was formed with Curley, C. Hunt from ITK and DIAND A. Stevenson, M. J. Ruel from DIAND. With funding from

The Inuit Land Use and Occupancy Project provided a basis for the Nunavut land claim. Tagak is considered a living father of confederation in Canada.

The 3 volume 1976 report
The Project resulted in a three volume, 153 page "comprehensive and verifiable" 1976 report that included "details of a data base produced from the information collected for the project.

The Inuit Land Use and Occupation Project was a "series of studies funded by the federal government intended to document how the land was ‗occupied‘—this term refers to the social, intellectual, and economic systems that underlie Inuit patterns of land use, while land use "refers to any or all of the hunting, fishing, trapping, and other activities that take place within the land, open-water and sea-ice environments that comprise Inuit territory."

Volume I was entitled Land Use and Occupancy.

Volume 2, Supporting Studies, was a 287 report with a photo essay by Terry Pearce.

Volume 3, Land Use Atlas, includes 153 colour maps.

Impact
The Inuit Land Use and Occupancy Project provided a basis for the Nunavut land claim.

"The Inuit Land Use and Occupancy Project (ILUOP) presented a detailed, comprehensive, and verifiable basis for the claim that Inuit used and occupied an area in excess of 2.8 million square kilometres at the time the ILUOP was completed in the Northwest Territories and northeast Yukon. This article describes the events that led to the ILUOP being undertaken, the methods and content of the study, and some of the outcomes following completion of the project.

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Standard
"The Inuit Land Use and Occupancy Project "undertaken in preparation for comprehensive land claim settlements, established the basic model of land use mapping that is still used today. This is based on the “map biography”, in which respondents are asked to locate and map harvesting or related land use activities during their adult lives (i.e., hunting, fishing, gathering) as well as other important elements such as burial sites, travel routes, and spiritual locations. Community land use patterns are then aggregated by map categories, with outer areas representing boundaries and high density areas representing the spatial intensity of community land use. This approach was subsequently used in Labrador and has since become a standard method in Canada, in part due to straightforward documentation, visually effective maps and a perception of scientific validity (Usher et al. 1992). However, map biographies also suffer from limitations, particularly as it is impossible to recall, record and map all information about land use and maps are inappropriate for documenting explanations of why or how land is used (Thom and Washbrook 1997)."