This volume provides fresh insight into northern human–animal relations and illustrates the breadth and practical utility of archaeological human–animal studies. It surveys recent archaeological research in northern North America and Eurasia that frames human–animal relations as not merely economically exploitative but often socially complex and deeply meaningful, and attuned to the intelligence and agency of nonhuman prey and domesticates. The case studies sample a wide swath of the circumpolar region, from Alaska, Nunavut, and Greenland to northern Fennoscandia and western Siberia, and span sites, finds, and scenarios ranging in age from the Mesolithic to the twenty-first century. Many taxa on which northern lives hinged figure in these analyses, including large marine mammals, polar bear, reindeer, marine fish, and birds, and are variously approached from relational, multispecies, semiotic, osteobiographical, and political economic perspectives. Animals themselves are represented by osteological remains, harvesting gear, and depictions of animal bodies that include zoomorphic figurines, petroglyphs, ornamentation, and intricate portrayals of human–animal harvesting encounters. Far from settling the problem of how archaeologists should approach northern human–animal relations, these chapters reveal the irreducible complexity of northern worlds and highlight the diversity of human and nonhuman animal lives. This book will be of particular interest to northern archaeologists and zooarchaeologists, and all those interested in the possibilities of a multispecies approach to the archaeological record.

Dogs provides a comprehensive account of the origins and development of the domestic dog over the past 15,000 years.

From the origins of the Arctic to its contemporary life, this book is an intriguing survey of human achievement in a place relatively unknown to the rest of the world. For more than 25,000 years, Arctic peoples have made warm and hospitable homes in diverse and innovative ways out of ecosystems of ice. For the first time in their long history, however, Arctic communities are facing the real possibility that the foundations of their way of life—sea ice and permafrost—will soon disappear. Published to coincide with a major exhibition at the British Museum, Arctic: culture and climate presents the history of the Arctic through the lens of climate and weather, and features a variety of fascinating objects, many of which are published here for the first time, including sealskin kayaks, drums used by shamans, traditional costumes, and contemporary art. This remarkable book explores the origins of Arctic peoples, early trade relationships between cultural groups, and relationships with animals, weather and their environments. It examines the strategies that indigenous people have used to deal with rapid transformations brought about by European explorations and colonial governments and sheds light on how these same strategies are being utilized today to mitigate the effects of global climate change. Bringing together indigenous and non-indigenous interdisciplinary scholars, this book is an arresting insight into the ways of life and material culture of Arctic peoples.

Contributors to this landmark volume demonstrate that ancestor veneration was about much more than claiming property rights: the spirits of the dead were central to domestic disputes, displays of wealth, and power and status relationships. Case studies from China, Africa, Europe, and Mesoamerica use the evidence of art, architecture, ritual, and burial practices to explore the complex roles of ancestors in the past. Including a comprehensive overview of nearly two hundred years of anthropological research, The Archaeology of Ancestors reveals how and why societies remember and revere the dead. Through analyses of human remains, ritual deposits, and historical documents, contributors explain how ancestors were woven into the social fabric of the living.

Introduction / Michael Bravo with Nicola Triscott -- Critical art and intervention in the technologies of the Arctic / Nicola Triscott -- Building autonomy through experiments in technology and skill / Michael Bravo -- Traveling through layers: Inuit artists appropriate new technologies / Katarina Soukup -- Trails and tales: multiple stories of human movement and modernity / David Turnbull -- Post-Cold War Arctic geopolitics: where are the people and the environment? / Lassi Heininen.

Dogs in the North offers an interdisciplinary in-depth consideration of the multiple roles that dogs have played in the North. Spanning the deep history of humans and dogs in the North, the volume examines a variety of contexts in North America and Eurasia. The case studies build on archaeological, ethnohistorical, ethnographic, and anthropological research to illuminate the diversity and similarities in canine–human relationships across this vast region. The book sheds additional light on how dogs figure in the story of domestication, and how they have participated in partnerships with people across time. With contributions from a wide selection of authors, Dogs in the North is aimed at students and scholars of anthropology, archaeology, and history, as well as all those with interests in human–animal studies and northern societies.

The goals of the second volume of the AHDR – Arctic Human Development Report: Regional Processes and Global Linkages – are to provide an update to the first AHDR (2004) in terms of an assessment of the state of Arctic human development; to highlight the major trends and changes unfolding related to the various issues and thematic areas of human development in the Arctic over the past decade; and, based on this assessment, to identify policy relevant conclusions and key gaps in knowledge, new and emerging Arctic success stories. The production of AHDR-II on the tenth anniversary of the first AHDR makes it possible to move beyond the baseline assessment to make valuable comparisons and contrasts across a decade of persistent and rapid change in the North. It addresses critical issues and emerging challenges in Arctic living conditions, quality of life in the North, global change impacts and adaptation, and Indigenous livelihoods. The assessment contributes to our understanding of the interplay and consequences of physical and social change processes affecting Arctic residents’ quality of life, at both the regional and global scales. It shows that the Arctic is not a homogenous region. Impacts of globalization and environmental change differ within and between regions, between Indigenous and non-Indigenous northerners, between genders and along other axes.