Aksik

Overview

Aksikis a Siberian Yupik term called out by captains to turn the boat quickly, as if to avoid danger or move in a new direction, by placing an oar against the bow and down in to the water and pulling back using the gunnel as a fulcrum point. Similarly, humanity must aksik away from climate change quickly. We believe that subsistence culture is the fulcrum point for this action.

AKSIK is also an acronym for Alaskans Sharing Indigenous Knowledge.

AKSIK is a multi-year scientific and advocacy project to create an online library of videos that:

  1. Document what native people in the Bering Sea area of Alaska are witnessing with climate change; and
  2. Communicate their adaptation needs via the internet.

We work with two communities in the Bering Strait:

  • Savoonga on St. Lawrence Island
  • Shaktoolik on the Norton Sound

This project is funded by St. Lawrence University's Environmental Education Initiative for Active Learning, Research and Advocacy, funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

http://www.stlawu.edu/academics/programs/environmental-studies