Climate change, health, and Indigenous knowledge in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region: decolonial perspectives from Inuvik and Tuktoyaktuk

This paper examines the lived health impacts of climate change in Inuvik and Tuktoyaktuk, Northwest Territories, with attention to permafrost degradation, housing instability, food insecurity, water contamination, ecological change, and gendered caregiving burdens. Grounded in decolonial, Elder-guided, and land-based research approaches, the study draws on conversational stories shared by ten Elders and Knowledge-Keepers during a three-day gathering in Inuvik in August 2024. Rather than treating permafrost thaw as only a technical or environmental problem, the paper examines how climate-related disruptions are experienced through bodies, homes, food systems, water relations, cultural continuity, and psychosocial well-being. The findings show that Elders connect thawing ground, declining traditional foods, changing species patterns, industrial contamination, chronic and unfamiliar illnesses, and ecological grief as interconnected dimensions of climate-health vulnerability. The paper contributes to Arctic climate-health scholarship by engaging recent Inuvialuit Settlement Region research while foregrounding Indigenous knowledge, relational accountability, and community-defined research priorities. It calls for Indigenous-led climate-health surveillance, gender-responsive adaptation, stronger water governance, and policy approaches that understand environmental, human, animal, and cultural health as inseparable.