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Introduction
This paper describes an adult learning project to revitalise the traditional Inuit art of weaving grass baskets. The participants involved in the project, all older women who speak an indigenous first language (Inuktitut) and who have limited experience with formal education, largely on their own initiative, undertook the process of successfully re-learning a craft that had almost faded from living memory in their community. In this paper I focus on the story of the revival of the art of grass basket-weaving to illustrate the potential empowering results that can be achieved when a community college validates traditional art knowledge as a relevant and meaningful form of learning.
The research was undertaken as part of a postgraduate program in adult education at Saint Francis Xavier University, Antigonish, Nova Scotia. My objectives for the thesis were to conduct a case study of a college programme that aimed to support the learning of the traditional art of Sanikiluaq grass basket-weaving, and to identify the features of the project that made it a practical example of emancipatory adult education. Emancipatory adult education has as its purpose a social mission to contribute through education to a more just and equitable society. Educators aim to produce adult education pedagogy that empowers learners (English, 2005).
I am not Inuit and I am not claiming access to the insights of Indigenous peoples in this analysis. Since 1989 I have worked in Nunavut, which has a population of 85 per cent Inuit, first as a practising adult educator and, recently, as a director of community-based programs. From 1989 to 1996 I was co-adult educator with Meeka Arnakak, a respected Inuit Elder and educator. The focus of her research and practice is on the development of college courses and programs that respect and include traditional knowledge, Inuktitut language and Inuit educators. She challenges Inuit and non-Inuit educators and administrators to include 'the many...areas of knowledge, which can be used in our communities to stand on and to gain strength from' (Arnakak, 1999). My experience of working with her finds fruition in this enquiry.
An important development influencing the provision of college programs in the Canadian Arctic was the formation in 1999 of a new territory. Nunavut was created to reflect more clearly and to...