The Inuit Dog and the Disappearing Inuit Culture
Cultural Anthropology
The Inuit Dog and the Disappearing Inuit Culture
Exactly how the first dogs (ancestors of the dogs we know today) first became domesticated is a highly debatable topic. What is not debatable, however is the importance of these animals to mankind and its societies and cultures since the time of their domestication. Hunter, herder, warning system against close danger, beast of burden, aid to the blind, companion – all roles played by countless breeds of dogs.
The importance of dogs in our societies can not be understated and nowhere, perhaps, is this more true than to the Inuit people. Quite simply, it was the Inuit dog – the Qimmiq, that allowed the Inuit to sustain their proud culture of self-reliance for at least a thousand years. “Dogs equaled life” (Woodward), said Johnny Munick, an Inuit boy, 12 years old during a period in the early 1960’s when it was purported that thousands of Inuit dogs were slaughtered by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police on Baffin Island. The alleged mass slaughter that took place is a highly controversial issue that decimated the Inuit dog population, leaving it, currently, a nearly extinct species. It is an issue that proves exactly how important dogs were to the Inuit way of life.
A little understanding of Inuit culture and dog domestication is important to understanding why the slaughter of their dogs occurred in the first place. It is also important to understanding why it was so devastating to their way of life (not to mention the fact that a beautiful pure breed of dog may have been systematically brought to the brink of extinction by political authorities because of certain prejudices towards a cultural group). The slaughter (or “disappearance” as it is sometimes referred to by the Canadian authorities) of the dogs in the 1950’s and 1960’s forever changed the Inuit way of life, pushing