Methods and approach to the interdisciplinary and cross-cultural Alaska Arctic Salmon Workshop: critical self-reflections from fisheries scientists

Abstract

Redistribution and shifting habitat envelopes are impacting organisms across many taxa, which in turn are impacting Indigenous ways of life. In Arctic Alaska, Pacific salmon are known to have occurred for at least a century, but in recent years appear to be increasingly common. With the goal of holistically understanding and describing these changes in a way that equitably considers Indigenous, local, and western knowledge, we share our experience and methodologies in facilitating the Arctic Alaska Salmon Workshop. We share our perspective, approach, and methods as fisheries natural scientists convening this workshop, which included community-based knowledge holders from the Iñupiat communities of Kotzebue, Point Hope, Utqiaġvik, and Kaktovik, and western scientists and researchers from universities, fishery management agencies, and local community government. After briefly discussing some of the workshop highlights, we conclude with four key takeaways: 1) that the process of co-production of knowledge is an ideal towards which we must strive, but acknowledge we may rarely, if ever, fully achieve, 2) pursuit of the ‘good science’ should guide our work, 3) examination and assessment of assumptions should occur early and often, and 4) Anglanikina! Make sure you have a good time, (Yup’ik).