[M-IS01] Environmental, Socio-Economic and Climatic Changes in Northern Eurasia

[MIS01-03] Convergence of arts, science, local and Indigenous knowledge for understanding frozen infrastructures change

★Invited Papers

*Vera Kuklina¹, Olga Zaslavskaya², Andrey Petrov³ (1.George Washington University, 2.International Alternative Culture Center (IACC/NAKKA), 3.University of Northern Iowa)

Keywords:Arts, Science, Local and Indigenous Knowledge, infrastructure, frozen landscapes

Climate change has a significant impact on frozen infrastructures composed of permafrost, ice and snow, and the built environment. Adaptation to and prevention of this infrastructure degradation requires collective governance by local and Indigenous communities and other stakeholders. The situation in the Arctic and Subarctic is exacerbated by remoteness, persisting digital divide, and divergence in perception of frozen landscapes. The majority of Arctic communities are located in remote regions with limited access to infrastructure and technologies. While for most stakeholders and decision-makers ice, snow and permafrost are perceived as an obstacle to development, for Indigenous Arctic communities, they are integral parts of daily lives, worldviews, and forms of community infrastructure. This paper is based on several projects dedicated to studies of frozen infrastructures that involve collaboration between experts from different disciplines, artists, and local and Indigenous communities. We define this Art, Science, and Local and Indigenous Knowledge (ArtSLInK) collaboration as a methodological and epistemological approach centered around decolonization practices encompassing simultaneous, equitable, co-productive engagement of science, arts and place-based local and Indigenous Knowledge systems, and their modes of exploration and expression. Bringing our methodological approach to sustainability research, we recognize the complexity and interconnectedness of the problems humanity is facing today. ArtSLInK further develops ArtScience initiatives as a new form of research that have multi and transdisciplinary multiscale, multitemporal and multi-modal character. It engages with diverse ways of knowing, including subjective, sensory and emotional dimensions as well as local and Indigenous perspectives on frozen matter. Implementation of such an approach requires an iterative process of collaborative knowledge production at all stages, starting from question formulation, through gathering, analyzing, curating, interpreting and presenting data and ideas situated in a specific context of study areas and partnering communities. In particular, we applied this approach within the project Informal Roads The Impact of Unofficial Transportation Routes on Remote Arctic Communities in response to challenges of COVID. We combined traditional scientific research field work and remote sensing methods with artistic interventions and reflections. In the summer of 2021 social and physical scientists and artists traveled together in an expedition to the north of the Baikal region. Places, where we traveled together, became our points of reference to shared experience for artists, scholars and representatives of local and Indigenous communities. At the stage of analysis, these points of reference helped to combine diverse sources, build bridges between different epistemologies and produce a new knowledge. Information collected during the expedition interviews with local residents, landscape descriptions and permafrost measurements, and audio, photo and video documentation constitute a basis not only for scientific publications and reports, but also exhibitions. All together, such collaboration enhances our understanding of interacting processes in the social, cultural, technological, environmental, and governance domains for frozen infrastructures and allows us to bring critical knowledge to a wider audience necessary for framing sustainable Arctic futures.