Nanuk Narratives: Voices of the People Living Alongside Polar Bears
“Nanuk Narratives” is an Inuit-led series of short documentary films about the deep and enduring relationship among Inuit and polar bears (nanuk). Hearing directly from Inuit across the Canadian Arctic and Greenland, these videos explore a diversity of topics, including Inuit observations of bear abundance and health, human-bear encounters and safety, tracking and hunting bears, cooking and eating bears, the cultural and emotional connections to bears, and Inuit recommendations for polar bear management.
This event will be presented by David Borish, the director of this initiative, who is also an EC50 Class of 2023 member. David will screen a variety of short films that hear from community voices, and talk about the process of co-creating films in partnership with Inuit communities, wildlife co-management boards, local filmmakers, researchers, and others. David will also share his experience filming polar bears across the Arctic, including skidooing in temperatures below -40 fahrenheit, and the sailing through the Northwest Passage on Le Commandant Charcot icebreaker.
This in-person event at the Explorers Club Headquarters will include an audience Q&A.
Streaming live here on explorers.org, our YouTube Channel, and our Facebook Live — Friday, March 14th at 7:00 pm ET.
RESERVATIONS
This will be an in-person lecture at Explorers Club Headquarters.
In-person tickets are $20 for Members, and $35 for the General Public.
Check-in will begin at 6:00 pm, with a beer and wine reception from 6:00 – 7:00 pm
David Borish
David Borish is a social science researcher and visual artist who uses documentary film to co-explore and communicate an array of environmental, social, and health issues in collaboration with underrepresented communities. As an award-winning filmmaker that has a PhD in Public Health & International Development, his visual work is grounded in evidence-based research. David has worked with wildlife co-management boards across the Canadian Arctic to co-create visual media about Indigenous knowledge of species like polar bears, caribou, and beluga. He has also worked with Indigenous communities on socio-ecological film projects in Uganda, Kenya, Nepal, Malaysia, Peru, and other parts of the world. He currently manages Cloudberry Connections, a company dedicated to environmental communications, and also lectures at the University of California San Diego. David is part of the Explorers Club’s annual “50 People Changing the World” class of 2023.
