Alaska Research Archive
06.2020 - 06.2021
in collaboration with Sofie Kusaba
Kivalina, Alaska is a small native village located in northwestern Alaska on a small barrier island in the Chukchi Sea. The city was originally located near the northern border of the Kivalina Lagoon, but was relocated eventually as a result of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, which enforced a permanence to partially migratory indigenous groups. Traditionally, the locals survived on subsistence hunting, most notablyof the Bowhead Whale. The region was historically rish for fishing at the mouth of a river delta. Now the ocean’s sustanence is diminishing, aquatic animals traveling further and further from shore.
As the Earth’s climate warms, the melting permafrost above the arctic circle has resulted in severe changes to the landscape. Despite efforts by the US Army Corps of Engineers to reverse the impacts of climate warming on the island, the village is threatened by rising sea levels and coastal erosion. As of 2013, it is predicted that the island will be unihabitable by
2025. The citizens of Kivalina are some of America’s first climate refugees, the village undergoing relocation.
This partial investigation took place over the course of one-year at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result of both logistical challenges with conducting fieldwork and disagreements between local and foreign actors, this research was paused. Despite this, our team believes that what we uncovered may be invaluable to other academics, researchers, and architects investigating this same question: How do we equitably manage retreat?
While it’s easy to distance ourselves as researchers from the material that we consume, it’s important to note that the real lives of real people are impacted by the informed decisions we make.
We have opened our research archive in an open-source format. Please peruse at your own pace and dive deep into the literature we’ve curated for you. All of this information can be sourced for free online, and the curators of this archive have little ownership over this contents. In case a document here is intended for private use only, please contact the Climigrant’s Sketchbook directly and we will remove it.
You can read more about our investigation in the following document:
︎︎︎ Listening: Lessons Learned from an Investigation of Kivalina
While it’s easy to distance ourselves as researchers from the material that we consume, it’s important to note that the real lives of real people are impacted by the informed decisions we make.
We have opened our research archive in an open-source format. Please peruse at your own pace and dive deep into the literature we’ve curated for you. All of this information can be sourced for free online, and the curators of this archive have little ownership over this contents. In case a document here is intended for private use only, please contact the Climigrant’s Sketchbook directly and we will remove it.
You can read more about our investigation in the following document:
︎︎︎ Listening: Lessons Learned from an Investigation of Kivalina