Finding Grounded Perspective in a Virtual World

 

By Aaron Poe 

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I’ve worked on collaborative efforts to help better connect communities and land managers on shared

projects to address climate adaption and land stewardship for over a decade. Most of this work has

taken place within the indoor confines of innumerable conference rooms and meeting halls. In 2020,

this ironic approach to work focused on fish, wildlife, lands and waters, took an even odder turn as

COVID-19 restrictions pushed most people in my line of work into our homes and online.

Being truly grateful for the ability to maintain my work while so many others couldn’t, I dove right in to

endless Zoom calls, Google hangouts and efforts to shift three different workshops to all-virtual events.

Even without the loss of in-person meetings, my work with the Northern Latitudes Partnerships in

Alaska and Western Canada has always been fraught with communications challenges and risks for

harmful misunderstandings that stem from cultural divides. My colleagues and I work to balance the

interests and perspectives of hundreds of amazing individuals from agencies, Indigenous organizations,

nonprofits, universities and foundations who have come together to build ways to adapt in the rapidly

changing north.

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Finding appropriate ways to keep folks working together ‘in a good way’ that honors each other’s

experiences, builds trust and fosters human connections became much harder in 2020. Not only was the

human-to-human connection lost, so was the connection to the lands and waters of focus for most of

our city-based partners—who in regular years would at least be able to travel to those regions and work

with their partners in communities.

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This dynamic was also true for the Arctic Funders Collaborative. For the first time our group was not able

to meet in person for our annual fall retreat. For these gatherings we attempt to always ground our

discussion in the cultural practices and landscape of the host community. Thoughtful consideration by

the staff for the collaborative brought in a virtual medicine walk led by Dene elder Lila Erasmus from the

Nacho Nyak Dun First Nation of Mayo, Yukon. Lila is President, Owner and Operator of Bows & Arrows

since 2006 and Naturally Dene since 2015.

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Lila’s session with our group last September left a mark on me—in a good way. From behind her iMac

consul, using a carefully orchestrated series of short video clips and photos, she led us on a September

afternoon trip with her husband Roy out on the land to harvest the medicines she’d be needing in the

coming months. During our tour Lila shared her knowledge about the land, its medicines and the ways

that Indigenous people approach harvest with humility, gratefulness and reciprocity.

Months later, as part of an effort focused on helping to strengthen and connect community-based

environmental monitoring in Alaska and adjacent Canada, I reached out to Lila again for help. This time

her story, pictures and footage of harvesting salt from mudflats for medicinal purposes during weekend

trip with extended family helped ground a team of scientists and community leaders zooming in from

across Canada and the U.S.

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In a year were so many of us needed medicine, virtual and otherwise—Lila offered a great gift to folks in

their bedroom, living room and pantry offices. People who were disconnected from the land at the

center of their work and disconnected from each other in person, had a shared experience--guided by a

wise woman connected to the land through Dene culture.