Donat Savoie

Last updated
Donat Savoie
Born
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
NationalityCanadian
Education University of Montreal
Occupation Anthropologist
Employer Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada
Known forInterim Executive Director of Canada's Inuit Relations Secretariat;
Chief federal negotiator for Nunavik self-government

Donat Savoie (born in Montreal, Quebec) [1] is a Canadian anthropologist, was the interim Executive Director of Canada's Inuit Relations Secretariat and chief federal negotiator for Nunavik self-government before his retirement in 2006. [2]

Contents

Early years

"By allowing myself to be integrated into the family and village, I learnt a great deal about the Inuit way of life, their mode of thought, their values and the difficulties they faced daily in a quest for food and family essentials. This was an opportunity for me to witness not only their capacity to survive, but also their creative response to many obstacles." (Savoie, regarding his 1967 experience in George River.)

[1]

Savoie left on May 3, 1967 for the Eastern Arctic, to the Ungava Bay community of George River, now known as Kangiqsualujjuaq, Quebec. There he lived with Inuk printmaker Tivi Etok and family while doing research for his masters' project. He received a B.S. degree in Anthropology from the University of Montreal in 1968, and a master's degree in Anthropology the following year. [2] [3]

The introduction and photographs in Jobie Weetaluktuk's 2008 book, Le monde de Tivi Etok: la vie et l'art d'un aîné inuit about the man Savoie lived with while doing his master's degree research, are by Savoie. [4]

Career

Savoie spent his career at the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (DIAND) where he held several positions. His first job, in 1969, was the analysis and editing of Father Émile Petitot’s ethnographic work in the Northwest Territories. From 1971-1974, he was a Research Officer in the Northern Research Division, before becoming Chief of the Eastern Arctic Section, Northern Research Division in 1975. For thirteen years, from 1977 through 1990, Savoie was Director of Circumpolar and Scientific Affairs. In 1992, Savoie became Acting Director General, Self-Government, and in 1993-2001, Senior Negotiator for Nunavik Self-Government negotiations. The Minister of DIAND appointed Savoie as Chief Federal Negotiator for Nunavik Self-Government negotiations in 2001, a position he held until 2006. In the last year before his retirement, he served as Interim Executive Director, Inuit Relations Secretariat, April 2005-April 2006, thus making him the first director of the federal government's new Inuit secretariat. [1]

"The 36 years I have spent in the public service of Canada, and nearly exclusively with the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, have brought a lot of fun and many nice accomplishments." (Savoie, 2006)

[2]

In addition to being the Founding President of the University of Montreal Research Committee on Northern Populations in 1974, Savoie has held leadership positions in a variety of organizations, including Vice President, Canadian Association of French Language Sociologists and Anthropologists (1973); Secretary Treasurer and Vice-President, Recherches Améridiennes au Québec (1971–1975); Vice President, Man and the Biosphere/Canada Program, Unesco (1984–1987). [3] He was elected a Fellow of the Arctic Institute of North America in 1996, and ten years later, in 2006, was elected a member of the College of Fellows of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society. He was the 2003 recipient of the Weaver-Tremblay Award. [5]

From 1977 through 1982, Savoie was also editor of Montreal's Cultures Amérindiennes Collection of Éditions Hurtubise HMH Ltée. [3]

He retired from government service April 7, 2006. [2]

Partial bibliography

In French language:

Related Research Articles

Nunavik Proposed autonomous area in Quebec, Canada

Nunavik comprises the northern third of the province of Quebec, part of the Nord-du-Québec region and nearly coterminous with Kativik. Covering a land area of 443,684.71 km2 (171,307.62 sq mi) north of the 55th parallel, it is the homeland of the Inuit of Quebec and part of the wider Inuit Nunangat. Almost all of the 13,181 inhabitants of the region, of whom 90% are Inuit, live in fourteen northern villages on the coast of Nunavik and in the Cree reserved land (TC) of Whapmagoostui, near the northern village of Kuujjuarapik.

Kangiqsualujjuaq Northern village municipality in Quebec, Canada

Kangiqsualujjuaq is an Inuit village located at the mouth of the George River on the east coast of Ungava Bay in Nunavik, Quebec, Canada. Its population was 956 as of the 2021 census.

Inuktitut Name of several Inuit languages spoken in Canada

Inuktitut, also Eastern Canadian Inuktitut, is one of the principal Inuit languages of Canada. It is spoken in all areas north of the tree line, including parts of the provinces of Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec, to some extent in northeastern Manitoba as well as the Northwest Territories and Nunavut. It is one of the aboriginal languages written with Canadian Aboriginal syllabics.

Kuujjuaq Northern village municipality in Quebec, Canada

Kuujjuaq, formerly known as Fort Chimo and by other names, is a former Hudson's Bay Company outpost at the mouth of the Koksoak River on Ungava Bay that has become the largest northern village in the Nunavik region of Quebec, Canada. It is the administrative capital of the Kativik Regional Government. Its population was 2,668 as of the 2021 census.

Charlie Watt is a former Canadian Senator from Nunavik (Québec).

Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami Canadian Inuit political organization

Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, previously known as the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, is a nonprofit organization in Canada that represents over 65,000 Inuit across Inuit Nunangat and the rest of Canada. Their mission is to "serve as a national voice protecting and advancing the rights and interests of Inuit in Canada."

Sheila Watt-Cloutier Inuit environmentalist

Sheila Watt-Cloutier, OC is a Canadian Inuit activist. She has been a political representative for Inuit at the regional, national and international levels, most recently as International Chair for Inuit Circumpolar Council. Watt-Cloutier has worked on a range of social and environmental issues affecting Inuit, most recently, persistent organic pollutants and global warming. She has received numerous awards and honors for her work, and has been featured in a number of documentaries and profiled by journalists from all media. Watt-Cloutier sits as an advisor to Canada's Ecofiscal Commission. She is also a senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation.

The James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement is an Aboriginal land claim settlement, approved in 1975 by the Cree and Inuit of northern Quebec, and later slightly modified in 1978 by the Northeastern Quebec Agreement, through which Quebec's Naskapi First Nation joined the agreement. The agreement covers economic development and property issues in northern Quebec, as well as establishing a number of cultural, social and governmental institutions for Indigenous people who are members of the communities involved in the agreement.

Makivik Corporation is the legal representative of Quebec's Inuit, established in 1978 under the terms of the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement, the agreement that established the institutions of Nunavik. As such, it is the heir of the Northern Quebec Inuit Association, which signed the agreement with the governments of Quebec and Canada.

Ivujivik Northern village municipality in Quebec, Canada

Ivujivik is a northern village in Nunavik, Quebec, and the northernmost settlement in any Canadian province, although there are settlements further north in the territories. Its population in the Canada 2021 Census was 412. Unlike most other northern villages in Nunavik, it has no Inuit reserved land of the same name associated with it.

Abe Okpik Inuit politician and leader

Abraham "Abe" Okpik, CM was an Inuit community leader in Canada. He was instrumental in helping Inuit obtain surnames rather than disc numbers as a form of government identification. He was also the first Inuk to sit on what is now the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories and worked with Thomas Berger.

Inuit Group of peoples of Arctic North America

Inuit are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland (Denmark), Canada, and Alaska. The Inuit languages are part of the Eskimo–Aleut languages also known as Inuit-Yupik-Unangan and also as Eskaleut. Inuit Sign Language is a critically endangered language isolate used in Nunavut.

Taamusi Qumaq, was an Inuit historian, linguist, writer, politician and elder from Nunavik, Québec, Canada who contributed to the preservation of the Inuit language and traditional culture. Despite lacking any formal schooling, Qumaq published two seminal works on the Inuit culture: a 30,000-word comprehensive Inuktitut dictionary and an encyclopedia on Inuit traditional customs and knowledge. He was fluent in Inuktitut only.

Kangirsuk Northern village municipality in Quebec, Canada

Kangirsuk is an Inuit village in northern Nunavik, Quebec, Canada. It is 230 kilometres (140 mi) north of Kuujjuaq, between Aupaluk and Quaqtaq. The community is only accessible by air and, in late summer, by boat. The village used to be known also as Payne Bay and Bellin.

Émile-Fortuné Petitot, a French Missionary Oblate, was a notable Canadian northwest cartographer, ethnologist, geographer, linguist, and writer.

Tivi Etok is an Inuit artist, illustrator, and printmaker. In 1975, he was the first Inuk printmaker to have a collection of his own prints released. He is now an Elder.

Inuvialuit Settlement Region Region in Canada

The Inuvialuit Settlement Region, abbreviated as ISR, located in Canada's western Arctic, was designated in 1984 in the Inuvialuit Final Agreement by the Government of Canada for the Inuvialuit people. It spans 90,650 km2 (35,000 sq mi) of land, mostly above the tree line, and includes several subregions: the Beaufort Sea, the Mackenzie River delta, the northern portion of Yukon, and the northwest portion of the Northwest Territories. The ISR includes both Crown Lands and Inuvialuit Private Lands.

Bernard Saladin d'Anglure is a Canadian anthropologist and ethnographer. His work has primarily concerned itself with the Inuit of Northern Canada, especially practices of shamanism and conceptions of gender. As an anthropological theorist, he studied under the structuralist Claude Lévi-Strauss, but has become most recognized for his innovative methodology and elaboration of the concept of the "third sex". He speaks French, English and Inuktitut fluently. He is currently Professor Emeritus (Retired) at the Université Laval.

John Amagoalik is an Inuit politician from Nunavik (Québec). He campaigned for Inuit rights and made a significant contribution to the founding of the Canadian territory of Nunavut. He was Chairman of the Nunavut Implementation Commission and is widely regarded as the "Father of Nunavut".

Zebedee Nungak is a Canadian Inuit author, actor, essayist, journalist, and politician. As a child, Nungak was taken from his home in the community of Saputiligait, along with two other children, for the purposes of an experiment by the Canadian government to "[expunge] them of Inuit culture and groom them to become northern leaders with a southern way of thinking." Nungak later became pivotal in securing successful land rights claims and the creation of his home territory of Nunavik.

References

  1. 1 2 3 George, Jane (April 15, 2005). "Savoie to lead new Inuit secretariat". nunatsiaq.com. Archived from the original on May 12, 2008. Retrieved 2009-01-13.
  2. 1 2 3 4 George, Jane (April 7, 2006). "Inuit Relations Secretariat loses interim director Donat Savoie retires after 36 years with DIAND". Archived from the original on May 13, 2008. Retrieved 2009-01-13.
  3. 1 2 3 "Savoie, Donat". cbs.dk. February 1, 2008. Retrieved 2009-01-13.[ permanent dead link ]
  4. ↑ "The World of Tivi Etok". sikunews.com. Archived from the original on 2011-07-16. Retrieved 2009-01-13.
  5. ↑ "Weaver-Tremblay Award". anthropologica.ca. December 11, 2008. Archived from the original on September 25, 2008. Retrieved 2009-01-13.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.