Doctoral Dissertation Research: Coexisting Sovereignties, Overlapping Geographies: The Gwich'in Nation and the U.S.-Canadian Border

这个博士论文研究项目将考察主权和非国家国家地位的不同表述，这些表述是通过土著格维辛民族的实践和集体价值观来表达的。主权通常被描述为在固定边界的特定领土上的最终国家权力。这个项目将用对权力和领土的另一种理解来对抗正统的理解。Gwich'in Nation的居民居住在美国北部和加拿大边境之间的十五个不同的村庄，跨越重叠的地理区域，包括多个法律管辖区，政府间关系，环境管理合作，社会经济和独特的时空文化概念。尽管联邦、省、州政府和私营公司不断提出挑战，但这些地区仍是戈维辛人在相互关系、共存的过程中实践和阐明其跨界主权的场所。哥威族在行使主权时提出的主张是，主张一种具有哥威族特色的物质、社会和政治形式的权力，这种权力在其人民共同的国家景观中运作，同时生活在美国和加拿大等更大的民族国家中。这个项目的目的是分析在其他主权实体（美国和加拿大的治理实体）中共存的Gwich'in主权权力的实践和表达，以提出一种新的关系权力的表述。博士生将采用一种基于当地的研究方法，为基于社区的数据积累和传播模型提供信息，同时也使用传统的定性研究技术。方法将包括一对一访谈、以社区为基础的焦点小组以及在美加边境两侧的概念制图讲习班。方法的多样性将被用来理解戈维希人作为一个民族是如何运作的；戈维辛民族如何在其多个地理区域行使主权；以及格威辛族成员如何从理论上和物质上构想他们的国家。戈维辛族成员表达和实践的其他主权表述，是世界各地土著社区正在进行的更大范围的对话的一部分。不仅需要在政治地理中引入更多来自土著民族的动态主权的例子，而且有正当的理由来检查这些实践，以适应一个不断变化的世界，在这个世界上，自决的呼声和一些政治社区在民族国家关系之外运作的愿望正在迅速增加，在某种程度上，联合国《土著人民权利宣言》和美洲人权委员会的裁决等国际机制加速了这一进程。该项目将参与当代全球政治变化中关于权力、国家和民族的对话，并分享土著Gwich'in民族如何在复杂的地理环境中提供权力和集会的替代操作。格威辛民族展示了传统文化、主权权力和地理如何能够被一个民族维持和共享，以及国家如何能够共存并裁决边界、管辖权和自然环境。作为博士论文研究改进奖，该奖项将为有前途的学生提供支持，使他们能够建立强大的独立研究事业。

This doctoral dissertation research project will examine alternative formulations of sovereignty and non-state nationhood expressed through the practices and collective values of the indigenous Gwich'in Nation. Sovereignty often is described as ultimate state power over a set territory with fixed borders. This project will confront that orthodox understanding with alternative understandings of both power and territory. The communities who populate the Gwich'in Nation inhabit fifteen disparate villages between the northern U.S. and Canadian border and across overlapping geographies that include multiple legal jurisdictions, inter-governmental relations, environmental management collaborations, social economies, and distinct cultural conceptions of space and time. These geographies are the sites in which the Gwich'in people practice and articulate their transboundary sovereignty in a relational, coexistent process despite ongoing challenges from federal, provincial, state governments and private corporations. What the Gwich'in Nation proposes in their exercise of sovereignty is to assert a physical, social, and political form of power that is distinctly Gwich'in and that operates within the shared national landscape of their people, while simultaneously living in the larger nation-states of the U.S. and Canada. The objective of this project is to analyze the practices and articulations of Gwich'in sovereign power as they coexist within other sovereign bodies (U.S. and Canadian governance entities) in order to propose a new formulation of relational power. The doctoral student will employ an indigenous-based research methodology to inform community-based data accumulation and dissemination models while also using traditional qualitative research techniques. Methods will include one-on-one interviews, community-based focus groups, and conceptual mapping workshops on both sides of the U.S.-Canadian border. The diversity of methods will be used to render understandings of how the Gwich'in people operate as a nation; how the Gwich'in Nation exercises sovereignty throughout its multiple geographies; and how members of the Gwich'in Nation conceive their nation in theoretical and material ways.The alternative formulations of sovereignty expressed and practiced by members of the Gwich'in Nation are part of a larger, emerging conversation in indigenous communities around the world. Not only is there a need for introducing more examples of dynamic sovereignty from indigenous nations into political geography, there is legitimate cause to examine these practices for a changing world where vocalizations of self-determination and the desire for some political communities to operate outside the nation-state nexus is increasing at a rapid pace, accelerated in part by international mechanisms such as the U.N Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and rulings of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. This project will engage contemporary global political changes in conversations about power, state, and nation and share how the indigenous Gwich'in Nation offers alternative operations of power and assembly within a complex geography. The Gwich'in Nation demonstrates how traditional culture, sovereign power, and geography can be sustained and shared by a people as well as how nations can coexist and adjudicate boundaries, jurisdictions, and natural environments. As a Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement award, this award will provide support to enable a promising student to establish a strong independent research career.