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

本博士论文研究项目将研究通过土著Gwich'in Nation的实践和集体价值观表达的主权和非国家民族地位的替代表述。主权通常被描述为在一个有固定边界的固定领土上的最终国家权力。这个项目将面对正统的理解与权力和领土的替代理解。居住在Gwich'in Nation的社区居住在北方美国和加拿大边境之间的15个不同的村庄，并跨越重叠的地理区域，包括多个法律的管辖区，政府间关系，环境管理合作，社会经济以及空间和时间的独特文化概念。这些地理位置是Gwich'in人在一个关系共存的过程中实践和表达其跨界主权的场所，尽管联邦、省、州政府和私营公司不断提出挑战。Gwich'in Nation在行使主权时提出的是主张一种物理，社会和政治形式的权力，这种权力明显是Gwich'in，并在其人民的共同国家景观中运作，同时生活在美国和加拿大的更大的民族国家中。这个项目的目的是分析Gwich'在主权权力中的实践和表达，因为它们在其他主权机构（美国和加拿大的治理实体）中共存，以便提出一个新的关系权力的表述。博士生将采用以土著为基础的研究方法，为基于社区的数据积累和传播模式提供信息，同时还使用传统的定性研究技术。方法将包括一对一的访谈，以社区为基础的焦点小组，和概念映射研讨会在美国的两侧。加拿大边境。方法的多样性将被用来呈现如何Gwich'in人民作为一个国家运作的理解;如何Gwich'in国家行使主权在其多个地理;以及Gwich'in Nation的成员如何在理论和物质上构想他们的国家。Gwich'in Nation的成员所表达和实践的主权的替代表述是一个更大的，在世界各地的原住民社区中出现的对话。不仅有必要在政治地理学中引入更多土著民族动态主权的例子，而且有正当理由在不断变化的世界中审查这些做法，因为在这个世界中，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，这在一定程度上得益于《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。该项目将在关于权力，国家和民族的对话中参与当代全球政治变革，并分享土著Gwich'in Nation如何在复杂的地理环境中提供权力和集会的替代运作。Gwich'in Nation展示了传统文化，主权权力和地理如何被一个民族所维持和共享，以及国家如何共存并裁定边界，管辖权和自然环境。 作为博士论文研究改进奖，该奖项将提供支持，使有前途的学生建立一个强大的独立的研究生涯。

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.