Community Well-being
Marine resources such as salmon, cultivated shellfish, and seaweed are vital for food security, cultural continuity, and livelihoods in Â鶹´«Ã½'s coastal communities. Both subsistence and commercial harvests are integral to the way of life in these communities and contribute significantly to community well-being.
UAF Professor Emerita Dolly Garza hosts an Indigenous seaweed culinary activity with students in the Â鶹´«Ã½ Aquaculture Semester at the University of Â鶹´«Ã½ Southeast Sitka Campus.
Led by anthropologist Davin Holen and epidemiologist Micah Hahn, the Interface of Change Community Well-being team is working with communities to learn how changes in access, harvest, cultivation, and use of marine resources affect the health and social, cultural, and economic well-being in rural coastal communities.
University of Â鶹´«Ã½ Fairbanks marine biologist Schery Umanzor engages with children in Klukwan at an annual Interface of Change project community participatory workshop.
The Community Well-being team is working with collaborators in Seldovia, Cordova,
Valdez, Haines, and Klukwan to discuss, document, and model patterns of local change
through collaborative activities, including community conversations and participatory
photography.
Community Conversations
Each year over the course of the Interface of Change project, we organize an interactive workshop in each of the communities we are working with. These meetings serve as an opportunity to share the latest findings and updates from the project and to discuss potential collaborations between community-based researchers and the Interface of Change team. We will also have conversations to learn from community members about environmental stress that impacts the subsistence way of life and local economies. We hope to make these positive conversations that lead to unique resilience and adaptation strategies.
