Beyond the pale: Inuit resistance to the Moravian reconstruction of northern Labrador

Summary

Moravian missionaries in central and northern Labrador won growing numbers of Inuit converts during the nineteenth century, as they pursued a concerted program of economic, social and cultural reorganization aimed at establishing stable mission communities that were tightly articulated with the wider Moravian network. Inuit who declined to convert to Christianity came to be marked as dangerous hold outs, ‘heathens’ who represented a nagging moral threat to the missionary project. Archaeologically, Inuit negotiation of changing identities during this period can be seen in the layout of households and settlements. The appearance at some northern communities of radial house clusters in which dwellings backed onto each other, as distinct from groups of houses with parallel entrance tunnels, large communal houses, and isolated dwellings, is one expression of this emergent logic of resistance and cultural difference.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Labrador Inuit and Europeans, Contact and Long-term Relations   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2014

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): SYM-66,05