SELECTED THESES ON THE CIRCUMPOLAR ARCTIC

While contact between industrial and traditional societies can occur on many fronts, with acculturation as a result, studies show that both formal education and the work experience have modernising effects. In Canada's Northwest Territories, governments have introduced employment training programs, which help indigenous peoples participate in the spreading wage economy. This thesis investigates the extent to which employment training itself is structured to encourage the acculturation of the native people into the mainstream of Canadian society.
Using published and other government documents as well as interviews in the field, this dissertation describes and analyses all employment training programs delivered in the NWT between 1970 and 1982.
Their modernising effect is assessed by isolating four key differences between the indigenous and modern societies -- language, activity scheduling, relationship to the land and local community. These are used as criteri to analyse the dimensions of the various training programs, and to infer their effects.
It is concluded that the delivery of employment training programs in the Northwest Territories has generally failed to accommodate the characteristics of native societies. Most programs have been structured in a fashion likely to promote the rapid individual modernisation of the trainees. The findings are discussed in the light of the central government's stated policies towards native people in the Territories and of further socioeconomic change.