European Explorers Destroyed the Inuit Way of Life

Franklin’s expedition didn’t have a significant impact on the Inuit people of Canada. But his previously made maps, the subsequent search for his last expedition, and improved understanding of the Arctic gave whalers the information they needed to expand their operations into this area. Whaling had an enormous impact on the Inuit way of life. Whaling operations had been in place in the Canadian Arctic since the late sixteenth century but the peak of whaling happened in the 1860’s and 1870’s, about a decade after Franklin’s doomed voyage. The whalers created a trading relationship with the Inuit, and provided them with European tools and boats in return for their expertise in hunting whales and surviving in the North. As the whaling trade declined, effects on the Inuit became even worse as whalers tried to make up for the diminishing whale population by supplementing their incomes with caribou, seal and walrus hunting, as well as fishing and fox trapping. These activities over-exploited many traditional Inuit subsistence resources. As a result of this the Inuit no longer had the means to trade with the Europeans for the tools which they had become accustomed to, nor could they harvest the animals that formed the basis of their traditional lifestyle.