Course:HIST104/VANOC Inukshuk Fridge Magnet

"Show your spirit with this Vancouver 2010 magnet, featuring a full colour logo. Perfect for a gift or for your refrigerator!"

The Vancouver 2010 Olympics logo features a design of an inukshuk. The logo is called Ilanaaq (pronounced el la nawk), and features five stone-like objects, each a different colour, configured, to represent a person. “The different colours represent different regions of the country: the green and blues symbolize coastal forests, mountain rangers and islands. The red represents Canada’s Maple Leaf and the yellow depicts brilliant sunrises.” Moreover, the Illanaaq emblem also features a mouth which gives “it happy and welcoming human characteristics.”

This contemporary design of an inukshuk by Vancouver based graphic designers Elena Rivera MacGregor and Gonzalo Alatorre was chosen from 1,600 entries from across Canada by an international panel of nine judges. The mascot will be named Ilanaaq which means ‘friend’ in the native Inuit Inuktitut language. Rivera MacGregor claims that her winning design represents the culture, environment and people of Canada.

In December of 2007, it was announced that Natural Color Productions would be in charge of the development and sale of "Calendars, Postcards, Fridge Magnets and Playing Cards” bearing the Vancouver 2010 Olympic logo. Operated and owned in British Columbia, Natural Color Productions are known as a prominent publishing and distribution company in Canada. Having designed and published postcards for the Vancouver Expo '86, Dennis Kim, director of licensing and merchandising with VANOC (Vancouver 2010 Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games) states that “[they] will develop dynamic and affordable products such as postcards, calendars, posters [and fridge magnets] which will capture and showcase the 2010 Winter Games and offer additional ways for Canadians to engage in the Games.”

Inukshuk

Inukshuk (pronounced in-ook-shook) are man-made stone monuments. Inuksuit (plural) have been used by the Inuit people as guides for special purposes in the Artic. They are a symbol, represented with a man-made stone structure or cairn that is erected to serve as a direction marker, demarcate areas used for food storage (such as a food cache), the migration routes of caribou, or to communicate a message of safe passage for those who follow. Originally, Inukshuk were built as a survival tool by the native Inuit and other peoples of the North American Arctic and serve to represent cooperation, unity, and the strength of the community as a whole.

More specifically, the inunnguaq stone structure is composed of separate stones arranged in the shape of a human with outstretched arms. Each separate stone supports each other, symbolizing that no single stone is more important than another. Meaning can only be derived from the stones as a whole structure, and the construction of the object required the efforts of the entire group, signifying the importance of the group effort over the individual. Indeed, "they are the result of a consensus of purpose, of focused action by a group united in its goal and labour."

Inuksuit have been used by Inuit for 4000 years and are still in use in the Arctic today. When looked at all together, the inuksuit form a three dimensional map that contains information on more than just trails and food caches. They inform the Inuit on good places to hunt or fish, where they can shelter for the winter and the history of the land and the people who lived there. In the twenty first century, mining and hydro electricity developments threaten their continued existence. Protection and preservation of the inuksuit sites have been underway for at least the last 30 years. The process involves many federal and provincial agencies looking at zoning characteristics, land claims and land use studies.

The attention attracted by recent tourism marketing of the inuksuit, as the unofficial symbol of the arctic, may be beneficial in terms of helping to preserve the inuksuit. Marketing campaigns that take the inuksuit out of the context of the Arctic lead to some of the controversy on nonindigenous use of the symbols. People in southern Canada are also adapting the form for their own use. Pink flamingos and garden gnomes have given way to inukshuk as lawn adornments. The 2000/2001 Mosaicultures Internationales competition in Montreal featured a gigantic topiary of an inukshuk. In Vancouver the inukshuk craze has resulted in a large one being built along the Stanley Park Seawall and the adoption of a modified inunnquaq as the symbol of the 2010 Olympics in the form of magnets, jewellery, coins and bookmarks.

The Inunnquaq - considered a recent development, first appearing in the 19th century.

VANOC and the Inukshuk: Contact Zones

The concept of 'contact zones' was first developed by Mary Louise Pratt (Professor of Social and Cultural Analysis at New York University), in an essay entitled "Arts of the Contact Zone". In that work Pratt defines contact zones as “social spaces where cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in contexts of highly asymmetrical relations of power, such as colonialism, slavery, or their aftermaths as they are lived out in many parts of the world today”. Pratt conducts an in-depth analysis of the written work of “The First New Chronicle of Good Government”, by Guaman Poma, noting several features of the work which make it the product of a contact zone. According to Pratt, the attributes of a work that are the product of contact zones are as follows:

• A work that is written in two languages, where the author appropriates another’s language for his/her own ends. (The relationship between the author and the source language is often one of an asymmetrical power relationship);

• The work, or object, is a reconstruction of the world with the author/creator in the centre of the universe;

• The work is autoethnographic, in which the author undertakes to “describe [his culture and people] in ways that engage with representations others have made of them. The work is a “selective collaboration with an appropriation of idioms of the metropolis or conqueror”; and,

• The author’s work may undergo a process of transculturation, whereby materials transmitted by a dominant or metropolitan culture are appropriated and adapted.

As the Inukshuk is widely recognized as a product of Inuit culture, the VANOC Inukshuk can be viewed as the result of the appropriation of one culture’s iconography by another. The two culture zones involved in the act of appropriation include VANOC (a representative of corporate/market-oriented culture) and the Inuit (minority aboriginal culture). However, because Pratt’s 'contact zone' paradigm focuses on asymmetrical relations of power, with the subordinate culture appropriating and parodying elements of the dominant or 'metropolitan' culture, the process of transculturation has been reversed in this case. VANOC, a member of the dominant market-oriented corporate culture, has appropriated the iconography of the subordinate minority aboriginal Inuit culture. The end result is the abstract reconfiguration of the Inuit aboriginal iconography by VANOC for the purposes of corporate branding and mass media marketing—-ironically, this reconfiguration by VANOC is a misinterpretation and misrepresentation of the Inuit Inukshuk as VANOC has incorrectly identified the VANOC logo as an Inukshuk, when it is in fact an Inunnquaq. Inukshuk created in the form of human beings (inunnguaq), appear to be a recent development, perhaps appearing only after the arrival of European whalers during the 19th century. Interestingly, many inunnguat (plural) are being built by non-Inuit and are being incorrectly called inuksuit. The process of parody in this case highlights the dominant culture’s lack of understanding of the subordinate culture’s iconography.

The result of the "contact zone" (the social space where VANOC and the Inuit cultures, symbolically, "meet, clash and grapple"), accentuates the divide between dominant and subordinate culture.

Contemporary Inukshuk Iconography

The Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games emblem "is a contemporary interpretation of the Inukshuk." VANOC describes it as a symbol of friendship, hope and hospitality. The Vancouver 2010 logo will be an expression of a nation that "warmly welcomes the people of the world with open arms." John Furlong, chief executive officer of the Vancouver 2010 Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games (VANOC) states, “As VANOC relies on partnerships and a shared vision to deliver the Games, so does our emblem. Each stone relies on the other to support the whole. Together, the result is a symbol of strength, vision and teamwork that points us all in the direction of excellence and it will welcome the world to Canada in 2010.”

Elena Rivera MacGregor, along with her design team, used the inukshuk located in Stanley Park as inspiration for their design. "There were only so many things that could represent the entire country," said Rivera MacGregor. "We researched it and we concluded the inukshuk was in fact one character that could pretty much tell the whole story. The value of the style and components of it, the colours, that's what took it over the top." In the lead up to the 2010 Winter Olympics, the logo will be seen almost everywhere: on television, signs, apparel, global advertisements, and especially Vancouver 2010 merchandise such as fridge magnets.

The choice of symbol has received less criticism than the 2010 mascots which were unveiled shortly after. Paul Okalik, premier of the territory of Nunavut, was pleased by the choice of an inukshuk as the Olympic symbol: "It shows a strength. Our inukshuk has been around a very long time. To be shown off to the rest of the world is very special for us." Theodora Mantzaris, one of the judges for the design competition, was also impressed by the design: "You see I'm Greek, I was seeing it (an inukshuk) for the first time and I felt somebody welcoming me. So I thought it was a strong emblem."

Not everyone agrees that the design choice was an appropriate one however. In a 2005 interview with the CBC, former Nunavut Commissioner Peter Irniq, was quoted as saying "Inuit never build inuksuit with head, legs and arms." He believes that every inukshuk has a meaning and reason for being built in a certain location and building them should not be taken lightly. Irniq also says "the Olympic Committee (VANOC) should have consulted with the elders of Nunavut before ... they chose the design."

Although the logo may not be accepted by everyone, it appears that the colorful inunnguaq chosen to represent Vancouver was a good choice. As Furlong states, “Together with the five Olympic rings, Ilanaaq reminds us every day that we Canadians have been given the opportunity and the privilege to do giant things. What more can we ask for?”

External Links

• What is an Inukshuk?
• Official Website: The Olympic Store, "Vancouver 2010 Magnet - Inukshuk Emblem"