Thule archaeological sites typically yield large quantities of well-preserved faunal remains. These remains represent a wealth of information on a wide range of activities related to Thule animal-based subsistence economies, but have only recently been subjected to the quantitative ecological analyses that have increasingly concerned archaeologists elsewhere. This thesis involves the development of a linear programming model of Thule resource scheduling, and an explicit test of its applicability. When compared to the results of a detailed zooarchaeological analysis of faunal material collected from a variety of seasonal site types on southeastern Somerset Island, the modelling procedure was found to offer moderately interesting insights not otherwise attainable.

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This study examines long-term Inuit-European and -Euroamerican intersocietal interaction in the central Canadian Arctic. This geographical area encompasses the traditional ranges of the contiguous Copper, Netsilik and Iglulik Inuit societies. Specifically, the study analyzes and discusses changes in intra- and intergroup material trade networks and social relations resulting from indirect and direct contact with the developing capitalist world-system. Through the application of world-system theory and methodology, it is shown that indirect contact in the form of the acquisition of material trade items was a gradual, though constant, process that had a considerable impact on the cultural development of these societies. Both indirect and direct contact were greatly accelerated during the 19th century, increasing the rate of cultural change, and, by the early 20th century, ultimately culminating in the articulation of the Copper, Netsilik and Iglulik Inuit societies within the modern capitalist world-system.

Although the study of Thule harpoon heads has produced important seriations, datings and technological reflections during the last century, a lack of fundamental knowledge about these weapons is still occurring. An attempt is made to document the different contexts surrounding the use of these artifacts. Technological, social and symbolic investigations are made on the occupants of the Skraeling Island site (High Arctic, Canada) and the Clachan site (Coronation Gulf, Canada) in order to build a complete understanding of the harpoon head morphological attributes. Using the hierarchical cluster analysis (SPSS), groupings have been statistically formed, underlying the meaningful dimensions of variation of the objects. It is then found that technological, social and symbolic mechanisms are systematically responsible for different aspects of Thule harpoon head morphology, and by comparing the two archaeological assemblages, we conclude that these mechanisms operate in the same direction, even if resulting in different harpoon head styles.

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This thesis seeks to identify the mosaic, rather than the monolithic, nature of culture contact by integrating historical and archaeological sources relating to the concept of gender roles, as they influence response within a contact situation. Specifically, I examine how the Inuit gender system structured artifact patterning in Inuit-European contact situations through the investigation of three Inuit sites in Frobisher Bay, Baffin Island. These date from the 16th, 19th and early 20th centuries and represent a variety of seasonal occupations and dwelling forms. / The ethnographic data suggest that Inuit gender relations were egalitarian and complementary. On this basis I hypothesize that European goods and materials were used equally by men and women. Within each gendered set of tasks, European goods and materials were differently used, according to empirically functional criteria such as the nature of the tasks. / Opportunities for and responses to European contact differed depending on the types of tasks in which Inuit women and men engaged and the social roles they played. Seasonality of occupation bears upon the archaeological visibility of gender activities. / Sixteenth-century Elizabethan contact did not alter Nugumiut gender roles, tasks, authority or status but served primarily as a source of raw material, namely wood and iron. Based on the analysis of slotted tools I suggest a refinement to take account of the overlap in blade thickness that occurs for metal and slate, and which depends on the function of the tool. I conclude that there was much more metal use by Thule Inuit than previously believed. However, during Elizabethan contact and shortly afterwards there was actually less metal use by the Nugumiut than in the prehistoric era. / Little archaeological evidence was recovered for 19th-century commercial whaling contact, (suggesting geographic marginality to European influence), or for 19th century Inuit occupation in the area. This is partly because of immigration to Cumberland Sound and because of subsequent structural remodelling of the dwellings by later occupants. / By the early 20th century, the archaeological record showed not only equal use of European material across gender but a near-ubiquitous distribution across most activity classes, even though commercial trapping never replaced traditional subsistence pursuits but only supplemented them.

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