Polar Bears and Inuit People in the Arctic

by Anguteeraq L. Christensen
(Ilulissat, Greenland)

This song “Nanook” is performed by the Greenlandic band Nanook. It is concerned with the polar bear and how climate change is affecting this animal’s ways of life.





However, climate change does not just affect polar bears. In fact, it also affects humanity and especially the people living in the Arctic who witness climate change on a daily basis.

Since climate change has resulted in uncertainties and threats to the ways of life of both animals and humans in the Arctic, the band Nanook has used the polar bear as their symbol for quite some time.

The band’s commitment to this animal as a symbol of both the power and fragility of nature, culture, and life. It is also present in the name of the band ´"Nanook" which means "the greatest of all polar bears," and is the name of a polar bear God in Inuit mythology.

Lyrics by Christian Elsner & Frederik Elsner

Video:
Story by Nanook
Filmed by Ulannaq Ingemann (Polarbear footage: Nordicphoto/Shutterstock/Henry Harrison)
Directed by Ulannaq Ingemann, Andreas Otte and Nanook
Edited & Special effects by Marc Fussing Rosbach
Actor: Ujarneq Fleischer