File f103 - Wight, Dorothy J.

File consists of a recording of Dorothy Wight. Topics of the conversation include family background in northern Canada, transfer from settlement to settlement. Father's government career, current work with North West Territories Housing Corporation. Liking for isolated settlement life, plans to live and work up north; aim to work with government Finance Dept., door to any career she chooses. Definition of northern settlement status, hamlet status: government, population, types of employment. Appalling state of formal education in NWT; subject as sole university student from her settlement, own exceptional education through Ontario correspondence courses; combined correspondence and regular school­ work. Family plans for subject's university attendance, necessary transfer to western Arctic for schooling beyond Grade 8. Poor quality of teaching. Correspondence course (Economics) from Queen's while awaiting personal readiness to move south, encounter Queen's, Kingston. NWT usual pattern of correspondence courses from Alberta, sudden transfer from settlement population (300) to U.of Alberta student population (30,000). Choice of Queen's based on smaller size, vivid praise of former students (especially geologists). Subject's Ontario correspondence-school background. Mother's New Brunswick origins, clerical training, northern marriage. Subject's social ostracization as daughter of government representative; community jealousy of father's status, authority. Self-reliance, enjoyment of north as open country; appreciation of freedom from social pressures, truly spare time. Opinion that those who set good examples in personal lives do most to stimulate positive social change; mistrust of reformist zeal. Hobbies.//Possibility of theatre company tours up north. Social structure in northern communities: established whites; transient whites; religious older generation of Eskimo; confused younger generation of Eskimo, victims of unfortunate schooling system. Influx of government schools in mid-1950s; hiring through Ottawa of unstable, reformist 'border-line crazies', unsuited to gently revolutionize a Stone Age culture. Teachers' attempts to alienate Eskimo children from parents by mocking native customs; breakdown of Eskimo nomadic lifestyle; pressure to prevent children from speaking Eskimo; helpful missionary work instructing children in syllabics. Ignorant Ottawa statement that Eskimo are largely illiterate (i.e. cannot speak English); near-total literacy rate in own language; subject's tentative desire to learn Eskimo (5 basic languages, hundreds of dialects). Influence of southern immigrants on job situation: recent reverse-discrimination system favouring Eskimo over whites, southern whites over local inhabitants; experience of two white northern males, unable to find work till they applied as southerners 'with significant northern experience'. Assurance of work in own field through scarcity of suitable applicants; plans to consider marriage, children, only after establishing career; school system as deterrent to parental aspirations. Provincial government clampdown restricting Ontario correspondence courses to Ontario residents. Need for stable middle-aged teaching population up north; strong bond between children and home settlements, boarding-school as a non-viable alternative. High proportion of drop-outs, professional high school students; monetary support for serious students. Unlikelihood of reversion to simple life, despite problems of social change: lifestyle of original Eskimo simply too grim.