#AdventBotany 2020 Day 9 - Bringing a new light - Qulliq

By Dawn Bazely

Since 2014, writing about seasonal plants for Alastair and Jonathan’s Advent Botany blog has motivated me to try my hand at diverse forms of science communication, including the video log or VLOG. My one and only VLOG Advent Botany post makes me laugh out loud when I watch it, and I’m not sure that I would ever try to do an Advent Botany post on Tik Tok. But, never say never!

Adapting our teaching during the COVID_19 pandemic has pushed all university course directors onto the steep learning curves of Zoom, for synchronous online lectures, and video making, for asynchronous teaching. Even I have improved my home-made videos, so I decided to make my second contribution to Advent Botany 2020, my second-ever VLOG. It’s an update of my 2017 post about the Inuit qulliq (kudlik), the stone oil lamp traditionally powered by seal blubber, with wicks made of dried flowers of arctic willow and arctic cotton mixed with moss, but as you will see here, it works well with cooking oil and kitchen towels.

Here is my VLOG about the plants used with the qulliq, and other interesting things.

Advent Botany 2020 Pandemic Edition — Qulliq post update from Dawn Bazely on Vimeo.

Here are photos of Inuit friends, colleagues and artists whom I mention in the VLOG.

Woman against dark background with elongated candle like flame in foreground — Inuk elder, Martha Flaherty, lights the qulliq at the Inuit studies conference, Montreal in October 2019 (Photo Dawn Bazely)

three people displaying carved jewellery — Adventure Canada staff (Laura Baer, left, and Cedar Swan, CEO, centre) with Inuk carver and jewellery designer Alie Kippomee, in his home community of Mittimatalik (Pond Inlet), Nunavut.

two adults with a carved qulliq oil lamp — Chatting with the carver of my Qulliq oil lamp, Mr K. Kojak, in Nain, Nunatsiavut, in 2018 (Photo Dawn Bazely)

Inuit jewellery as wearable art: how can we better support designers and makers? Poster.

Four people around food table — Inuk lawyer, artist, activist, culturist, interpreter, Aaju Peter (centre right), teaches ecotourists, Dani, Victoria and Santi (left to right) about arctic country foods. (Photo Dawn Bazely)

three people in coats looking slightly cold — In 2019, with two of my fellow Adventure Canada staff and friends on an arctic ecotourism trip. Inuit culturalists, artist and jewellery designer, Ashley Savard (left) and interpreter, translator and advocate, Martha Flaherty, on Tallurutit (Devon Island), Nunavut.

My original blog post is here.

For more #AdventBotany see our 2020 index page.