The intimate arctic: An early anthropologist's diary in the strict sense of the term

A lively debate has taken place in anthropology in recent years on field-work and its representation in ethnographic accounts. At the same time, historians and cultural critics have dissected the ideology and rhetoric of early explorations. Here I examine the writings of the anthropologist and explorer Vilhjalmur Stefans-son (1879–1962) in the light of current debates about textual representation, drawing upon recent discussions of ethnography, gender, and the power relations of early twentieth-century explorations. Stefansson went on lengthy expeditions into the Alaskan and Canadian Arctic and wrote extensively on his encounters with indigenous groups, I argue that while Stefansson was a perceptive ethnographer and explorer, he was silent in both his publications and his diaries about important aspects pertaining to his fieldwork, in particular the ethnographic contributions of his Inuit companions and his intimate relations with a native woman named Pannigabluk. This silence, I suggest, contradicts the narrative trope Stefansson generally adopted, summed up in his concept of the friendly Arctic’.