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Editor: Sue Hamilton
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The Fan Hitch, Journal
of the Inuit Sled Dog, is published four
times a year. It is available at no cost
online at: https://thefanhitch.org.
The Fan Hitch welcomes your letters, stories, comments and suggestions. The editorial staff reserves the right to edit submissions used for publication.
Contents of The Fan Hitch are protected by international copyright laws. No photo, drawing or text may be reproduced in any form without written consent. Webmasters please note: written consent is necessary before linking this site to yours! Please forward requests to Sue Hamilton, 55 Town Line Rd., Harwinton, Connecticut 06791, USA or mail@thefanhitch.org.
This site is dedicated to the Inuit Dog as well as related Inuit culture and traditions. It is also home to The Fan Hitch, Journal of the Inuit Sled Dog.
The Fan Hitch welcomes your letters, stories, comments and suggestions. The editorial staff reserves the right to edit submissions used for publication.
Contents of The Fan Hitch are protected by international copyright laws. No photo, drawing or text may be reproduced in any form without written consent. Webmasters please note: written consent is necessary before linking this site to yours! Please forward requests to Sue Hamilton, 55 Town Line Rd., Harwinton, Connecticut 06791, USA or mail@thefanhitch.org.
This site is dedicated to the Inuit Dog as well as related Inuit culture and traditions. It is also home to The Fan Hitch, Journal of the Inuit Sled Dog.
Atanarjuat The Fast Runner:
Canada's Best Film Ever!
Montreal, April 30, 2015 – Isuma.TV press release
Atanarjuat has been named Canada's best film of all time by the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF). A survey of Canadian filmmakers, critics, academics, programmers and other industry professionals on the top 10 Canadian films of all time awarded Atanarjuat with first place, a position previously held by Claude Jutra's Mon Oncle Antoine. TIFF has polled the industry every ten years since 1984. The 2004 Top Ten list ranked Atanarjuat at number 5. A decade later, the film has jumped to the top of the list, "a tribute to the film's unique approach to storytelling, its intense specificity, and its powerful universality" explains Steve Gavetock, TIFF senior programmer.
An historic event for the international film industry, this is the first time Canada or any First World country has named an indigenous-language film as its Best Film Ever.
International sales inquiries for Atanarjuat, the full Fast Runner Trilogy, and other films by Zacharias Kunuk can be directed to Isuma Distribution International.
IsumaTV is a collaborative multimedia platform for indigenous filmmakers and media organizations. It currently carries 5000+ films and videos in more than 70 different languages on 800+ user-controlled channels, representing cultures and media organizations from Canada, and around the world.
For more information please contact: Cara Di Staulo 1-514-476-0707 info@isuma.tv
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Ancient Wolf Genome Pushes Back Dawn of the Dog
Ancient Wolf Genome Pushes Back Dawn of the Dog
During the last couple of weeks in May there has been a flurry of media outlets reporting on the recently published scientific paper “Ancient Wolf Genome Reveals an Early Divergence of Domestic Dog Ancestors and Admixture into High- Latitude Breeds“. Go here for a summary. This research drew heavily on Inuit Dog DNA, in this case Greenland Inuit Dogs. The origins of dog domestication continues to be a very popular pursuit of scientific research and it looks like more published papers are yet to come, and again relying on contributions of Inuit Dog DNA.
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New Rabies in the North Resulting in More Dogs being Destroyed
New Rabies in the North Resulting in More Dogs being Destroyed
A rabid fox in Pangnirtung about 298 kilometers (185 miles), as the raven flies, north north-east of Iqaluit on the southern quarter of Baffin Island was killed by a bylaw officer on May 5th. Five dogs bitten by the fox were destroyed and fifteen more that were showing symptoms were also killed. Most of those dogs were roaming strays. Following the exposure about a hundred dogs in the community were vaccinated. Also in early May the North Baffin community of Pond Inlet reported identifying a dog that was positive for rabies. These are the first two Baffin communities reporting rabies cases so far this Spring. Doing a web search on rabies and other vaccination preventative dog diseases in the north turns up a seemingly never ending list of articles over the years of dogs dying from distemper, parvovirus and rabies. Public education, reducing the stray, untethered and intact (un-neutered) and unvaccinated dog population and access to vaccines are still serious issues still needing to be addressed.
Dr. Leia Cunningham, owner of NunaVet Animal Hospital, Nunavut’s first and only veterinary clinic, was featured in a May 22nd Nunatsiaq News story, “Iqaluit vet hopes to better serve Nunavut”. Responding to the two rabies outbreaks, the article said: “In the face of potentially deadly outbreaks, Cunningham said her goal is to do better outreach across the territory, and she hopes to do that in partnership with the Government of Nunavut and local hamlets vaccination programs. “The biggest thing is public education,” she said.”