Many indigenous minorities throughout the Arctic are presently enduring severe social and economic adversity. Although residents of the Arctic are fewer in number than most other minority ethnic groups, their difficulties are not. This article is a review of one aspect of those difficulties, in one sector of the north: education among the native residents of rural Alaska.

Mankind's relationships with animals consist mainly of preying on them or selecting and controlling useful traits through domestication. The tradition of manipulating populations to conserve animals is ancient. Old laws in western Europe restricted hunting to the upper classes, and regulations have governed the killing of mammals and birds for food. Inhabitants of Britain's remote St Kilda Island, for example, lived off sea birds for 150 years, taking into account the breeding requirements and reproductive potential of several species. Marine birds provide good examples of how different patterns of animal exploitation and conservation have become established. The utilization of one such bird the Common Eider Somateria mollissima demonstrates a rare mutual dependence between man and animal.

The Southern Ocean has unique features that have aroused the interest of the scientific community. As the site of the only circumpolar current, it is the principal region where waters from the major ocean basins may be mixed and/or interchanged. It is also the formation region for Antarctic Bottom Water and Antarctic Intermediate Water, which penetrate far northward into the major ocean basins.

Each year, more and more of Canada's vast northern territories are being explored in the search for untapped mineral resources. But the area is covered with snow for seven to ten months a year, which hampers most activities connected with mineral exploration. Snow cover also affects changes in albedo and temperature and hydrologic forecasting. The surface hydrology in most areas is only active for two to five months a year. Historically, snow hydrologists have been limited to the use of ground source measurements for estimating the spatial and temporal variability of snow cover. In the Yukon and Northwest Territories hydrometeorological stations are few and tend to be clustered around settlements. Moreover, the ground source data are subject to error and do not necessarily provide a complete picture of current conditions. The synoptic view provided by satellite images presents an economical way to monitor the retreat and advance of the snow-line and of mapping snow cover in remote and sparsely populated areas. The information may eventually be useful for extrapolating conventional ground source data more effectively over the entire Yukon and Northwest Territories.

Following a recent upsurge of interest in Australia's heritage and association with the Antarctic, plans were formulated in the winter of 1977 to place ashore a small expedition at Cape Denison to assess the state of the various huts left by the Australasian Antarctic Expedition (AAE) in 1912–13 (Davis, 1919; Mawson, 1915). Particular interest centred on the living and working hut and the party was to make recommendations as to whether it could be either renovated in situ or returned to Australia and re-erected in a place suitable for public viewing. The decision to send a summer expedition was reached after numerous enquiries from sources within Australia and overseas, dating back to a report in 1962 when the first Australian National Antarctic Research Expedition (ANARE) to visit Cape Denison found the hut in need of repair. All records since 1930 report the gradual whittling away of the surface timber, particularly on the windward side, and the gradual shrinking of the tongue and groove pine with which the roof and verandah are clad.

The object of the British North-Polar Expedition 1977–79 was for Allan Gill and myself to make the first circumnavigation of Greenland by dog sledge and umiak, beginning and ending at Thule in north-west Greenland (Fig 1). This 13 000 km journey estimated to take 16 months, was, I felt, one of the most interesting routes that a polar traveller could take; around the Greenland coast there is a greater variety of climate, scenery and physical obstacles than is likely to be encountered along a coastline of comparable length anywhere else in the world. I was convinced that as a literary and filming project this was an expedition that would justify not only the financial outlay, but also the good faith of all of those who had supported the project against the criticism that no polar journey is worthwhile unless it has a well conducted and acceptable scientific programme.

The University of St Andrews Greenland Expedition spent late June, July and August 1978 at the head of Íkamiut kangerdluarssuat near Sukkertoppen, west Greenland. The expedition's aims were to climb previously unsealed or relatively unknown peaks, and carry out geomorphological and geological studies. Base camp was established at the still-frozen lake Taserssuaq on 28 June with the help of the crew of Daniel, a fishing boat chartered from Sukkertoppen. During the following weeks 13 first ascents and six second ascents were made in an area noted for its alpine peaks. The major achievement was a route on the 1 675 m north face of a peak on the south side of Taserssuaq; this climb took 40 hours. Other notable first ascents were Qáqarssuaralak (1 332 m), an 800 m high ice face on a peak flanking an icefield and, north of Taserssuaq, a 1600 m high peak was climbed by a steep ice route. A traverse, following several interlinking glaciers, was achieved from Taserssuaq to Evighedsfjord. Canoe journeys were made along Íkamiut kangerdluarssuat to the mountains and glaciers on its eastern and western shores, the deserted village of Ikamiut and the bird colonies of Sermilinguaq.