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essentialism is necessary to enter the game played in the global arena. However, should there at any
time be a deviation from this status between nature and culture and the Greenlandic Inuit become a
modern society, they would then be considered a cultural nation for whom it is not or no longer
appropriate to pursue the hunting of whales.
Conclusion
In the arenas of
world polity
, where the decisions are made on the distribution of funds and the
granting of voice, the actual make-up of cultures is irrelevant. Instead there are legitimate and less
legitimate forms of cultural representation. In Greenland, a traditional narrative of the own
collective identity is still active. In the we-images produced via discursive and symbolic practices, the
Greenlanders present themselves as a culture of hunters living in harmony with their environment.
The Greenlandic narrative adopts and modifies the images of otherness that originated in the
dominating Western societies (Sowa, 2013b). These relational images of identity created imaginary
counter-conceptions to European collective identities. The Greenlandic form of representation of
the modern ‗primitive people‘ who protect their environment and have always done so has asserted
itself in the end. This self-image is compatible with global indigeneity discourse and puts Greenland
in the position of a legitimate actor in the struggle for a share of power and resources.
When an indigenous people wish to found a nation, then this is a novelty to begin with. As the
global model of indigeneity was conceived in reference to societies formally constituted as nation-
states, it is currently doubtful that the Greenlanders will be able to preserve the rights recognized for
indigenous peoples e.g. the right to continue whaling in the frame of
Aboriginal subsistence whaling
.
Once the Greenlandic Inuit have evolved into a modern society, they cannot return to some earlier
position on the timeline of evolution, at least not as long as the global categories and models of
world
polity
do not change. If the Greenlanders alter their identity discourse, then they face losing the label
of being ‗indigenous.‘ With the status of indigeneity as a mode of social inequality, Greenland at least
secures its right to continue whaling. In the perspective of Euro-American societies the image of
Greenlanders as enlightened moderns, possibly also as independent of Denmark, would make them
a cultural nation for which the ‗barbaric‘ hunting of whales would no longer be appropriate.
Therefore the global model of indigeneity always likewise has a discriminating effect even though it
is applied against discrimination. It was meant to counteract discrimination against indigenes, which
is why conferment of the indigenous-people status granted them the right to determine their own
development. But simultaneously the status of an indigenous people is a form of discrimination
because it excludes them from modernization and from entering the capitalistic world, at least at the
level of self-representation.
Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments, which
helped to improve the manuscript. The research in Greenland on which the article is based was
made possible through a research grants provided by the German Research Foundation (DFG) and