Quannah Chasinghorse is fighting to save the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

This story originally appeared in Teen Vogue and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now , a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. In March, PhD candidate and climate justice organizer Maia Wikler traveled to Alaska to continue reporting on the ongoing human rights and climate crisis in the Arctic. She is directing a short documentary film, with support from The North Face, featuring the Gwich’in women who are leading the fight to protect the Arctic Refuge. “Did someone lose their dog?” Quannah Chasinghorse jokes, pointing at a large moose in her neighbor’s snow-covered yard. At -40 degrees Fahrenheit, it is a typical winter’s day in Fairbanks, Alaska. Quannah, an 18-year-old Han Gwich’in and Oglala Lakota youth, is curled up on the couch, wearing a shirt emblazoned with the slogan “Protect the Arctic, Defend the Sacred.” It is a rare moment of rest for Quannah. In the past year she has traveled coast to coast, advocating to protect her homelands from the desecration of oil drilling, with her mother, Jody Potts, who is Han Gwich’in and a tribal member of the Native Village of Eagle. Her mother also serves as the regional director for […]

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