Silent Hunter, Loud Smile: Indigenous Agency Beyond the Primitive Gaze in Nanook of the North

Silent Hunter, Loud Smile: Indigenous Agency Beyond the Primitive Gaze in Nanook of the North

This paper explores Robert Flaherty’s Nanook of the North (1922), focusing on its cinematic representation of the Inuit’s traditional way of life. It particularly examines their eating customs necessitated by hunting and butchering, and the agency of its indigenous subject, Nanook. While the film’s sociocultural implications as a reflection of Western colonial desires and nostalgia for primitive have received considerable scholarly attention, Nanook’s role and agency represented within the film remain a relatively unexplored topic. By analyzing Nanook’s gaze and playful performance juxtaposed with the film’s use of music, this paper demonstrates how the film challenges the stereotype of the Inuit as passive subjects and the exotic other. Ultimately, I argue that Nanook’s silent communication with the audience serves as a satirical critique of colonial impulses and a testament to the resilience of indigenous agency.