The William E. Taylor Research Award presented to Lisa Stevenson for her research on causes of suicide among Inuit youthHull, Quebec, March 5, 2001 — Lisa Stevenson, a doctoral student in medical anthropology at Berkeley University in California and a Canadian citizen living in Toronto, has been awarded the 2001 William E. Taylor Research Award by the Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation. The $5,000 William E. Taylor Research Award will allow her to further her research on the effects of rapid social change on the Inuit's perceptions of themselves, and on the relationship between the dramatic changes of the past 40 years and the high suicide rate among Inuit youth.
Dr. David Morrison, Curator in Charge of the Archaeological Survey of Canada at the Canadian Museum of Civilization, noted the excellence of Ms. Stevenson's project. "We found her research especially interesting because it has a real potential for concrete, contemporary applications to the problems confronting Inuit youth in Canada," he explained.
Ms. Stevenson's research will look at the current causes of suicide among young Inuit people. She will focus on the historical and biogeographical aspects of the passage from camp life to the modern micro-city of the Arctic. Her research will be carried out in Iqaluit, at the Nunavut government health centre, and in a more traditional Inuit community near Pangnirtung.
Ms. Stevenson is very happy to be the recipient of the William E. Taylor Research Award. "I am honoured to have been chosen by the Archaeological Committee of the Canadian Museum of Civilization," she said. "This grant will enable me to continue my research with the concrete goal of understanding, and perhaps helping to find solutions to, the devastating problems facing Inuit youth today."
William Ewart Taylor was a renowned archaeologist and tireless proponent of public education. In the 1960s, he headed the Archaeology Division at the National Museum of Canada and helped found the Canadian Archaeological Association. Between 1967 and 1984 he was Director of the National Museum of Man (a precursor of the Canadian Museum of Civilization) and oversaw the renovation of the Victoria Memorial Museum Building. Later in his career, he spent five years as President of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Dr. William E. Taylor died in 1994.
This is the third annual William E. Taylor Research Award to be granted. Last year's winner was Geoffrey Hayes of St. Albert, Alberta, a student at the University of Utah.
The William E. Taylor Research Award was created in memory of Dr. Taylor's lifelong achievements and to support outstanding efforts in the fields of archaeology, anthropology and museology.
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