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View of a grassy landscape with a path leading through a tall wooden gateway to a round walled clearing with a small wooden building with a grassy roof. Behind the clearing there is the sea, with snowy hills in the distance.
Brattahlíð – reconstruction of Thjodhild’s church, Quassiarsuk, Greenland. Photo by Manuela S. Scheuerer (alpros), via Flickr. Licence: CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0
Tephra layers (Langanes, southern Iceland) that mark settlement. (Anthony Newton 2011)
A grassy landscape surrounding green fields and a few small buildings, next to a shallow body of water with rocky hills on the opposite shore
View across harvested hay fields, Vatnahverfi valley, Igaliku Kujalleq, Greenland, RESPONSE project (Alice Watterson 2023)
A mixture of bones: many are tube shaped, many are long and either straight or curved and pointed, while others are irregular shapes
Tray of fish bones for sorting from Hrisheimar, Iceland (Wendi Coleman, 2019)
A person wearing a hood and full body waterproofs, riding in a rigid inflatable boat (RIB) across cold, flat looking water, with a cloudy sky and a small iceberg and snowy hills in the distance
The weekly Vatnahverfi (Greenland) shopping trip on the RESPONSE project rib (Alice Watterson 2023)
Soil erosion at Hrútafell, southern Iceland (Anthony Newton 2022)
Aerial view of eight people bending over digging next to buckets in an archaeological dig, surrounded by many grey stones with flat sides and straight edges
Iron Age Roundhouse, Swandro, Orkney (Stephen Dockrill, 2023)
Eight people working at an archaeological dig in the middle of a grassy landscape. Some are looking into  part of the dig, one is digging into the soil next to a bucket, and two are standing and sifting through samples using sieve trays suspended from wooden frames.
Excavating the midden at site 5500 in Vatnahverfi, Greenland for the RESPONSE project (Alice Watterson 2023)

Welcome to NABO, the North Atlantic Biocultural Organization

Photo taken in 1907-1910 by Eiríkur Þorbergsson, showing the storehouse of the first free trade association in Húsavík, Northern Iceland.

Photo of the Kaupfélag Þingeyinga in 1907-1910 by Eiríkur Þorbergsson, © Ljósmyndasafn Þingeyinga, www.husmus.is Opens a new tab or window.  
From a PhD thesis by Dr Megan Hicks
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About NABO

Since 1992, NABO has cross-cut national and disciplinary boundaries to help North Atlantic scholars make the most of the immense research potential of our damp and lovely research area. NABO has worked to aid in improving basic data comparability, in assisting practical fieldwork and interdisciplinary ventures, in promoting student training, and in better communicating our findings to other scholars, funding agencies, and the general public.

About us

NABO strives to improve data comparability, assist in practical fieldwork and interdisciplinary ventures, promote student training, and better communicate our findings to other scholars, funding agencies, and the general public.

About NABO

History

The Story of NABO The North Atlantic Biocultural Organization (NABO) was formally founded in 1992 (after a key meeting in 1988 hosted by the Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum at Bowdoin College …

Read more about NABO’s history

The NAE program’s RESPONSE project encourages trans-disciplinary collaboration in environmental humanities, history, social sciences, natural sciences, and arts and media for sustainability.

With roots in the NABO cooperative, the NAE program studies North Atlantic island societies across centuries, covering various aspects from culture to climate impacts.

NAE links communities in Scotland, Iceland, and Greenland, facilitating cross-regional research with a historical ecology perspective.

Focusing on Greenland, the RESPONSE project emphasizes co-production of knowledge with local institutions, indigenous communities, and scholars using digital media for public engagement and education.

Explore NABO Projects

 
 
 
 
 
 
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NABO Meetings and Conferences

Reykjavik, Iceland, 2022

Thanks to an initiative by Orri Vésteinsson and the University of Iceland, we are launching a three-day collaborative NABO meeting Sept. 28th, 29th, and 30th 2022 in Reykjavik Iceland. This will be a hybrid event, but we hope to have significant live participation. The proceedings will be recorded and posted on the NABO website.

Our theme for September 28th and 29th will be “North Atlantic Works Back in Progress” with the aim of both reporting on new work in the lab and field and looking ahead to ongoing collaborations and new digital tools for data management and community engagement. We anticipate overviews of new and renewed projects and initiatives with field and lab results from across our region and overviews of exciting new interdisciplinary initiatives.

Photo: Provisioning a fifteenth century Icelandic fishing station, NABO 2022 conference slide by Frank Feeley

Photo

Map showing the location of the university in Reykjavik, IcelandPhoto of someone holding an enormous fish, saying Post cranial elements = Consumer, Cranial elements = Producer

 

Latest Blog Posts

The Making-of ‘Greenland RESPONSE’: a short film

Reading Time: 5 minutesThe first thing most people picture when they think of Greenland is unlikely to be lush green pastures and grazing sheep, but the UNESCO Kujataa area in south Greenland has a rich heritage of sheep farming that began over a thousand years ago with the… Read More »The Making-of ‘Greenland RESPONSE’: a short film

Article: Legacies of childhood learning for climate change adaptation

Reading Time: < 1 minuteGlobal Environmental Change have published an article by Rowan Jackson, Andrew Dugmore and Felix Riede titled Legacies of childhood learning for climate change adaptation. Jackson, R., Dugmore, A. and Riede, F. (2024) Legacies of childhood learning for climate change adaptation. Gobal Environmental Change 67, 102878.… Read More »Article: Legacies of childhood learning for climate change adaptation

How to Add an Event to the NABO Calendar

Reading Time: 4 minutesAdding an Event Who can add an event? Anyone who is a registered member of the website can submit an event for adding to the calendar. You need to be logged in to add an event. To make the events appear on the calendar, they… Read More »How to Add an Event to the NABO Calendar

How to Add a New Post

Reading Time: 3 minutesAdding a New Post Who can add a post to the NABO Website? To add a new post to the NABO website, you need to be logged in. If you are a NABO blogger, you can add posts to your own blog. To add a… Read More »How to Add a New Post

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    NABO Contact Email:

    anthony.newton@ed.ac.uk
    thomas.h.mcgovern@gmail.com

    Postal Address 1:

    Institute of Geography
    University of Edinburgh
    Drummond Street
    Edinburgh
    Scotland EH8 9XP

    Postal Address 2:

    CUNY Graduate Centre
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