One With the Whale

In St. Lawrence, Alaska, a remote island in the Bering Sea where hunting whales is a matter of life and death, a shy Native teen, Chris Apassingok, became the youngest person ever to harpoon a whale for his village. His family gets blindsided by thousands of keyboard activists brutally attacking him online—without fully understanding the importance of the hunt to his community’s survival. “One with the Whale” chronicles the obstacles Chris and his family face, amidst larger currents of food security, environmental racism, climate change, cultural genocide, and social media. The livelihood of the Apassingoks and their village are threatened as they search for a balance between modernity and a traditional subsistence lifestyle.