In this study, I investigated the continental shelf environments of the Bering, Chukchi, and Beaufort Seas using species of Ostracoda and their shell chemistry as indicators of oceanographic conditions and change. Ostracodes are bivalved Crustacea that secrete a calcareous shell commonly preserved in sediments in the Arctic. Because ostracode species have survival limits controlled by temperature, salinity, oxygen, sea ice, food, and other habitat-related factors, they are useful ecological indicators. A primary objective of my dissertation research was to establish how their ecology, biogeography and shell geochemistry is related to ocean variability in water mass properties and productivity at high latitudes. First, I examined community assemblages of ostracodes over several decades (1970-2018) in the northern Bering, Chukchi, and Beaufort Seas, and the main environmental factors that affect their biogeography. Results showed that large-scale south-to-north and small-scale nearshore-offshore gradients in ostracode community structure were tied to changes in water mass properties in combination with food sources and sediment substrate. Although the dominant species did not significantly change over the investigated period, the frequency of two cold-temperate species that are primarily and previously restricted to shallow North Pacific sediments off Asia has increased during the last decade. This suggests that these species are responding to recent increases in coastal and mid-shelf bottom water temperatures and/or carbon flux to the benthos. A second goal was to assess the feasibility of using stable oxygen isotopes (δ18O) of carbonate from ostracode shells as paleoceanographic proxies for water mass identification on Arctic and subarctic continental shelves. Through the use of regression analyses, I established that the δ18O values of carbonates from two species (of five investigated) can be reliable recorders of summer water mass changes in temperature and seawater δ18O content. The third part of the study was to use results from these prior two goals in combination with data on biogenic silica, foraminifera assemblages and stable isotope composition of biogenic carbonates, to reconstruct 2,000 years of paleoceanography from a radiocarbon-dated sediment core on the Mackenzie Shelf of the Beaufort Sea. This high-resolution (sub-centennial) record identified shifts in multiple proxies that are related to climate oscillations such as the Medieval Climate Anomaly, the Little Ice Age, and the modern period of anthropogenic change. The overall findings of my dissertation research support the premise that on complex and dynamic continental shelves, paleoceanographic uncertainties can be addressed by documenting microfossil faunal assemblages, measuring stable isotope variability in microfossil carbonates, as well as relating the distribution of species in time with an understanding of species ecology.