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The Alaska Native Reader

The Alaska Native Reader

History, Culture, Politics

  • Author: Williams, Maria Sháa Tláa; Kirk, Robin; Starn, Orin
  • Publisher: Duke University Press
  • Serie: The World Readers
  • ISBN: 9780822344650
  • eISBN Pdf: 9780822390831
  • Place of publication:  Durham , United States
  • Year of digital publication: 2009
  • Month: September
  • Pages: 418
  • DDC: 305.897/0798
  • Language: English
Alaska is home to more than two hundred federally recognized tribes. Yet the long histories and diverse cultures of Alaska’s first peoples are often ignored, while the stories of Russian fur hunters and American gold miners, of salmon canneries and oil pipelines, are praised. Filled with essays, poems, songs, stories, maps, and visual art, this volume foregrounds the perspectives of Alaska Native people, from a Tlingit photographer to Athabascan and Yup’ik linguists, and from an Alutiiq mask carver to a prominent Native politician and member of Alaska’s House of Representatives. The contributors, most of whom are Alaska Natives, include scholars, political leaders, activists, and artists. The majority of the pieces in The Alaska Native Reader were written especially for the volume, while several were translated from Native languages.

The Alaska Native Reader describes indigenous worldviews, languages, arts, and other cultural traditions as well as contemporary efforts to preserve them. Several pieces examine Alaska Natives’ experiences of and resistance to Russian and American colonialism; some of these address land claims, self-determination, and sovereignty. Some essays discuss contemporary Alaska Native literature, indigenous philosophical and spiritual tenets, and the ways that Native peoples are represented in the media. Others take up such diverse topics as the use of digital technologies to document Native cultures, planning systems that have enabled indigenous communities to survive in the Arctic for thousands of years, and a project to accurately represent Dena’ina heritage in and around Anchorage. Fourteen of the volume’s many illustrations appear in color, including work by the contemporary artists Subhankar Banerjee, Perry Eaton, Erica Lord, and Larry McNeil.

  • Contents
  • List of Illustrations
  • Preface
  • Acknowledgments
  • Alaska and Its People: An Introduction
  • I. Portraits of Nations: Telling Our Own Story
    • Lazeni ’linn Nataełde Ghadghaande: When Russians Were Killed at“Roasted Salmon Place” (Batzulnetas)
    • The Fur Rush: A Chronicle of Colonial Life
    • Redefining Our Planning Traditions: Caribou Fences, Community,and the Neetsaii Experience
    • Memories of My Trap Line
    • Cultural Identity through Yupiaq Narrative
    • Dena’ina Ełnena: Dena’ina Country: The Dena’ina in Anchorage, Alaska
    • Qaneryaramta Egmiucia: Continuing Our Language
    • Deg Xinag Oral Traditions: Reconnecting Indigenous Language and Educationthrough Traditional Narratives
    • The Alaskan Haida Language Today: Reasons for Hope
  • II. Empire: Processing Colonization
    • Yuuyaraq: The Way of the Human Being
    • Angoon Remembers: The Religious Significance of Balance and Reciprocity
    • The Comity Agreement: Missionization of Alaska Native People
    • Dena’ina Heritage and Representation in Anchorage: A Collaborative Project
    • How It Feels to Have Your History Stolen
    • Undermining Our Tribal Governments: The Stripping of Land, Resources,and Rights from Alaska Native Nations
    • Terra Incognita: Communities and Resource Wars
    • Why the Natives of Alaska Have a Land Claim
    • A Brief History of Native Solidarity
  • III. Worldviews: Alaska Native and Indigenous Epistemologies
    • A Yupiaq Worldview: A Pathway to Ecology and Spirit
    • The Cosmos: Indigenous Perspectives
    • Seeing Mathematics with Indian Eyes
    • What Is Truth? Where Western Science and Traditional Knowledge Converge
    • The Yup’ik and Cup’ik People
  • IV. Native Arts: A Weaving of Melody and Color
    • Ugiuvangmiut Illugiit Atuut: Teasing Cousins Songs of the King Island Iñupiat
    • Fly by Night Mythology: An Indigenous Guide to White Man, or How to Stay Sane When the World Makes No Sense
    • Kodiak Masks: A Personal Odyssey
    • Artifacts in Sound: A Century of Field Recordings of Alaska Natives
    • Digital Media as a Means of Self Discovery: Identity Affirmations inModern Technology
    • America’s Wretched
    • The Alaska Native Arts Festival
    • Conflict and Counter-Myth in the Film Smoke Signals
    • Alaska Native Literature: An Updated Introduction
  • V. Ravenstales
    • Poems
    • Poem
    • Living in the Arctic
    • Tunnel? . . . What Tunnel?
    • Daisy’s Best-Ever Moose Stew
  • Suggestions for Further Reading
  • Acknowledgment of Copyrights
  • Index

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  • Loan duration: 21 days
  • Format: PDF

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