Professors Paul Ongtooguk and Jackie Cason discuss Alaska Native voices and environmental conservation movements in Alaska. Topics include Alaska Village and Native Corporation jurisdictions, John Muir's legacy, the Sierra Club, and the book The Firecracker Boys by Dan O’Neill. Paul Ongtooguk is the director of Alaska Native Studies at UAA. Amongst his many research projects, he designed and contributed to the websites alaskool.org and akhistorycourse.org. He currently teaches the...

Dinjii Vadzaih Dhidlit: The Man Who Became a Caribou is a new bilingual volume based on a series of oral interviews with Gwich'in elders living in rural northeast Alaska and the Yukon Territory. Richly illustrated, the book covers a wide range of topics based on traditional harvesting and use of caribou from ancient to contemporary times. It also reveals traditional beliefs and taboos about caribou and includes a detailed naming system for caribou anatomy, conversations about potlatches and...

Editors and contributors to the bilingual books Akulmiut Neqait / Fish and Food of the Akulmiut (University of Alaska Press) and Yuuyaraq/The Yup’ik Way of Being (Alaska Native Language Center)-- Ann Fienup-Riordan, Alice Rearden, Marie Meade and Mark John--discuss the Yupik way of life. Akulmiut Negait, details the lives of the Akulmiut living in the lake country west of Bethel, Alaska, in the villages of Kasigluk, Nunapitchuk, and Atmautluak. Akulmiut Neqait is based in conversations...

Editors and contributors to the  bilingual books Akulmiut Neqait / Fish and Food of the Akulmiut (University of Alaska  Press) and  Yuuyaraq/The Yup’ik Way of Being (Alaska Native Language Center)-- Ann Fienup-Riordan,  Alice Rearden, Marie Meade and Mark John--discuss the Yupik way of life. Akulmiut Negait, details the lives of the Akulmiut living in the lake country west of Bethel, Alaska, in the villages of Kasigluk, Nunapitchuk, and Atmautluak. Akulmiut Neqait is based in conversations...

Children's book authors Barbara Jacko Atwater and Ethan J. Atwater (How the Raven Got His Crooked Nose), Phyllis Adams (Gingerbread Moose and Alaska Boots for Chelsea) and Cindy Baldwin (Sarah's Days) talk about the Alaska Native traditions they share through writing modern children's stories. Carols Sturgulewski, with Alaska Center for the Book, actrs as moderator. Topics will range from who "owns" a story, to bridging urban-rural and generational divides, to working with illustrators and...

Alaska authors discuss their books and writing in different genres. Jane Harper discusses Unequally Divided, her novel based during the Vietnam era (2:40-23:10), Phyllis Fast discusses her forthcoming mystery Red Paint Woman (23:58-38:40), and Jan Harper Haines discusses her family biographyr Cold River Spirits (39:01-1:24:20). Here is a brief description of the authors: Jan Harper Haines’ Cold River Spirits: Whispers from a Family’s Forgotten Past is a classic in Alaska literature. It...

How is everything poetry while nothing is poetry? How does teaching others govern one's own creative process? Are poets different from writers of other genres? These questions coupled with poetry readings are the focus of this unusual literary event where taking in poems makes poems. Jon Davis is the author of four full-length poetry collections—Improbable Creatures, Preliminary Report, Scrimmage of Appetite, and Dangerous Amusements; five chapbooks; and Heteronymy: An Anthology. Davis...

Jane E. Harper's Unequally Divided is a vibrant novel portraying difficult choices of love and life’s direction during the tumultuous Vietnam era. The story takes place in Columbus, GA, near the Fort Benning Army base and highlights the struggles of soldiers training for war while depicting the era's history with flashes of music, religion, domestic abuse, and women’s issues. Author Jane E. Harper was born in North Carolina and raised in Pennsylvania. She earned a bachelor's degree from...

Ann Fienup-Riordan and Alice Rearden siacuss their new book, Qanemcit Amllertut/Many Stories to Tell: Tales of Humans and Animals from Southwest Alaska. This bilingual collection shares new translations of old stories recorded over the past four decades through interviews with Yup’ik elders from throughout southwest Alaska. Some are true qulirat (traditional tales), while others are recent. Some are well known, like the adventures of the wily raven, while others are rarely told. All are...

Dr. Steve J. Langdon presents Kaalaxch's Endeavors: A Preeminent Jilkáat Tlingit Leader and the Coming of the Americans. Kaalaxch was an esteemed and prominent leader (“chief”) of the Jilkáat Tlingit who lived in Klukwan on the Chilkat River in northern southeast Alaska. At the time of the assertion of jurisdiction by the United States government in 1867, he had acquired a reputation as a preeminent leader due to his achievements in establishing his clan and the Jilkáat Tlingit as powerful...

Founders of Aurora Pride, an Indigenous LGBTQ2 (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and Two-Spirit) support group, Jenny Miller, Will Bean and Tuigana McDermott come together to discuss “Two-Spirit Identity” and its distinct meaning in Alaska Native and indigenous communities. Jenny Miller created “Continuous,” a photographic portraiture series documenting the experiences of Alaska Native LGBTQ2 Two-Spirit peoples from distinct tribal backgrounds. She is Inupiaq and was raised in...

This is Aron Crowell's presentation for the event Seals and Alaska Native Life. Aron Crowell is director of The Arctic Studies Center's Yakutat Seal Camp Project. Note, the podcast of the event is also posted in iTunes. The event, Seals and Alaska Native life also welcomes Esther Koezuna (Inupiat artist and skin sewer from King Island), Shaaxsaani (a Tlingit artist using traditional materials in contemporary ways), and Ilarion Larry Merculieff (author of Wisdom Keeper: One Man's Journey to...

Ilarion Larry Merculieff (author of Wisdom Keeper: One Man's Journey to Honor the Untold History of the Unangan), Aron Crowell (The Arctic Studies Center's Yakutat Seal Camp Project). Esther Koezuna (Inupiat artist and skin sewer from King Island), and Shaaxsaani (a Tlingit artist using traditional materials in contemporary ways) discuss their work and relationship with seals. (Note, Aron Crowell's presentation about Harbor seals is also posted in iTunes) This event is held in honor Agnes...

Ann Fienup-Riordan and Alice Rearden present Ciulirnerunak Yuuyaqunak/Do not Live Without an Elder, The Subsistence Way of life in Southwest Alaska. Ann Fienup-Riordan is an anthropologist who has lived and worked in Alaska for more than forty years. She has written and edited more than twenty books on Yup’ik history and oral traditions. Alice Rearden is from Napakiak, Alaska and is a fluent Yup’ik speaker and expert translator and oral historian. In October of 2010, six men who were...

In The Tao of Raven, using the story of Raven and the Box of Daylight and relating it to Sun Tzu's Art of War, Ernestine Hayes expresses an ongoing frustration and anger at the obstacles and prejudices still facing Alaska Natives in their own land, while sharing her own story of attending and completing college in her fifties and becoming a professor and a writer. Ernestine Saankalaxt’ Hayes belongs to the Kaagwaantaan clan of the Eagle side of the Lingit nation. Her first book, Blonde...

Professor Emerita Phyllis Fast is an anthropologist, artist and mystery writer. Author of the acclaimed Northern Athabascan Survival: Women, Community, and the Future, her current focus is writing Alaska Native mysteries. At this event she discusses Half-Bead of Fundy and Midnight Trauma, which take place in Fairbanks, Alaska. • Half-Bead of Fundy: They wanted her beaded jacket at any cost. It was up to Alaska Native, Deloo Goode, to figure out what was so important about her mother's...

Ilarion Merculieff is an Unangan, Aleut, raised in a traditional way on St. Paul Island in the Bering Sea. His memoir, Wisdom Keeper, One Man's Journey to Honor the Untold History of the Unangan People, brings Unangan traditional knowledge, Aleut history, and sacred teachings to light in order to address critical changes throughout the world today. Ilarion Merculieff is the co-founder of the Indigenous Peoples’ Council for Marine Mammals, the Alaska Forum on the Environment, the...

Dr. Kristin Hanson’s book Alaska Native (Iñupiaq) Translations and Transformations of Protestant Beliefs and Practices: A Case Study of How Religions Interact, has recently been published by Edwin Mellen Press. It explores how has and how can Inupiaq spirituality-culture inform and shape the immigrant Christian system, as well as the lives of Inupiat who have embraced Protestant beliefs. The book is based on an ethnographic study of two Anchorage congregations that have notable Seward...

Dr. Kristin Hanson’s book Alaska Native (Iñupiaq) Translations and Transformations of Protestant Beliefs and Practices: A Case Study of How Religions Interact, has recently been published by Edwin Mellen Press. It explores how has and how can Inupiaq spirituality-culture inform and shape the immigrant Christian system, as well as the lives of Inupiat who have embraced Protestant beliefs. The book is based on an ethnographic study of two Anchorage congregations that have notable Seward...

The fascinating book Anguyiim Nalliini/Time of Warring draws on little-known oral histories from the Yup’ik people of southwest Alaska to detail a period of bow-and-arrow warfare that took place in the region between 1300 and 1800. The result of more than thirty years of research, discussion, and field recordings involving more than one hundred Yup’ik men and women, Anguyiim Nalliini tells a story not just of war and violence, but also of its cultural context—the origins of place names, the...

Ernestine Saankalaxt’ Hayes belongs to the Kaagwaantaan clan of the Eagle side of the Lingit nation. Her memoir, Blonde Indian: an Alaska Native Memoir, received the American Book Award in 2007 and is the 2016 Alaska Reads selection. According to Jonas Lamb (Juneau Empire), Blonde Indian “celebrates Tlingit culture, the strong connection between the people, this magnificent land, the animals and the spirits, it also brings to light the historic and contemporary fallout of colonialism and...

Sven Haakanson, Alvin Amason, Ann Fienup-Riordan, and Anna Mossolova come together to share their intimate knowledge and study of Alaska Native masks. The nature of masks within expressions of symbolism and transformation, and Alaska native mask collections abroad will be discussed and the overall importance of masks within Alaska Native cultures and traditions honored. Joing the discussion are scholars Marie Meade and Tim Troll. (5:03-8:56)Introduction of the guest speakers by Dr. Maria...

Larry Ilarion Merculieff has been a wisdom keeper and passionate advocate for indigenous rights. At this event, Indigenous Elder teachings concerning movement into the 5th World, also known as the 5th Hoop, are explained. Larry Ilarion Merculieff is an Unangan, Aleut, raised in a traditional way on St. Paul Island in the Bering Sea. He is the co-founder of the Indigenous Peoples’ Council for Marine Mammals, the Alaska forum on the Environment, the International Bering Sea Forum, and the...

Guest speaker Julie Raymond-Yakoubian shares her collaborative work with tribes in the Bering Strait region of Alaska on the topic of "knowledge, beliefs and experiences of the supernatural environment". Julie is the Social Science Program Director at Kawerak Inc. in Nome, Alaska. Kawerak has recently initiated a new research project on the “Supernatural Environment” with 15 tribes. Phenomena that can be described as “supernatural” include, among others, things such as sea monsters, little...