FRIDAY NIGHT CLASS AT ILISAGVIK, ALASKA, LAND AND ITS PEOPLES

I signed up for and began a Friday evening course at Barrow’s two year college, Ilisagvik, this week.  The history course is entitled, “Alaska, Land and its Peoples” and will run through mid-April.  I had missed the first session working at the flu clinic at the grocery store, so was happy to be joining the 14 other students and our instructor, Dan Wall.  His degrees are in anthropology and history and his presentation was captivating and interesting. 

The first week’s assignment had been to gather information about an Alaskan community and share it with the class.  Fellow students talked about what they had learned, either first-hand or by reading about:

1) Homer, the halibut fishing capital of the world with a very prosperous coal industry, how the spit there had dropped during the 1964 earthquake, that Tom Bodette and a woman named Jewel (I’m not very well-informed and don’t know who Jewel is…no laughing) were either from or had lived there and that the most predominant group of Alaskan natives in Homer are the Aleuts from the Aleutian chain of Alaska.

2) Bethel, in the Y-K (Yukon-Kuskoquim) Delta that serves as a hub to 55 surrounding villages.  The ethnic mix is similar to that of Barrow with a large majority of people being Alaskan Native, but Yupik instead of Inupiat and many other cultures represented there.  There is a large Albanian community and the highest number of taxi cabs per person in Alaska, the ratio being 1:62.  The Yupik language is very predominant and children can be enrolled in a Yupik language immersion school that goes up through the 6^th grade.  Berries make up a large part of the Yupik diet as many grow on the surrounding tundra in the summer months.  There are plentiful caribou within 100 miles and the fishing is abundant, especially on the Kuskoquim and Johnson Rivers.  Of the 16 restaurants there, 14 of them are Korean-American and port fried rice is now considered a traditional food.  There is a high rate of alcoholism and a high (9.6%) school drop-out rate by the 7^th grade.

3) Kivilina is a small coastal community with one road leading into it in the summer months.  It’s located approximately 80 miles NW of Kotzebue and the first record of its existence dates to 1847.  By 1905, it had relocated because it had been dangerously mistaken for a hunting ground.  Subsequently, a large portion of its population was wiped out by diseases that Caucasian presence to the area introduced.  There are no cars in Kivalina, the main modes of transportation being boats, snow machines and ATV’s.  Subsistence living is a way of life with whaling being the main source of food.  The largest employer in Kivilina is the North Slope Borough School District.

The instructor shared that half way between Kivilina and Point Hope at Cape Thompson, there was a proposal called Project Chariot that would create an artificial harbor, using atomic bombs.  According to Norman Chance who wrote Project Chariot: The Nuclear Legacy of Cape Thompson, Alaska and shared his findings on http://arcticcircle.uconn.edu/SEEJ/chariotseej.html, Douglas L. Vandergraft with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was quoted as writing "In 1957, the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission [AEC] established the 'Plowshare Program' to "investigate and develop peaceful uses for nuclear explosives." In early 1958, the AEC selected a site at the mouth of the Ogotoruk Creek near Cape Thompson, approximately 30 miles southeast of the Inupiat Eskimo village of Point Hope. Shortly thereafter, they developed plans for an experimental harbor excavation to be called Project Chariot. Late in 1962, after extensive scientific studies, the AEC announced that it "would defer further consideration of the proposed Chariot experiment," due in part to public criticism....”  According to Wikipedia, “the history of Project Chariot is recounted in the book The Firecracker Boys by Dan O'Neill (originally published in 1994 and revised and reissued in 2007 as The Firecracker Boys: H-Bombs, Inupiat Eskimos, and the Roots of the Environmental Movement).”

4) Koyuk, a community of approximately 450 people is on the Seward Peninsula, approximately 90 air miles northeast of Nome.  The student shared that 88.9% of the population there is Inupiat with several other ethnic groups.  The village is relatively close to a hot springs which is 65 miles to the north and is at the base of the Maloto hills where caribou and bears make for good hunting.  Three rivers converge at Norton Sound Bay, so residents have easy access to salmon, crab and halibut.  Koyuk is on both the routes of both the Iditarod Sled Dog and the Iron Dog Races. 

According to http://www.kawerak.org/tribalHomePages/koyuk/areainfo.html: “The site of "Iyatayet" on Cape Denbigh to the south has traces of early man that are 6,000 to 8,000 years old. The villagers were historically nomadic. Lt. Zagoskin of the Russian Navy noted the village of "Kuynkhak-miut" here in 1842-44. A Western Union Telegraph expedition in 1865 found the village of "Konyukmute." Around 1900, the present town site began to be populated, where supplies could easily be lightered to shore. Two boom towns grew up in the Koyuk region around 1914: Dime Landing and Haycock. The "Norton Bay Station," 40 miles upriver, was established to supply miners and residents in 1915. In addition to gold, coal was mined a mile upriver to supply steam ships and for export to Nome. The first school began in the church in 1915; the U.S. government built a school in Koyuk in 1928. The City was incorporated in 1970. Koyuk is a traditional Unalit and Malemiut Eskimo village that speaks a dialect of Inupiat Eskimo. Residents maintain a subsistence lifestyle. The sale or importation of alcohol is banned in the village.”

5)  Edna Bay is on an island in Southeast, Alaska, located west of Ketchikan, accessible only by airplane.  The industry is predominantly logging and none of its approximate 60 residents are Alaskan Native.  The area is covered in moss, resembling a rain forest and both deer and sea food are plentiful.  The community is very warm and welcoming and common gathering places are the one grocery store and single post office.  The student who shared about Edna Bay is anxious to leave the cold clime of Barrow and return to the island where walking on the beach in a t-shirt can be done during even some of the winter months. 

6)  Point Lay is on the coast, south west of Barrow.  I didn’t take as many notes about Point Lay as I’d learned about it when I visited there in November.  More notes can be found in the November 18, 2012 post, VILLAGE TRIP AND HEALTH FAIR IN POINT LAY.

7)  Little Diamede Island lies off the west coast of Alaska and is closer to Siberia.  Bowhead whaling is prevalent and residents live off of the sea animals.  The island is made up of high mossy cliffs where houses are built looking out over rocky beaches.  Little Diamede was instrumental in US defense efforts during World War II. 

8)  Point Hope or Tikigaq is the most traditional of the North Slope Borough villages and according to the student sharing, is the oldest known village in North America.  Wikipedia mentions much about valuable archaeological digs there and our instructor shared that findings showed that the area was a very real Inupiat military power, dispelling beliefs that the people of the villages had harmonious and peaceful relationships.  Much about Point Hope can be found in Charle’s Brower’s autobiography, 50 Years Below Zero.

Next week the rest of the students will make their presentations.  I’m considering doing mine on either Wainwright because of some knowledge of the area gained from talks with Dad and my week there with Bertrand and Kaktovik, east of Prudhoe Bay, where I’ll be assigned to work in the clinic (surrounded by polar bears). 

Our instructor talked at length about economic systems including core countries that employ peripheral ones to either supply or manufacture commodities and how this leads to dependence and loss of culture.  He cited many countries where this has happened over the course of human history and drew parallels to what has happened in in the past in many of the Alaskan Native communities, moving from domestic to commercial economies by supplying fur in exchange for metal goods and unfortunately liquor and guns.  This has caused a breakdown of the previous gender specific division of labor, supplying for the needs of one’s family where there is no trading, but only an economy of sharing. 

The instructor pointed out several times that his strong belief is that there are no bad guys vs.  victims, but that human nature is susceptible to wanting different and valuable resources.  It is unfortunate though that the outcomes that the Alaskan Natives have seen played out in their culture related to these dynamics have been largely detrimental.  I admire them for wanting to relearn their languages and reinstill their culture and values into their children.