Who are Alaska’s Native peoples?
The term “Alaska Native” is used to describe the peoples who are indigenous to the lands and waters encompassed by the state of Alaska: peoples whose ancestors have survived here for more than ten thousand years.
Distinct cultural groups. Alaska Native people belong to several major cultural groups—Aleut/Unangan, Athabascan, Eyak, Eskimo (Yup’ik, Cup’ik, Siberian Yupik, Sugpiaq/Alutiiq, Inupiaq), Haida, Tlingit, Tsimpshian—and many different tribes or clans within those groupings.
Each of these cultures is distinct, with complex kinship structures, highly developed subsistence hunting and gathering practices and technologies, and unique and varied languages, belief systems, art, music, storytelling, spirituality, and dance traditions, among many other attributes.
Common values. What these cultural groups share in common, however, are deeply ingrained values, such as honoring the land and waters upon which life depends, having respect and reverence for fish and wildlife, valuing community over individuality, sharing with others, and respecting and learning survival skills and wisdom from Elders. Alaska Native cultural worldviews are holistic. Native cultures accept that everything in creation is connected, complex, dynamic, and in a constant state of flux. Alaska Native peoples have a deep and sophisticated qualitative understanding of the environment in which they live. This understanding comes from stories passed down for generations; it also comes from life experiences, learning from mentors beginning at a young age, observations of others in the community, and the guidance of Elders.
Geography. The different Alaska Native cultural groups today inhabit the lands they have occupied for more than ten thousand years. The Inupiaq people live in the Arctic; the Yupiaq live in Southwestern Alaska; the Unungan live in the Aleutian Chain and Pribilof Islands; the Athabascan live in the Interior and Southcentral part of the state; the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimpshian live in Southeastern Alaska; and the Sugpiaq and Eyak occupy the lower Southcentral region, Kenai Peninsula, and Kodiak. Many now have moved to urban areas, because of economic pressures impinging on the villages and because opportunities for jobs and education are greater. Although it is difficult to estimate what the overall population was in early history, stories and archeological investigations prove that Alaska Native people used and occupied virtually all inhabitable land in the 586,412 square mile terrain we now call Alaska.
Populatio
n. Today more than 100,000 Alaska Native individuals live in Alaska,1 with many more whose ancestry includes some strand of Alaska Native heritage. Until about 1930, Alaska Native people are estimated to have accounted for between fifty percent and a hundred percent of Alaska’s population. Due to the influx of non-Natives, however, Alaska Native citizens now represent approximately sixteen percent of the state’s population. Most live in small rural communities accessible only by air or boat. Roughly six percent of Anchorage citizens (approximately 17,000) are of Alaska Native descent.3 Nearly one quarter of Alaska schoolchildren from kindergarten through grade 12 are Alaska Native.
Politics and economics. Alaska Native people are vitally involved in the political and economic landscape of modern Alaska. The Alaska Native Brotherhood (founded in 1912), the Tlingit and Haida Central Council (1939), Alaska Native Sisterhood, the Alaska Federation of Natives (1966), the Inuit Circumpolar Conference (1975), and many other organizations, tribal leaders, Native legislators, and individuals have helped shape key political issues including subsistence, land claims, civil rights, education, cultural and language preservation, energy cost and alternatives, and climate change.
What is important to know about Alaska Native cultures?
An attempt to answer this question fully has engaged many scholars, Elders, and educators for hundreds of years.
Some fundamentals:
Alaska Native cultures:
- Have developed over thousands of years in response to environmental conditions among the most challenging on earth.
- Are many and varied, representing at least seven major groups across the state –Aleut/Unangan (Southwestern Coastal Alaska), Inupiaq (Northwestern and Northern Coastal), Athabascan (Interior), Tlingit (Southeastern), Tsimpshian (Southeastern), Haida (Southeastern), Eyak (Southeastern), Yup’ik, Cup’ik, Siberian Yupik, Sugpiaq/Alutiiq (Southwestern), with many different tribes or clans within those groupings.
- Are distinct from one another, with unique and varied languages, complex kinship structures, and highly developed subsistence hunting and gathering practices and technologies, belief systems, art, music, storytelling, spirituality, and dance traditions, among others.
- Share key values, such as honoring the land and waters upon which life depends; respecting and sharing with others; respecting and learning from Elders; living with an attitude of humility and patience; honoring the interconnections among all things; being mindful in word and deed; knowing one’s place in the context of one’s history, traditions, and ancestors.
- Are completely rooted in and tied to the land and waters of a particular region and the practices and customs necessary to thrive in that region.
- Have been hard hit by myriad forces over the past two centuries, including diseases brought by European immigrants and traders; enslavement and oppression by colonizing powers (including the United States government, territorial government, Russian government, and religious organizations); a huge influx of non-Natives, which has altered access to subsistence foods and resulted in restrictive regulation; the arrival of western technologies, religions, economic systems, industrial development, and educational systems; and climate change.
Following passage of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) in 1971 and establishment of thirteen regional and over 200 village corporations, Alaska Native peoples collectively have become among the most powerful economic forces in the state.
As history has shown, important decisions regarding Alaska’s environment, public education, and economy depend on an understanding of Alaska Native histories and cultures.
Some aspects of Alaska Native identities and cultures and the role they play in shaping Alaska today and tomorrow.
Despite these obstacles, Alaska’s Native peoples not only continue to survive, but also help define Alaska’s economy, politics, and future. It is important to note that traveling to the remote villages where most Alaska Native people live is, for non-Natives, like traveling to a foreign country in every sense of the word. A casual observer may note that Alaska Native individuals appear to be “Americanized” in that they use modern tools, clothes, and machinery, and most speak English and wear western clothes. But the bulk of Alaska Native identity is beneath the surface. Each village has different relationship and communication protocols, different customs and traditions, and different world views even within a single region of Alaska; these differences are magnified when considered against other indigenous cultures and mainstream society.
Alaska Native peoples have had intimate contact with their immediate environments for hundreds of generations and thus have a profound understanding of place. Development of oil reserves on Alaska’s North Slope in the 1970’s introduced a new tension when Alaska Native aboriginal land claims impeded construction of the 800-mile trans-Alaska pipeline. Most Alaska Native land claims were extinguished by congressional action in 1971, a solution that remains a topic of dispute today.
Alaska Native history is fraught with stories of conflict with western legal systems (particularly over land) and with western theories about land, fish, and wildlife, as well as “For far too long we Dena’ina people have been trying to tell our story in other people’s words. This may explain some of why we’ve been almost invisible in our own country, even among ourselves.”Clare Swan
What is the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA)?
Alaska Native peoples have been living for thousands of years on the lands now called Alaska (a westernized version of the Aleut term for "great land” or "mainland”). Current theory asserts that early peoples migrated to Alaska some 25,000 years ago over a land bridge connecting Alaska and eastern Siberia. These immigrants then spread out over the region, developing over time into multiple, distinct nations.
In the 1700s, traders from other nations—Russia, Spain, England, and what would become the United States—arrived in increasing numbers to exploit the fur trade. In 1784, Russia asserted dominion and claimed Alaska as a colony. In 1867, Russia sold Alaska to the United States government for $7,200,000 (about 1.9¢ per acre), transferring title to all public and vacant lands not owned by individuals, without regard to the claims of aboriginal peoples who had been living on the lands for generations.
These peoples—deemed “uncivilized tribes” by the United States government- considered most of these lands to be their communal property, based on the principle of “traditional use and occupancy.” The treaty with Russia “provided that those tribes would be subject to such laws and regulations as the United States might from time to time adopt with respect to aboriginal tribes.”
In 1884, Congress declared that indigenous Americans “should not be disturbed in the possession of any lands actually in their use or occupation or then claimed by them, but that the terms under which such persons could acquire title to such lands were reserved for future legislation by Congress.” This action was significant because it laid a groundwork for Native land claims that, in Alaska, would take another century to resolve.
In 1966, Alaska Native leaders convened statewide as the Alaska Federation of Natives (AFN), an entity that meets annually and remains a political force today. AFN pressed Congress to resolve the question of Alaska Native land claims stemming in part from Alaska’s days as a Russian colony and United States territory. From the perspective of many Native individuals and organizations, the lands on which they had been living and subsisting from “time immemorial” had never been the property of Russia to sell. Pressure was building to settle aboriginal claims: the state wanted resolution to carry out day-to-day affairs, and construction of the $8 billion trans-Alaska oil pipeline could not go ahead until conflicting land claims were settled.
After five years of struggle and compromise among Alaska Native groups, the state, oil companies, and conservationists, the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Richard Nixon.
Until ANCSA, official U.S. policy had been to “grant to them (indigenous people) title to a portion of the lands which they occupied, to extinguish the aboriginal title to the remainder of the lands by placing such lands in the public domain, and to pay the fair value of the titles extinguished.” (This policy was frequently dishonored, however; a cursory review of Native American history indicates numerous incidences of indigenous groups being forcibly removed from their homelands without remuneration).
How did Alaska Native corporations start up?
Passage of ANCSA on December 18, 1971 provided title to forty million acres to be divided among some 220 Native villages and twelve regions within the state. An additional four million acres consisting of historical sites, grave sites, and other special lands were made available with certain constraints on usage: economic development was to be restricted on these lands. Twelve regional and over 200 village corporations—entirely new structures in Native societies—were set up to select the lands, hold the titles, and receive, invest, and administer the settlement payments on behalf of their shareholders. A thirteenth corporation was set up to receive monies on behalf of Alaska Native people living outside the state.
These corporations shared in a payment of $462 million over an eleven year period, and an additional $500 million in oil revenues derived from specified Alaska lands. Alaska Native people who were born on or before December 18, 1971 and enrolled in the corporations became shareholders—another new concept and relationship for most of them. Under ANCSA, most village corporations retained only surface rights to the lands they selected, with regional corporations responsible for managing subsurface resources found on their lands and the lands of the village corporations within their regions. If those subsurface resources were developed (mined,drilled), seventy percent of the revenues generated were to be shared among all twelve regional corporations and all of the village corporations on a per capita basis—a very different arrangement compared with non-Native corporations across the globe.
From the outset, as holders of the last remaining Alaska Native lands, the village and regional corporations have assumed enormous responsibilities. They have also faced enormous challenges, including an initial shortage of well prepared Alaska Native people ready to operate these new and complex structures. Like all other corporations, Native corporations strive to maximize profits for their shareholders and may be liable for mismanagement if they fail to do so. Many regional corporations have invested in real estate, secured military contracts, and engaged in mining, logging and other economic endeavors to generate corporate profits. A few corporations earn large profits from their efforts and many are more modestly profitable. Others have so far failed to attain profitability but nevertheless continue to survive.
In 1994 the shareholders amended the articles of incorporation to allow for the issuance of Class "B" stock. Class "B" shareholders who were born after December 18, 1971. Class "B" stock is life estate stock. When the owner dies, the stock is returned to the Corporation.
Do all Alaska Native people get dividends?
The short answer is no. ANCSA corporations declare dividends only in years when they make profits, and not all of them are profitable in any given year. Shareholders of the profitable corporations receive dividends; those of less profitable corporations may not. Only a few corporations make sizeable profits, so only a minority of shareholders receive significant dividends. And, in many cases, only people born on or before December 18, 1971 are shareholders. Photo: Annual shareholder meeting
