Alaska Natives

Alaska Natives are the Indigenous peoples of Alaska in the United States. They include many different cultural and language groups, such as the Inupiat, Aleut, Yupik peoples, and American Indians like the Eyak, Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, and Northern Athabaskan. Most Alaska Natives are part of federally recognized Alaska Native tribes, which belong to 13 Alaska Native Regional Corporations that help manage land and resources.

The ancestors of Alaska Natives moved into Alaska thousands of years ago in several waves. Some groups came later and spread across northern North America, but the Alaska Natives are the ones who stayed in Alaska. Scientists believe their ancestors came from Asia, possibly using the Bering land bridge or traveling by sea.

Over time, Alaska Native cultures grew and changed, showing great skill in living in cold and tough environments. Today, Alaska Natives make up more than 20% of Alaska’s population, and their languages and traditions remain important parts of the state's heritage.

List of peoples

Most Alaska Natives belong to two big groups: the Eskaleut and the Na Dene. Here is a list of the different groups of Alaska Natives, based on their historic languages:

• Alaskan Athabaskans
  • Ahtna
  • Deg Xitʼan
  • Denaʼina
  • Gwichʼin
  • Hän
  • Holikachuk
  • Koyukon
  • Tanana Athabaskans
    • Lower Tanana
    • Tanacross
    • Upper Tanana
  • Upper Kuskokwim (Kolchan)
• Aleut (Unangan)
• Ancient Beringian
• Eskimo
  • Iñupiat, an Inuit group
  • Yupik
    • Alutiiq (Sugpiaq)
      • Chugach Sugpiaq
      • Koniag Alutiiq
    • Cup'ik
    • Nunivak Cup'ig
    • Siberian Yupik (Yupiget)
    • Yup'ik
• Eyak
• Haida
• Tlingit
• Tsimshian

Demographics

Alaska Natives make up about 15.4% of the people living in Alaska today. In 1990, there were around 86,000 Alaska Natives in Alaska and 17,000 more living in other states. By 2013, the number grew to over 120,000 Alaska Natives in Alaska alone. Many live in small villages, but more are moving to cities. In 2010, 44% of Alaska Natives lived in urban areas, up from 38% in 2000.

Before Europeans arrived, around the year 1750, there were about 93,800 Alaska Natives. Their numbers went down over time, reaching a low of 25,450 by 1910. Since then, the population has grown again, reaching 168,826 by 2010, with most living in Alaska.

Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development Nome Dillingham Bethel

History

The modern history of Alaska Natives began in the eighteenth century when they first met Russian explorers from Siberia. Later, in the nineteenth century, British and American traders arrived in the region. In some parts of Alaska, Christian missionaries did not arrive until the twentieth century.

Russian colonial period

Vitus Bering spotted Alaska during an expedition. In the 18th century, Alaska Natives met Russians, with contact happening at different times across Alaska. Russians came by ship from Siberia in the mid-eighteenth century, establishing trade with Alaska Natives, especially in the Aleutian Islands. They set up settlements around trading posts, including Russian Orthodox missionaries. These missionaries were the first to translate Christian scripture into Native languages, such as Tlingit. The lasting effect of this period is seen today in many Russian Orthodox Christian congregations in Alaska made up mostly of Alaska Natives.

The Sibero-Russian promyshlenniki did not hunt or gather marine life themselves. Instead, they made the Aleuts do this work, treating them unfairly. As the fur trade grew, competition among Russian companies increased. Catherine the Great, upon becoming ruler in 1763, encouraged fair treatment of the Aleuts. However, competition between trading companies eventually led to conflicts that worsened relations with Indigenous populations. Over time, the situation became very difficult for the Aleuts and other Native Alaskan peoples affected by Russian contact.

As animal populations decreased, the Aleuts, who depended on the fur trade with the Russians, had to take greater risks in the dangerous waters of the North Pacific to hunt for more otter. The Shelikhov-Golikov Company, and later the Russian-American Company, became a monopoly, using conflicts and systematic violence to exploit Indigenous peoples. When the Aleuts rebelled and won some battles, the Russians responded with deadly force, destroying their boats and hunting equipment, leaving them with no way to survive.

The most serious effect on the Aleut population during the first two generations of Russian contact (1741/1759-1781/1799 AD) was the introduction of new diseases from Eurasia. About 80% of the Aleut population died from these infectious diseases, to which they had no immunity, unlike Europeans who had lived with these diseases for centuries.

Effects of Russian colonization

The Russian Tsarist government moved into Indigenous lands in present-day Alaska for its own reasons. It used the land’s natural resources during the trading years, and spread Russian Orthodoxy. Their arrival in these areas changed the land and the lives of Indigenous communities.

Historians have suggested that the Russian-American Company used Indigenous peoples for cheap labor during the fur trade. The company not only made Indigenous people work but also held some as hostages to get otter pelts, a tax called iasak. This was a way the Russians had used before in Siberia during the Siberian fur trade. Beaver pelts were also given to fur traders when they first met with different communities.

The Russian-American Company used military force against Indigenous families, taking them hostage until men in the community provided furs for them. Otter furs on Kodiak Island and the Aleutian Islands attracted the Russians to start these taxes. Robbery and unfair treatment, including punishment and taking away food, also happened when fur traders arrived. Catherine the Great ended the giving of tribute in 1799, but her government then made Indigenous men between 18 and 50 years old work as seal hunters only for the Russian American Company. This mandatory work separated men from their families and villages, breaking down communities. With men away hunting, villages had little protection, leaving only women, children, and the elderly.

In addition to changes from mandatory work, diseases also changed Indigenous populations. Although records from that time were scarce, it has been said that 80% of the Aleut people were gone by 1800. The Alaska Native population was first recorded in the 1880 United States census, and it was estimated that the population had dropped from 80,000 in 1741 to 33,000 because of disease. The population kept decreasing until 1910 and did not go above the 1880 number until 1947.

Relationships between Indigenous women and fur traders grew as Indigenous men were away from villages. This led to marriages and children known as Creole peoples, who had both Indigenous and Russian ancestry. To reduce conflicts with Aleutian communities, it became policy for fur traders to marry Indigenous women. The Creole population grew in the area controlled by the Russian American Company.

The growth of the Russian Orthodox Church was another important part of colonizing and converting Indigenous peoples. Ioann Veniaminov, who later became Saint Innocent of Alaska, was a key missionary who carried out the Orthodox Church’s plan to Christianize Indigenous peoples. The church encouraged Creole children to follow Russian Orthodox Christianity, and the Russian American Company provided them with education. Many Orthodox missionaries, like Herman of Alaska, protected Natives from unfair treatment. Creole people were believed to be very loyal to the Russian crown and the Russian American Company. After finishing their education, children were often sent to Russia to study skills such as mapmaking, theology, and military intelligence. In the 1850s, Russia lost much of its interest in Alaska.

American colonialism

Alaska’s rich natural resources, especially gold, interested the United States. In 1867, the United States bought Alaska from Russia. This happened without asking the Native Alaskans, who were not considered citizens at the time. The land that belonged to Alaska Natives was treated as “open land,” allowing white settlers to claim it without giving anything to the Native people living there. The only schools available for Alaska Natives were those set up by religious missionaries. Many white settlers did not understand the complex cultures that Alaska Natives had developed to live in their challenging environment. Instead, they saw them as lesser than European Americans, which matched white supremacist ideas.

The Klondike Gold Rush of 1896–1898 brought more white settlers to Alaska and led to unfair practices against Indigenous peoples. American settlers enforced racial segregation and discriminatory laws similar to Jim Crow laws, seriously limiting Alaska Natives’ opportunities and cultural practices, treating them as second-class citizens. This segregation showed up in many ways, including “whites only” signs that stopped Natives from entering certain buildings. Educational discrimination was also common. In an 1880 court case, a child was not allowed to go to school with Americans because his stepfather was Native.^{[clarification needed]} Children of mixed heritage could only go to American schools if their families gave up their native culture. At the same time, the U.S. government made policies to break up Alaska Native family structures. Federal records show that breaking up Native family units was a planned part of Federal Indian policy to assimilate Indigenous children. The Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative played a big role in causing trauma across generations by taking children from their native villages and putting them in schools far away, often with children from other tribes. This system created new Indigenous family structures depending on whether children returned to their native villages or stayed elsewhere after finishing school. These policies stopped Alaska Native children from speaking their languages, wearing traditional clothes, being with other Natives, eating traditional foods, or practicing their religions. The separation of families and loss of culture caused deep trauma that continued for generations.

In 1912, the Alaska Native Brotherhood (ANB) was formed to fight for citizenship rights. The Alaska Native Sisterhood (ANS) was created in 1915. Also in 1915, the Alaska Territorial legislature passed a law allowing Alaskan Natives the right to vote – but only if they gave up their cultural customs and traditions. The Indian Citizenship Act, passed in 1924, gave all Native Americans United States citizenship.

ANB became very powerful in the 1920s. They protested the segregation of Alaska Natives in public places and institutions, and also organized boycotts. Alberta Schenck (Inupiaq) led a well-known protest against segregation in a movie theater in 1944. With the help of Elizabeth Peratrovich (Tlingit), the Alaska Equal Rights Act of 1945 was passed, ending segregation in Alaska.

In 1942, during World War II, the United States forced around nine hundred Aleuts from the Aleutian Islands to leave. The idea was to move the Aleuts from a possible battle area to keep them safe, but European Americans in the same area were not forced to leave. The evacuation was handled so badly that many Aleuts died; the elderly and children had the highest death rates. Survivors returned to the islands to find their homes and belongings destroyed or stolen. Civil rights activists such as Alberta Schenck Adams and Elizabeth Peratrovich protested unfair laws against Native Alaskans with sit-ins and lobbying.

The Alaska Equal Rights Act of 1945, the first anti-discrimination state law in the U.S., resulted from these protests. It gave all Alaskans the right to “full and equal enjoyment” of public places and businesses, banned segregating signs, and allowed punishments of a $250 fine and up to 30 days in jail for discriminatory actions.

Alaska became part of the United States in 1959 when President Dwight D. Eisenhower recognized Alaska as the 49th state.

ANCSA and since (1971 to present)

In 1971, with the help of Alaska Native leaders such as Emil Notti, Willie Hensley, and Byron Mallott, the U.S. Congress passed the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA), which settled land and financial claims for lands and resources that Alaska Natives had lost to European-Americans. It set up thirteen Alaska Native Regional Corporations to manage these claims. In some ways, Alaska Natives or Native Alaskans are treated differently by the government compared to other Native Americans in the United States, partly because their history with the U.S. government was different.

Europeans and Americans did not have much contact with Alaska Natives until the late 19th and early 20th centuries when many came to the region for gold rushes. The Alaska Natives were not given individual land ownership under the Dawes Act of 1887 but were instead treated under the Alaska Native Allotment Act of 1906.

The Allotment Act was repealed in 1971, after ANSCA, and reservations were ended. Another difference is that Alaska Native tribal governments cannot collect taxes for business done on tribal land, according to a 1998 United States Supreme Court decision in Alaska v. Native Village of Venetie Tribal Government. Except for the Tsimshian, Alaska Natives no longer have reservations but do control some lands. Under the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, Alaska Natives have the right to hunt whales and other marine mammals.

Climate change

Four Indigenous tribes in Alaska—the Shishmaref, Kivalina, Shaktoolik, and Newtok tribes—are facing big changes because of climate change. Their homes are being affected by melting sea ice and more wildfires, making life very hard.

Because of climate change, Alaska Natives are having trouble with health problems, finding enough food and clean water, and keeping their homes safe. The land where they live is changing fast, and some villages might have to move because the ground is no longer stable. This change also makes it harder for animals to live in their usual places, which affects the food that these communities depend on.

Subsistence

See also: Subsistence economy

For many Alaska Natives, gathering food from nature is still very important for both their economy and culture. In a place called Utqiaġvik, Alaska, back in 2005, over 91 percent of the local Iñupiat families still got food by hunting, fishing, or gathering, compared to about 33 percent of families who were not Iñupiat.

Alaska Natives don’t have many treaties with the United States to protect their rights to get food from nature, except for the right to hunt whales and other sea animals. A law called the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act took away many of these rights in Alaska.

Ethnicity by region

Census 2010, Table 16 (Alaska).

According to the 2010 census, this was the ethnic breakdown of Alaska Natives by region. The total adds up to 100% for each region.