Archaeology and the Sugpiaq renaissance on Kodiak Island: Three stories from Alaska

Abstract

The Sugpiat people have lived in the Kodiak Archipelago for at least 7,500 years, but suffered extraordinary pressure on their cultural identity beginning with violent Russian conquest in 1784 and followed by Russian and American colonisation. Recognising that drastic actions were needed to preserve Sugpiaq heritage, the Kodiak Area Native Association began a cultural revitalisation movement. The centrepiece was a Native-owned state-of-the-art museum that opened in 1995. This essay recounts the stories of three participants in the beginning of a process that has transformed the cultural landscape of Kodiak.La présence sugpiaq dans l’archipel Kodiak remonte à au moins 7500 ans. Les Sugpiat ont cependant subi d’intenses pressions sur leur identité et leur culture avec la violente conquête russe de 1784 suivie par la colonisation russe et américaine. Consciente qu’il fallait recourir à des moyens radicaux pour préserver le patrimoine sugpiaq de l’île Kodiak, la Kodiak Area Native Association a entrepris un mouvement de revitalisation culturelle, dont la pièce maîtresse fut l’ouverture, en 1995, d’un musée autochtone d’avant-garde. Cet essai relate l’expérience de trois participants au début d’un processus qui a transformé le paysage culturel de l’île Kodiak

Historical Ecology: A Robust Bridge between Archaeology and Ecology

“…The Distributed Long-term Observing Networks of the Past [84] assess human behavior and environmental change in the Arctic and subarctic regions over space and time. All these collaborations engage multiple knowledge communities, both of heritage and of practice, while addressing climate change [104][105][106][107][108].…”

Archaeologies of Climate Change: Perceptions and Prospects

“…There is a fear of future cultural detachment, especially amongst younger generations (Rasmus, Allen, and Ford 2014). The critically endangered archaeology of these regions can be viewed as another way in which culture is being lost in a very literal sense, not least for communities where historical infractions and colonial practices have left them feeling disconnected from their material past (e.g., Pullar, Knecht, and Haakanson 2013). However, archaeological material is also increasingly being recognized as having great strength as tangible heritage, and through heritage building, having the potential to reinforce individual and group identities and reinforce community resilience (Laven 2015).…”

“…Indeed, since the late 1990s, community archaeology has entirely changed the face of archaeology (e.g., Silliman 2008;Watkins 2017;Zimmerman 1996) to the point where conducting a project without involving the local community, especially in the case of descendant communities, is now quite unthinkable. Community-based archaeology is not only vital in reducing the distance between professional and public entities (Grima 2016;Oldham 2017), particularly in Indigenous contexts (Pullar, Knecht, and Haakanson 2013), but can also serve as an instrument connecting people to their present, their traditional heritage, and cultural pride. There is even an argument made for the role of community archaeology in a decolonializing process (e.g., Atalay 2006).…”