Post by Okwes on Jan 29, 2008 17:54:19 GMT -5
A tiny native village in Alaska copes with urban encroachment Members of
the Dena'ina Athabascan tribe, completely surrounded by metropolitan
Anchorage, struggle to preserve their language and culture. from the
January 28, 2008 edition
EKLUTNA, Alaska - Outside in the crisp fruity air, traffic on the Glenn
Highway emits its usual roar. Inside the log-hewn community center,
surrounded by a forest of stunted spruce and golden-leafed birch, a
dozen villagers attend the weekly elders' lunch and speak of times when
this tiny enclave seemed a world away from Alaska's largest city.
Many decades ago, the fish were so thick in the Eklutna River that you
could practically walk on them, says Julia Cooper, who grew up as one of
a dozen children in a two-room cabin nearby. In the 1960s and '70s,
homes were heated by wood stoves and residents hauled water from a
spring across the highway, says Irene Chilligan, another local.
Unlike most native villages in Alaska, which are scattered over the
roadless bush and isolated from urban areas, the Dena'ina Athabascan
village of Eklutna – home to about 60 people – is located within
the municipal borders of Anchorage. Just 26 miles to the west loom the
imposing downtown buildings that house oil company executives, lawyers,
and other blue-suited titans.
The near-urban setting has its obvious advantages – access to jobs,
medical and social services, shopping, and schools.
But the remaining 250 or so tribal members, most residing outside the
village, also worry about the erosion of life that dates back centuries.
Now one of the nation's smallest native tribes is fighting back to
preserve its culture – and making notable progress.
Their efforts are low key, as befits a tribe that shuns self-promotion.
But they are pushing to revive a language that has almost disappeared
and to garner more recognition from an outside world that, until
recently, was barely aware of the tribe's existence.
Things have changed dramatically since he was growing up, says Aaron
Leggett, the 26-year-old Dena'ina cultural historian at the Alaska
Native Heritage Center. "You'd say you are Dena'ina, and people would
say, 'What's that?' " Now, he says, his great aunt, the Eklutna tribe
president, gets almost weekly requests to perform a Dena'ina ceremony.
"I told her it's not long before you're going to be called to do
Dena'ina blessings for weddings and bar mitzvahs."
•••
Eklutna does offer a small slice of bush Alaska in the big city. The
tribal headquarters office, clinic, and support buildings are mostly a
collection of trailers. In typical rural Alaska fashion, old vehicles
and machines that can be cannibalized for parts lie scattered about. A
few sagging couches and easy chairs perch in the woods. It's all in
sharp contrast to the well-heeled suburbs just to the east.
At the heart of the village is St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Church,
Anchorage's oldest structure, a weathered wooden building erected here
in the 1870s. It encompasses a cemetery where traditional native "spirit
houses" – dollhouselike structures painted in family colors –
are topped with Orthodox crosses. A wooden chapel just big enough for
one person sits nearby. All reflect Eklutna's status as a stronghold for
Orthodoxy during Alaska's Russian period.
The faith is not a thing of the past here. Adjacent to the historic
church, which holds icons of saints considered so fragile that flash
photography isn't allowed inside, stands a modern Orthodox church built
a century later. It is used for special religious and family events. The
Russian Orthodox Diocese of Alaska maintains the facilities, conducts
regular tours, and has even established a new monastery here.
Historically, Eklutna's Dena'ina people made their home over a much
bigger area. The indigenous residents moved up and down the coastline
and into the surrounding Chugach Mountains, following the ebbs and flows
of fish and game. At what is now the Eklutna Lake campground in Chugach
State Park, they hunted sheep on the mountain slopes. From the
now-prestigious downtown Anchorage address of Third Avenue and K Street,
Alex Vasily – the famous Dena'ina tribal chief and shaman – ran
his smokehouse.
the Dena'ina Athabascan tribe, completely surrounded by metropolitan
Anchorage, struggle to preserve their language and culture. from the
January 28, 2008 edition
EKLUTNA, Alaska - Outside in the crisp fruity air, traffic on the Glenn
Highway emits its usual roar. Inside the log-hewn community center,
surrounded by a forest of stunted spruce and golden-leafed birch, a
dozen villagers attend the weekly elders' lunch and speak of times when
this tiny enclave seemed a world away from Alaska's largest city.
Many decades ago, the fish were so thick in the Eklutna River that you
could practically walk on them, says Julia Cooper, who grew up as one of
a dozen children in a two-room cabin nearby. In the 1960s and '70s,
homes were heated by wood stoves and residents hauled water from a
spring across the highway, says Irene Chilligan, another local.
Unlike most native villages in Alaska, which are scattered over the
roadless bush and isolated from urban areas, the Dena'ina Athabascan
village of Eklutna – home to about 60 people – is located within
the municipal borders of Anchorage. Just 26 miles to the west loom the
imposing downtown buildings that house oil company executives, lawyers,
and other blue-suited titans.
The near-urban setting has its obvious advantages – access to jobs,
medical and social services, shopping, and schools.
But the remaining 250 or so tribal members, most residing outside the
village, also worry about the erosion of life that dates back centuries.
Now one of the nation's smallest native tribes is fighting back to
preserve its culture – and making notable progress.
Their efforts are low key, as befits a tribe that shuns self-promotion.
But they are pushing to revive a language that has almost disappeared
and to garner more recognition from an outside world that, until
recently, was barely aware of the tribe's existence.
Things have changed dramatically since he was growing up, says Aaron
Leggett, the 26-year-old Dena'ina cultural historian at the Alaska
Native Heritage Center. "You'd say you are Dena'ina, and people would
say, 'What's that?' " Now, he says, his great aunt, the Eklutna tribe
president, gets almost weekly requests to perform a Dena'ina ceremony.
"I told her it's not long before you're going to be called to do
Dena'ina blessings for weddings and bar mitzvahs."
•••
Eklutna does offer a small slice of bush Alaska in the big city. The
tribal headquarters office, clinic, and support buildings are mostly a
collection of trailers. In typical rural Alaska fashion, old vehicles
and machines that can be cannibalized for parts lie scattered about. A
few sagging couches and easy chairs perch in the woods. It's all in
sharp contrast to the well-heeled suburbs just to the east.
At the heart of the village is St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Church,
Anchorage's oldest structure, a weathered wooden building erected here
in the 1870s. It encompasses a cemetery where traditional native "spirit
houses" – dollhouselike structures painted in family colors –
are topped with Orthodox crosses. A wooden chapel just big enough for
one person sits nearby. All reflect Eklutna's status as a stronghold for
Orthodoxy during Alaska's Russian period.
The faith is not a thing of the past here. Adjacent to the historic
church, which holds icons of saints considered so fragile that flash
photography isn't allowed inside, stands a modern Orthodox church built
a century later. It is used for special religious and family events. The
Russian Orthodox Diocese of Alaska maintains the facilities, conducts
regular tours, and has even established a new monastery here.
Historically, Eklutna's Dena'ina people made their home over a much
bigger area. The indigenous residents moved up and down the coastline
and into the surrounding Chugach Mountains, following the ebbs and flows
of fish and game. At what is now the Eklutna Lake campground in Chugach
State Park, they hunted sheep on the mountain slopes. From the
now-prestigious downtown Anchorage address of Third Avenue and K Street,
Alex Vasily – the famous Dena'ina tribal chief and shaman – ran
his smokehouse.