ensure growth of wisdom, we recognize that we need to be with those that we consider wise, most often the Elders. We know that we become that which we hold up and respect. How many times have you heard this truth! You and I, as educators, seek through dialogue with those we admire, through reading all sorts of written media, through seeing videotaped media and through learning to read and communicate directly with nature. The information we gather requires that we sift through it to remove the chaff in the form of misdirected, misinformed and useless information which we or others may have interpreted wrongly. Knowledge is merely information, but wisdom requires that we understand, become enlightened or aware and, as we grow, live what we know! This is what we learn from our wise Elders—this is wisdom.

This wisdom cannot be separated from the sacred—our Native spirituality. Wisdom is embedded in the sacred, thus we live it. Remember that wisdom also resides in you—look for it. As a Native person, you need your Native language to commune with nature and to describe it in its own terms. A Native friend of mine from the village of Minto told me that our Native languages are living languages and that if you don’t use it, you are giving yourself away—relinquishing your identity. As a Yupiaq man, I have to draw on my Yupiaq language and mindset to feel the crispness of the snow, the balminess of a warm wind. I have to draw on my language to fully experience the mountains, the moon, the sun, the river, the spruce tree, the taste of Hudson’s Bay tea, the wolf, the eagle and the paramecium—it is a living language! All these experiences with the language, along with the five senses and intuition, are necessary for my growth and my spirituality.

Barriers have to be removed for my continued growth, otherwise staleness follows. This is another reason why we must get the children out of the classrooms as much as possible to be with and in nature. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote: “Nature becomes (to man) the measure of his attainments. So much of nature as he is ignorant of, so much of his own mind does he not yet possess. And, in fine, the ancient precept ‘know thyself’ and the modern precept, ‘study nature’ become at last one maxim.” Get the children to see beauty in the flower, tree, butterfly, grass, stream, fish and, yes, the slug. These living things interact and cooperate. This process does not leave out the rocks and other elements of Mother Earth—they are all an integral part it. Let them begin to understand that we are here for a purpose, to contribute to the good of the tribe and be of service to others. This involves goodness of self, morality, joy, cooperation and happiness. We have Christ, Dalai Lama, Ghandi, Chief Peter John, Lyons and others who have the selfless love which is the stabilizer, the balancer of life. They are our role models.

Let the children think of all the good traits and skills that they possess. Someone has called these the “inner assets”. They have talents and skills inherited from their ancestors with the Great Mystery working the genotypes to fit the place and conditions. This process needs our continued meditation and prayers for the still, small voice to let us know what else needs to be done. Ellanginginartuqut—we are becoming more aware!

The inner assets might include ability to interact effectively with others, intuitive perception, athletic skill, ability to observe and make sense of what is being seen, ability for abstract thinking, dexterity combined with mind, leadership skills, mindfulness of place, cooperation, showing love and humility and all the many other positive traits that children may possess. Not only must the children be guided to making a worthwhile living but to making a life that feels good to them as well. This is done through the mythology, stories, singing, dancing, drumming, place names and all the other rituals and ceremonies that have been handed down to us through many thousands of years. They must be guided to living life to the fullest—a good and responsible life working to become the very best they possibly can while making a contribution to their community. Children who want to live a healthy and stable life will be contributors to a healthy, stable and sustainable community.

These inner assets of children have to be capitalized on for them to become the very best that they are capable of. They can become the very best hunter, medical doctor, electrician, artist, craftsperson or medicine person, but this has to be infused with liberal amounts of love, humility, compassion and open-mindedness. This means that love has balanced the outer and inner ecologies of the young person. They work and experience place for the good of the community. We have to know place in order to know self, for place is our identity.

The last 500 years or so we have seen a maelstrom of confusion, a perfect storm! It is destructive because it is based on self-love, greed, hate and anger, which are in direct conflict with what nature teaches us. We must avoid personal narcissism just as we must avoid spiritual narcissism. We have to work for a balance. Some American Indian people refer to this as “Walking the Red Road”, a very narrow path which guides us on that thin line between good and evil. We are gradually emerging from this maelstrom of confusion and getting on a pathway that feels just right!

We, as teachers, are not just repositories of knowledge, but serve as a role model and guide for the physical, intellectual, emotional and spiritual development of these children, our future. May the Ellam Yua, the Spirit of the Universe, give us guidance and direction in this most important role.

Ecosophy: Sharing Our Pathways Articles

by

Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

What Is This Thing Called “Love”?

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 5, Issue 3

Many books and articles have been written on the subject of love, however, I would like to attempt to explain it from the viewpoint of one Yupiaq, myself. Ellam Yua (Spirit of the Universe, God) is the giver of love, the light of intelligence and understanding. Love allows one to do almost anything for something held dear in the heart. It is a powerful emotion which is unconditional. Based on this, I can say that love is a sense of belonging and being in touch with something that is good and beautiful, thus deserving care and harmony.

It then behooves Alaska Native people to instill this sense of love in education, in cultural camps and in everyday life. We want our students to be connected to order, to the patterns and symmetries of this universe. We want them to be able to see the good and the beautiful in their own place. This bonding with place will allow the Native people to do things that will not harm that place, to do things to rebuild, reclaim, regenerate and rehabilitate that place where necessary. They, in essence, will be thinking in terms of the happiness and satisfaction of the Seventh Generation. When some of these Native people become scientists and technologists, they will do things that make them happy as they are immersed in the beauty of the place in which they live. This love of place is sometimes lacking in modern scientists and technologists who are often trained to operate without a heart, such as the Tinman in the The Wizard of Oz. Too often scientists and technologists are expected to use only the brain without giving due consideration to the heart. We, as Alaska Native people, must learn to love oneself, love one another (kenkuraulluta), and above all relearn to love place.

Identity-Creating Camps

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 5, Issue 2

There is a crying need for healing among Alaska Native people and an essential element of the healing process is the need to retain our unique Alaska Native identities. This is best done through the use of the Native language because it thrusts us into the thought world of our ancestors and their ways of comprehending the world. With the use of the Native language, we begin to appreciate the richness and complexity of our traditional philosophical and spiritual world views. It is for these reasons that we need to pay more attention to how we can draw upon our Alaska Native languages to serve as the foundation for the various science and cultural camps that we sponsor. To gain the full expression of our languages, identity and way of life, the camps must also take place in all the seasons of the year with the Elders being the prime movers. Their description of traditional activities through the local language best conveys the relationships between a Alaska Native concept and its practice.

The following are a few suggestions on how we might approach and design camps for different purposes. Three types of Native cultural camps are described and each may be revised and adapted to suit the local situation and needs.

Cultural Immersion Camp

For students who have a good command of the Native language or dialect in a particular region and thus can be immersed on all aspects of the local culture.

1. All activities are done utilizing the Native language only and the focus is on in-depth learning of the things one needs to know to make a life and a living.

2. All planning and implementation includes local Native Elders and other knowledgeable Native people explaining what and why things are done the way they are for cultural adaptability and survival. This can include the following topics:

a. Use of and relationship to plants and animals: times for harvesting; how and why certain rules are followed to ensure continuation of species; explain the traditional preparation and preservation techniques; how does the process contribute to natural diversity and cultural adaptability?

b. Medicinal plants: their use and how they have been preordained by Ellam Yua (Spirit of the Universe) to have power to heal certain diseases; harvesting process—preparation and preservation; how to use them, being mindful of the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual inclinations of the person being treated; how do they contribute to natural diversity and cultural adaptability?

c. Explore the nature-mediated technology of the Alaska Native people: materials; preparation methods; explanations of why certain parts of materials are used; how the idea for the technology came about; functioning of the various parts; use and care of the item; does it utilize refined or unrefined natural resources and why; is it biodegradable; what are its spiritual aspects; how does it contribute to natural diversity and cultural sustain-ability and adaptability?

d. Explore the natural sense-makers of nature for weather, seasons, flora and fauna.

e. Discuss time and its measurement.

f. Navigation techniques: finding direction using nature and celestial objects.

3. Use song, dance and drumming for transmission of culture, especially its spiritual aspect; develop a realization that everything a Native person does is a form of prayer and paying homage to Ellam Yua (or whatever name a tribe has for the Creator.)

4. Use mythology and stories for value-creation and teaching what it means to be human; the entire experience should be value-creating and give a cultural orientation, an identity.

5. Live off the land as much as possible, using traditional techniques and technology.

6. The scheduling must be flexible and determined by the Elders to do things when it feels right.

Language Development Camp

For students who have little or no understanding of the Native language or have little or no speaking ability. Thus the focus is on learning the language itself in a setting where it has inherent meaning.

The process is best determined on a day-by-day basis by the Elders and teachers, but it could range from full immersion as outlined above, to gradual immersion starting with the Native language being used with English interpretations, then progressing to an hour or two in which only the Native language is used. In either case, the goal would be to have the last week be all in the Native language. Otherwise, all of the suggestions outlined for immersion camps would apply.

Bridging Science Camp

Same as above but incorporating aspects of a Eurocentric viewpoint. The bridging camp should include not only the Native language and cultural practices, but also the Eurocentric scientific concepts and practices.

1. Most of the activities outlined above apply, but with the addition of a comparative perspective. All activities are coordinated to best achieve understanding. The traditional activities are not separate activities from Eurocentric mathematics and sciences, but are planned to be compatible and complementary with one another.

2. Identify some of the most used Eurocentric scientific terms and coin corresponding Native words with help from Elders and students.

3. When using Eurocentric science knowledge, concepts or theories, explore how they may add to or detract from one’s Nativeness.

4. Examine whether the Eurocentric knowledge is useful and applicable in the place you are situated or is it extraneous know-ledge in that context. When and where is it useful?

5. Use traditional estimation and intuitive measurement techniques; explore recognition of pattern and symmetry without mathematical equations to confuse the issue—the universe is not all numbers.

6. Use computers and other technological tools sparingly; explore the implications of the statement, “our memories are becoming obsolete.”

7. How does adding Eurocentric knowledge to the traditional ways of knowing enhance or detract from natural diversity and cultural adaptability?

8. Examine ways in which technological tools may add to environmental and mental pollution.

9. Examine ways in which the camp activities foster values of cooperation and harmony or competition and individualism.

10. The camp planners and implementers should always have the local list of Native values in front of them for guidance in determining what to include from the modern world.

The bridging science camps are intended to incorporate the Eurocentric mathematics and scientific concepts along with the local knowledge base of the Elders. All daily activities should be coordinated to effectively and efficiently teach and validate both thought worlds. The students should gain a keen understanding of Eurocentric scientific research since many of the findings corroborate Native observations and have helped to identify globally-stressed arenas that explain why Mother Earth is suffering. This makes it absolutely necessary that students learn Eurocentric concepts as well as their own ways of recognizing patterns, utilizing symbols, employing estimation and intuitive measurement and developing a keen observation of place.

The Native students have to realize that our ways of knowing are identity-building processes. They can then pursue careers in mathematics and the sciences buttressed with a nature-mediated world view giving them a kind and polite disposition to the world in which they live.

Native Science

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 1, Issue 5

We have talked, discussed and suggested activities in Native science, but have not really defined what we are talking about. During the regional meeting in Kotzebue, a group of interested people got together to talk about Native science. The following are thoughts that were produced attempting to understand what it is. It is requested that the staff and readers review and make additions, deletions and modifications to the stated “givens” as this is a beginning draft.

• Within our Native mythology and stories are the sciences and within the Native sciences are the mythology and stories.

• Native Science is concerned with asking the right questions to learn from nature and the spiritual worlds.

• Native science is centered on studying natural phenomena requiring long and patient observation—a matter of survival.

• The Native empirical knowledge of habitats and niches is conducive to intuition which may originate from the subconscious, natural or spiritual worlds. The way of knowing is qualitative and is conservation-based to ensure sustainability.

• Native ways of knowing are holistic or holographic that recognizes relationships in place and influences to processes in the ecological system.

• A belief in everything having a spirit establishes a sense of spirituality which is inseparable from everyday life. This spirituality is embedded in respect which gives honor and dignity to all things. “We are biologists in our own way.”

• Native science deals with all aspects of life: health (healing plants), psychology, weather prediction, earth science, shamanism, animal behavior according to seasons, stars and constellations, reincarnation, natural permutations, rituals and ceremonies to maintain balance and many areas of life.

• The Native scientist checks on past history and events to see and understand the present situation.

Ideas on assessing educational change process in Native language acquisition and learning of Native cultural and modern lifeways:

• Is the study based on natural phenomena?

• Is the inquiry logical and meaningful?

• Is the historical (mythology & stories) data available?

• How was the conclusion arrived at?

• Does the data gathering process include holistic thought?

•Does the process use the five senses and elements of intuition?

The Cry of the Loon: Mysterious, Mournful, Remembering Place

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 4, Issues 2 & 3

Waqaa, greetings to each and everyone of you. Some of you may well be asking yourselves, why have I chosen the tunutellek as my subject for this occasion? The Yupiaq name means “that which is packing something.” Indeed, the loon is carrying a heavy burden.

Wherever the loon exists, there are Native people, and you will have many loon stories that are mystical and magical in their content. Among them is the story of the blind boy who is made to see by the loon diving into the water with the boy on its back. This is repeated three times. In each dive and emergence, the boy could see a little clearer, and on its third emergence, the boy could see clearly. The loon helped the boy to see, likewise, it can help us to understand ourselves and see our connection to Mother Earth today.

Listen to the call of the loon. Its call is God-given through nature. It is its own language and understood by others of its kind and other creatures. Only we, with our ability to think and rationalize, do not understand because we listen only with the mind, not with mind and heart well sprinkled with intuition. To some it is eerie, as if some bad thing is about to happen. Maybe an alangguk, an apparition or ghost of some kind is about to appear. It conjures up many thoughts that are not based on “what is” but on “what if.” This is the fear that most of us face as a Native people, especially when thinking about changing education. “What if” the educators, legislators and powers that be do not believe and think that this could be done. But regardless, we must take those steps necessary to change education so that it takes into consideration, in fact, makes an educational system based on our own tribal worldviews. When thought of in that context, then it includes our Native languages, ways of generating knowledge, research, ways of making things and ways for using them respectfully. Our Alaska Native languages come from the land, are derived from the land. It is the language of the land that makes our Native people live in harmony with Nature. According to the Muskogee Cree, Bear Heart, harmony is a tolerance, a forgiving, a blending. This is what our Native languages allow us to do. Our Native words come from the creatures and things of Mother Earth naming themselves, defining themselves through action words—that’s reality! Nature is our teacher. Information and rationality are a small segment of knowing and learning. In the use of our Native languages, we come to live life intimately because we are enmeshed in it rather than looking at it from a distance through a microscope or telescope. It then behooves that we relearn our languages and learn to live close to nature to regain our health as a Native people. When we have that vision and goal, and work toward it, then we will have harmony; we will have tolerance; we will forgive; and we will again blend into our world. We will be using our five senses and intuition to learn about our place. The loon never lost its spiritual vision. It has a love for life, its environment and its creator. Its education was from Mother Earth for the heart, for it to become creative and to know how to live in its community, its habitat.

The loon still gets messages from its unconscious on new thoughts or solutions to problems. We, as human beings, have cluttered up our conscious minds with information and rational thinking, so that our world of dreams is no longer sought through meditation, vision questing, fasting and looking deep into the silence within us for direction. Not only have we become socio-politco-economic dependents, but we depend on outside sources to take care of our problems whether it’s individual, family or community. You see, the loon looks into its inner ecology knowing that no one else can do that for it. It knows that it is incumbent upon itself. In order for us to receive guidance and direction for our lives, we must relearn what the loon does naturally. We must look into ourselves where power and strength lie and tap into it to begin to address our own problems.

Another strength of the loon, is that it teaches and nurtures its young to live as a loon. It does not require that someone else do the educating. The loon develops the loon worldview of its young closely connected to others and its place. As it migrates from place to place, it remembers and appreciates the diversity and beauty of Nature. It nurtures its offspring to become independent yet knowing its dependence on the abundance of Nature to succor its needs. It teaches its young to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” This is true love; this is unconditional love that we need in this world. A love for self, a love for others and a love for place giving one a sense of responsibility to take care of oneself, to care for others and the environment that one lives in. The loon’s cry is remembering a place that was harmonious, full of beauty and diversity that Nature so loves. This is heart talk! This is science—knowing place.

Very much like our Native people, the loon’s life is not all roses and peace. The loon has a few problems, such as taking off. It is very much like the Wright brothers in their early experiments. The little homemade engine revs up, but has just enough power for it to barely to get off the ground. Just as the under-powered plane, the loon frantically flaps its wings and seemingly runs across the water’s surface. Once in a while, the loon will crash onto the tundra. But, it crawls back into the lake somehow and tries again. We, as a Native people, are testing our wings and power! If we find that some of our ideas do not work, we need to go back and try again, maybe with a different approach and tools. We must not be overly ambitious by overplaying our knowledge and abilities, but recognize our limitations as human beings. We must do that which we know we can succeed at first, then progress to more difficult tasks. And, if we fail, we must NEVER GIVE UP!

The sad fact about this precious bird is that it is losing ground in its efforts to survive. Our Canadian friends look upon it with great respect, so much so, that it is on their one- and two-dollar coins. They are called the “loonie” and “twoonie”. It is a known fact that the loon’s numbers are growing smaller at a fast rate in Canada. There is a problem that is so ominous and insidious that it is overwhelming the loon. It is not of its own making. It is human-made pollution consisting of chemical, biological, nuclear and noise which is destroying its habitat. It is we, humans, who are destroying its habitat and, unfortunately, as we destroy its habitat we are destroying ourselves in the process. The loon may well ask, “What was the question that makes technology the answer in the first place? Who asked it and when?” Technology is inherently good and is the product of human rationality. But, unfortunately, it has laid aside morality and ethics. Take for example, the computer. Many think it’s the answer for all our needs. It is speedy and answers questions with facts the human has fed into it. I say use it sparingly as a tool. It encourages individualism often to the point of isolationism. The excessive user wants to be alone with a stupid machine. If you feed it garbage, you get garbage in return. It takes away clear thinking, problem-solving skills and above all, removes common sense.

Modern technology wants to take and take, to make things without giving back. It wants to cut into Mother Earth to remove its natural resources. It wants to make people want more of its products. In so doing, indigenous people, creatures, plants and landforms are sometimes no barrier to the Eurocentric concepts of progress and development. They are merely removed as detritus and, in the process, destroy a people and their place. The loon’s mournful cry is in recognition of this needless destruction that is taking place by bigger and better technological machines of devastation.

The mournful cry of the loon is much aware of its dwindling food sources, the inability of some of its eggs to hatch and its members succumbing to poisons and new diseases. It recognizes that to not have children, to not have family, to not have a community, is to be scattered, to be falling apart. Many of our Native families are falling apart. I recognize that there are healthy Native families in the villages. I would say that these healthy families are surrounded by and witness to a holocaust of pain and misery. Our villages are, in essence, communities in name only. They are often not working together for the common good as in the old days. The unhealthy and dysfunctional families have youngsters seven, eight or nine years old who are raising and taking care of their younger siblings. Why should I worry about these young children acting as parents? Because these youngsters are missing an important aspect of their young lives—that of being a child! A child to be loved by parents, to be nurtured and taken care of by parents, to play as a child, to talk as a child, to imagine as a child. Oh, the yearning of the child just to be a child! Many children miss this growing up phase.

As if this was not enough, we allow video games, movies and television to become the babysitters while we go out and party, play bingo, gamble and do things that make us sicker. While the children are viewing and doing these things, they are seeing killing, cheating, lying, men beating women and children, all kinds of sex, adult language and all other undesirable aspects of life. The mournful cry of the loon is reminding us of the time when there were secrets from children, things that were not to be known by them until they were considered ready. Today, there are no secrets in the modern media. Go out on the playground, a school party, or anywhere youngsters are gathered. Listen to their language! You will hear a lot of foul language. The language that the youngsters use is an indicator of how bad the situation has become. There is no respect for the parents, teachers, elders and most certainly of other young people. We see children having children, children killing children, children killing elders, children committing suicide, children dropping out of school, children without hope—sad children. What a sad state for us to be in! These states of affairs contribute to the loss of childhood. We must gain control of what the children learn, see and do. We do this by regaining control of our own lives. We control this by turning off the television during dinner time so that heart talk can take place. Heart talk is kind, gentle talk that makes one want to be polite to everyone and everything around them. This talk allows members to know each other, what their likes and dislikes are, to know of problems they are having with friends, siblings and school. It allows the family to find out what they would like to see change in the home and why. This is where a family that loves and talks together becomes stronger because they know each other, love and care for one another. This is family.

The loon does not blame anyone even though its environment is rife with problems and pollution is beyond its control. Its mournful call reminds us that we, as humans, must do our part to regenerate and reciprocate to Nature. We, the Native people, must quit blaming others for our problems. When we blame others, we are saying that someone else should take care of the problem and deal with our feelings about the situation. We don’t like what has been happening in the schools, so we blame the state, district and teachers. We are saying to them “take care of the problem” and also “take care of my hurt and confused feelings about my own education. Please, heal me.” Why should we continue to do this? Why should we continue to say how confused and mixed up we are by the new civilization that has come to our villages? So now we have frame houses that are poorly insulated, built on stilts and expensive to maintain. But we are “educated” because we no longer live in sod houses. We have snowmobiles instead of dog teams that can often save our lives. We have flush toilets with Lysol cleaners that empty into an unhealthy lagoon, thereby making it unnecessary for us to go outdoors in all kinds of weather, where Nature can take care of natural wastes in a natural way. But, we are educated. We have antibiotics and hormone-laced hamburgers instead of smoked dry fish which is more healthful. We use toilet paper which kills trees instead of sphagnum moss which prevents rash and spread of germs. Boy, are we educated! So well educated to think our Native languages and cultures are no longer useful. This is what the loon is mourning. Why have you, the Native people, given up so easily? Giving up has been a very costly venture to us as a Native people. But, we are educated.

The loon’s standards of life and making a living are impeccable, thus allowing it to live successfully for many thousands of years. Its basic standard is respect—a respect for the Greater Being, spirits, others’ rights to live a life that fits their needs and a respect for the environment. It is taught all aspects of its place by its parents using all five senses. The young are taught how to play; taught the ritual of swimming, diving and making its call; taught how to select a nesting place; taught the art of making a nest; taught to appreciate the lifeforms within its place and taught to live a life that is interacting with all that is around it. Nature is science. It knows that it is a loon and always will remember that. Yes, its standards are simple and intertwined leading to a life that is full of meaning and direction.

For those of us that are indigenous or Native people, we must resurrect our ways of recognizing and paying homage to the Ellam Yua spirits and Nature. When we regain our spirituality, we will again learn to laugh from our hearts and play because “those who know how to play can easily leap over the adversaries of life. And one who knows how to sing and laugh never brews mischief” (an Iglulik proverb.) When we awake at dawn and look at the sun rising and life begins to stir again, this is mysterious. The loon is telling us of this mystery of life—its mysterious connection to us. This is sacred. When we begin to understand this, we will begin to change our relationship to our environment. We will begin to experience a need for a new existence. I am happy to state that among the Alaska Native people, the Yupiat have striven for and are heading for a new existence! We have many Yupiat Elders and others that have become teachers for all of us, and all point to the same direction—a new consciousness for life. A new consciousness that is vibrantly traditional, full of truth, beauty, health, happiness and love. These five attributes of life become the foundations to the question that each and everyone of us will ask ourselves as to the type of life that we want to pursue. As we put this into practice, we will become the model of existence for now and in the future.

In this contemporary world of chaos, we can create our own reality. We can re-create ourselves as we want to be. We have the power within us to do this. We have three things that will help us to do this. First, we have our past through myths, stories, rituals and ceremonies. We can draw from them that which will help us reconstruct, and dispense with those that will not be of help to us in our efforts. Secondly, we have our imagination and ability to see what we would like to be in the future. In the future, what will we look like? What will we live in? How will we make our living? What kinds of things will we possess? How will we recognize the spiritual? And, lastly, we have our rational, thinking minds that react to things around us and thus enable us to connect with things as they are now. We know what we are, know what others think of us, know how we try to make a living, know how the federal and state governments work against us, and know how we react to negative as well as the few positive things that happen to us. Knowing these time and thought spirals can help us to reconstruct our reality and ourselves. It is time that we make songs about alcohol and drugs telling of their power over us, telling us it is now time for us to give up and be released from their use, and give up or relinquish our emotional ties to these destructive elements. If we merely release these from our lives, we will return to it. So it is absolutely necessary that we give up our emotional ties to it—I do it because it makes me feel good, allows me to talk and mix with people. This is an emotional tie that will get you back to it.

The loon reminds us that its standards for life are high, and so should ours. In looking at the federal and state standards, I get confused as to the real meaning of them. Perhaps it’s the fragmented and convoluted approach by fields of study that make this so. It does not show me a need for a change in education. There is an old Chinese saying that goes something like this: When there is someone pointing at the moon, only the idiot looks at the finger! These Eurocentric standards require that we look at the content of the various fields of study. They tell us what our students are purportedly to know at the end of secondary school. Content, thus information accumulation and reasoning, seems to be of overriding importance. As I’ve said before, information and rationality are a very small part of learning. There is a missing ingredient that fails to give direction and a wholeness to the standards. This is not to say that they are useless, but can be if left alone.

The needed ingredient (strange attractors) are the Alaska Standards for Culturally Responsive Schools. These say to me that there needs to be a change in education, not only schooling. Schooling is that which happens in the structure called the school. Education is that which happens within and without the family, school and community. The latter is all inclusive. In reading and thinking about the standards, I get the distinct feeling that there is a need to change the way that we teach, the things that we teach about, the materials we use, how we measure growth and development and where things are taught. These standards behoove that something be done to accommodate the Native thought-worlds, their worldviews. The loon would desire this for its survival and ours. We are now on that pathway.

In conclusion, the cry of the loon is encouraging us to balance our physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual selves to begin to live lives that feel just right, walking peacefully and expressing it to others in our own Native languages. Piurciqukut Yuluta pitallketuluta. We will become people living a life that feels just right. Quyana.

Contaminants Have Found Us

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 6, Issue 3

As a young boy growing up in Bethel I experienced heavy snows and cold temperatures in winter, but our summers were times of fun and lots of hard work in the fish camps. We did not worry about pollution as our lifestyles did not produce wastes dangerous to ourselves or to the plants and animals around us. Most of the things that we used were biodegradable or recyclable; we lived in harmony with nature. Now we have been thrust into an industrialized world with its extensive use of natural resources to manufacture tools and other items that are supposed to make life easier for us.

We, as indigenous people, were adapted to these climatic conditions and so were the plants and animals we depended on for food. Perhaps these special adaptations made us, the plants and animals more susceptible to certain anthropogenic contaminants. And now our own activities in using technological devices in our everyday activities are contributing to the physical, chemical and biological pollution of our Arctic ecosystems.

From what scientists have told us, you get the idea that there are two sources of contaminants—sources far from the Arctic and within the Arctic. The industrial complexes in Russia and other Eurasian countries contribute to the Arctic contamination. The main modes of transport for these contaminants are air currents, ocean currents and riverine systems. The meltwater in the spring carries the pollutants downriver to the deltas and into the oceans. Another way of transporting contaminants is through the migratory birds and mammals which winter in the warm climates and then migrate north in the summer. These are often at the top of the food web and are the most effected. But we, as a Native people, continue to eat these nutritious foods as well as maintain breast feeding for our young children. Because of contaminants contained in these foods that we eat, we may very well have a higher exposure to and accumulation of contaminant contents. Some of the major areas of concern for the effects that these contaminants can have is “influencing the ability to conceive and carry children, reducing our defense against diseases, affecting children’s mental development or increasing the risk of cancer” (AMAP, 1997).

How do we as Alaska Native people and others begin to alleviate the situation? As long as we believe that science and technology is the answer to our problems, we will forever remain in the morass of the modern world. Unless we encourage our youngsters to go to the Elders and to pursue higher education to learn another way of making sense of this world, we will never get out of this trap. We must relearn our own Alaska Native languages and ways of making sense of this world. We have a way of looking at the universe that recognizes there are different perspectives—the outward and the inward. By using both viewpoints we can gain wisdom.

The Eurocentric way of knowing tends to rely on the physical and intellectual processes and pays less attention to the emotions and the spiritual dimensions. We must find a way of marrying the senses with the spiritual side for a more balanced perspective. Our Native languages are of wholeness and healing. They are languages of Native eco-philosophy, or “ecosophy”. We need to relearn how to live in harmony with nature. Our languages describe these thought worlds, these world-views. Our space-time concepts are cyclical according to the moon phases, seasons and the plant and animal cycles that determine the times of abundance and times of scarcity. The location and timing of these cycles give us scheduling and spacing tools. To relearn and revitalize our Alaska Native languages and cultures is to liberate ourselves from the industrial and materialistic prison into which we have been thrust.

To relearn our mythology that Raven created Mother Earth helps us realize that we cannot think of ourselves as being superior to anything of Mother Earth. Raven is a deity in this mythology but Raven can also be a buffoon, a comedian and a picaresque. The reason we do not worship the raven is because we are animists, not theists.

We must relearn our history but not from history books. We learn history particular to an individual, a family, a community from the quliraat and from the mythology, galumcit, stories, placenames, songs, dancing and drumming peculiar to that place. All these will give you a strong sense of who you are and where you are from. This beautiful concept of respect becomes clearer to us as it is connected to a belief system with high moral attitudes, rules and standards for personal character to become the best person one is capable of being. All of this is needed to begin to rebuild a new world based on what we learned from our ancestors, coupled with selective adaptations from the contemporary world.

Here are a few suggestions that we can work on: Insist on sustainable development—perhaps projects that require we work closely with nature—regenerative or reclamation activities such as cleaning up wetlands and fish-spawning areas. We must demand that industries and manufacturers find ways to reduce the use of natural resources, reduce packaging and pay attention to effluent and emission laws. We must demand that manufacturers of such thing as TVs, microwave ovens, snowmachines and other durable goods redeem and recycle those items when they become inoperable—perhaps they could establish a “lend-lease” program. We should begin to assess what technological tools are acceptable in the village instead of accepting whatever comes along. Let’s become more biologically literate, not just electronically literate; let us strive to live healthy.

I think that if we begin to pay attention to such matters, we will begin to live life with a strong sense of belonging, discipline, independence and generosity. After all, the ultimate standard is to live a life that is healthy and stable in a healthy and sustainable community.

Earth, Air, Fire, Water and Spirit as a Foundation for Education

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 1, Issue 4

Participants at the Cross-Cultural Orientation Program Camp at
Old Minto gather on the banks of the Tanana River for instruction.

Modern science studies that which is visible using many technological devises to refine their observations. Theories are constructed, used, modified or discarded as new information and findings warrant. The task of modern science has been to simplify Nature, learn of its underlying logic and then use that logic to control Nature (Briggs, 1992:14). Indigenous societies study that which is invisible to temper the development of technology and guide its association with Nature. The Yupiaq society deals with trying to understand the irregularities of Nature which is underlain with patterns of order. Many unseen forces are in action in the elements of the universe.

To begin to understand these phenomena, Yupiaq science education must begin with the five elements—earth, air, fire, water and spirit. The sacred gifts of each must be understood, as well as the human activities which contribute to the despiritualization and reduction of these life-giving gifts. In order to be holistic, the activities must include Yupiaq language and culture, language arts, mathematics, social studies, arts and crafts and sciences. All must be interrelated as all of earth is interrelated. For example, in dealing with the element air, the teacher could select the sacred gift of weather. And what an unpredictable choice! Like many Yupiaq myths, weather is so very dynamic, ever changing, and, like the myth, very mystical.

The wind has irregularities of constantly varying velocity, humidity, temperature and direction due to topography and other factors. There are nonlinear dimensions to clouds, irregularities of cloud formations, anomalous cloud luminosity and different forms of precipitation at different levels. There are patterns, however tenuous, such as the path of a jet stream or fronts to be studied. The Native students’ visual acuity and memory for detail could be used to advantage. There is very little in this universe which is linear, in a grid or in a two-dimensional square or three dimensional cube. The weather’s dynamic is that the part of its part is part of a part which is a part of another part and so on. The local Native elders could explain how they were able to predict weather based upon subtle messages given to them by the sun twenty-four hours before it happened. This involves the language of feelings of the inner world coupled with the language of reason. Being inclined to the spiritual, the Native was able to understand and accept the unpredictable permutations of weather. The Native people had learned certain general predictable patterns of weather connected to the seasons and moons. Yet, the Native student could get acquainted with some more predominate tools of the meteorologist such as the thermometer, barometer, anemometer, hydrometer, satellite pictures and other tools to give the elders’ knowledge depth, detail and a broader view. Introducing students to the notion of irregularities and anomalies of form and force (chaos and fractals) necessarily introduces them to holism. The key idea is for the students to understand the interconnectedness of all things in the universe.

Of utmost importance in using the five elements of life to teach science is assuring that the students understand that the sacred gifts of each is a gift to the life-giving forces of the living earth (or Mother Earth). The teacher must be careful to explain what those gifts are absolutely necessary for life on earth to continue. All these five elements’ gifts make possible for creation on earth to continue. The Yupiaq honored and respected these gifts in the rituals and ceremonies. Take for example, the Nakaciuq or the “Blessing of the Bladders.” The Yupiaq people believed that when the seal or some other sea mammal gave itself to the hunter, that the spirit of the seal entered its bladder upon giving up its life. This required that the people take care to remove the bladder, inflate it to dry and save it for the winter Bladder Festival to honor the sacred gift of the element, spirit. In this way the Yupiaq people honored and showed respect for the gift of the element earth for giving birth to animals upon which they depended for survival as a people.

During the festival, the bladders were reinflated with life-giving air and hung on poles for the duration of the activities. In the qasgiq were placed two three-to-four foot stout poles in front of the place of honor for the elders. The honors seating was located at the rear of the community house. On the flattened upper end were placed two earthen lamps with wicks which were *then filled with seal oil. The wicks were lighted and the lamps kept burning during the entire festival. One or two people were given the responsibility of keeping the lamps going. The gift of the element fire was used to light and give some warmth to the community house. To purify the air and the participants in the house, wild parsnips were burned. Another gift of the element earth, the parsnip plant was used to create purifying smoke with the transforming gift of the element fire. Fire, with the gift of air, transformed the seal oil to heat and light.

At the conclusion of the Bladder Festival, the bladders were taken down, deflated, and carried to the ocean or river where an opening in the ice had been made. With collective mindfulness of all the Yupiaq participants that the spirits of the animals were happy and satisfied with the care and careful execution of the required rituals and ceremonies, and that they would return and give themselves to the hunters, the bladders were returned to the sacred gift of the element water, the womb of creation.

A multi-disciplinary and -sensory study of the elements can be undertaken for the entire school year. The students would begin to understand that the experience of knowing and making the place a friend takes time. The students can be helped to fine tune their endosmotic sense-makers through carefully planned and executed lessons of observation that incorporate their Yupiaq language of feeling with the language of reason. The ultimate gift is that of the element spirit. This gift is, through the Yupiaq language, mythology, rituals and ceremonies, the students are taught the “correct lifeway, a lifeway appropriate to place” (Mills, 1990:159).

The modern schools are not teaching students how to live a life that feels right. Rather, the schools are giving a lot of information to the students without also showing them how they can transfer the information into useful knowledge for making a living. Another step is to individually and collectively as a people see how the usable knowledge could be transformed into wisdom to make a life. The students now look at an innovative teacher who refuses to use existing curricula, syllabi, lessons plans, media presentations, photocopied materials and so on, as not really teaching. They expect to be given a lot of information and to be entertained. The many machines, modern tools and the vaunted computers are not enough to teach a lifeway that feels right. It is more important that we use the Yupiaq values and culture well interspersed with imagination or intuition from within and the element spirit to make the new lifeway that feels right.

During the years which this activity is being done, the participants will explore, plan and implement ways to make the Alaska Native mythology as a teaching tool for the sciences as well as the humanities. Within the humanities (mythology) are the sciences and within the sciences are the humanities.

Kindergarten through third grade could possibly talk about the five elements generally. This is what earth does: it provides homes for people, animals and plants. Air is what you breathe. Fourth through the sixth grades can begin to talk about certain gifts that each element gives to earth to make it good and beautiful. They can begin to talk about the water cycle and begin to see how it is affected by the sun, water, land, air, plants and people. The junior high grades can begin to talk not only of the gifts, but how the activities of the human being affects the life supporting gifts of the five elements. The high school students can begin to discuss and research the five elements’ gifts and how people and pollution reduce the life supporting role of the gifts. They can expand their knowledge of the Yupiaq peoples’ perceptions and behaviors to the natural and spiritual worlds to keep them sustainable.

The teachers and teachers-to-be must be taught that the world is nonlinear and that, as a result, science will never understand everything about the universe. They must also realize and appreciate that in modern scientific and technological endeavors, mathematics, science and technology are interrelated as are all other disciplines. It behooves that science education and teaching in general become aligned to the common philosophical thread, or the “distant memory,” as it is called by N. Scott Momaday, of the ecological perspective. All peoples of the earth began from this vista, and therefore such a perspective makes it more probable and possible for attaining a new consciousness for a sustainable life.

References:

Briggs, J. (1992). Fractals the patterns of chaos. New York: Simon & Schuster.

Mills, S. (1990). In praise of nature. Washington, D. C. and Covelo, CA.: Island Press.

An Alliance Between Humans and Creatures

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley,

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 3, Issue 5 and Vol 4, Issue 1

Paper presented to the International Circumpolar Arctic Social Scientists conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, June 1998. Part 1 is printed here, part II will in printed in the next issue of Sharing Our Pathways.

Basic philosophical questions are raised in the course of observing and questioning people with respect to notions of inquiry, explanation, technology, science and religion as they relate to particular lifeways. Accordingly, world view as discussed here will attempt to answer the questions deftly set out by Barry Lopez. Lopez refers to “metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics and logic—which pose, in order, the following questions. What is real? What can we understand? How should we behave? What is beautiful? What are the patterns we can rely upon?” (1986:202). Added to the above list will be “ontology:” Why are we? Is there something greater than the human? Lopez goes on to point out, “The risk we take is of finding our final authority in the metaphors rather than in the land. To inquire into the intricacies of a distant landscape, then, provokes thoughts about one’s own interior landscape, and the familiar landscapes of memory. The land urges us to come around to an understanding of ourselves” (247).

The concept of “worldview” is very closely related to the definitions of culture and cognitive map (Berger, Berger, & Kellner 1974:148). A worldview consists of the principles we acquire to make sense of the world around us. These principles, including values, traditions and customs are learned by youngsters from myths, legends, stories, family, community and examples set by community leaders (Deloria, 1991, Hardwick, 1991). The worldview, or cognitive map, is a summation of coping devices which have worked in the past, and may or may not be as effective in the present (Netting, 1986). Once a worldview has been formed, the people are then able to identify themselves as a unique people. Thus, the worldview enables its possessors to make sense of the world around them, make artifacts to fit their world, generate behavior and interpret their experiences. As with many other indigenous groups, the worldviews of the traditional Alaska Native peoples have worked well for their practitioners for thousands of years (Kawagley, 1995).

Native ways of knowing imply action, states of knowing that entail constant flux of doing. The universe and Mother Earth are constantly changing. If we are looking at and trying to make sense of the world in which we live, we must speak of it as an active process. So our Alaska Native words describe pieces of activity (Roszak, Gomes, & Kanner, 1992 ). The Native words are sound symbols garnered from nature which then lend themselves to reality defining itself. The English words used to describe nature merely define nature and supplant reality. The scientific objectivity allows looking at “things” in nature and then as commodities to be used and exploited without regard to its habitat and niche in the ecological system. The institutions of higher learning teach us to look at “things” for in-depth detailed knowledge in a fragmentary approach. It allows us to develop technology to hasten our extraction of minerals, deforestation and agriculture. We are not mindful of the carrying capacity of the land and its ability to regenerate. Our affluence as industrial nations is merely a borrowed affluence. Borrowed from countries like Ghana, Philippines, Columbia, China, and India to name a few. Our technological prowess and its concomitant concepts of growth and development and that the “whole is the sum of its parts” (Mills, 1997) has brought us to the brink of disaster. I quote the following poem from Elisabeth Hermodsson (Mills, 1997):

once upon a time

we were to be pitied

we were in mortal fear

we believed in spirits, gnomes

god and other kinds of superstition

now we feel safe for we know everything

control everything

we have rational explanations

for everything

we make use of matter’s minutest particle

for our purposes

and we are much to be pitied

more than ever before

never has space been closer

never has responsibility been greater

never have we known more fear

and we do not believe in good or evil powers

nor in gods and other superstitions

we believe in ourselves

and never has space been wider

and never have we had greater power

and never have we been more powerless

we believe in progress

and never has catastrophe been so close

We certainly have a totalitarian and dehumanizing technological system. And most certainly, as a Native people, we have been unable to evaluate our satisfaction with the technological gadgets and tools that have been given or forced upon us by this all consuming giant. Its technocratic society questions the maintenance of our Native languages, subsistence, ways of knowing and Native rights to an education befitting our worldviews. But it espouses, through lip service and pronouncements, multiculturalism that many of its members deem evil. I don’t remember the source of the following quote but: “Too much think about white man, no more can find dream.” We have become aware of the materialistic and scientific sophistry with its inherent ability to obfuscate who we are, what we are and where we are going. After this vitriolic attack, I now get to the subject of my talk.

I have enclosed a diagram which I call the tetrahedral metaphor of the Native worldview. I have drawn a circle representing the universe or circle of life. The circle represents togetherness which has no beginning and no end. On this circle are represented the human, natural and spiritual worlds. There are two-way arrows between them as well as to the worldview at the apex of the tetrahedral. These two-way arrows depict communications between all these functions to maintain balance. The Yupiat say “Yuluni pitalkertugluni,” “Living a life that feels just right.” One has to be in constant communication with each of the processes to know that one is in balance. If the feeling is that something is wrong then one must be able to check to see what might be the cause for unease or disease. If the feeling of being just right comes instinctively and this feeling permeates your whole being, then you have attained balance. This means that one does not question the other functions intellectually, but that one merges spiritually and emotionally with the others. The circle brings all into one mind. In the Yupiat thought world, everything of Mother Earth possesses a spirit. This spirit is consciousness, an awareness. So the wind, river, rabbit, amoeba, star, lily, and so forth possess a spirit.

Thus, if all possess a spirit or soul, then all possess consciousness and the power that it gives to its physical counterpart. It allows the Native person the ability to have the aid of the spirit to do extraordinary feats of righting unbalanced individual psyche, community disease or loss of communication with the spiritual and natural world through irreverence toward beings of Nature. Harry Robinson (Robinson, 1992) calls this “‘nature power,’ the life-sustaining spirituality.” Dr. Grof refers to “power animals” (Grof, 1993) which gives its possessor the power to “communicate with them, adopting aspects of their wisdom or power and re-establishing links with them when the connection has been lost through negligence or lack of reverence, or by offending either the animal spirits or one of the greater spirits of the natural world.” These are not available through Western scientific research methods but through the ancient art of shamanism. From this you can see that when we rely on Western means of research only, it is a limiting factor, and this is what our institutions of higher learning teach. All areas of social and scientific research teach only one way of trying to learn and understand phenomena. Our technological and scientific training imprison the students’ minds only to its understandings, much to the detriment of the learners who enter the mainstream Western world to become its unerring members of progress and development.

The Alaska Native needed to take lives of animals to live. To give honor, respect, dignity and reciprocation to the animals whose lives were taken, the Native people conceived and put into practice many rituals and ceremonies to communicate with the animal and spiritual beings. These are corroborated through the Alaska Native mythology which are “manifestations of fundamental organizing principles that exist within the cosmos, affecting all our lives” (Grof, 1993).

It behooves the Alaska Native person to leave something behind, such as a piece of dry fish when getting mouse food from the tundra. The mouse food is gathered in the early fall so that the mouse and its family will have an opportunity to collect more food for the winter. The seal when caught is given a drink of water so that its spirit will not be thirsty when it travels to the animal spiritual kingdom. This is done to show respect to the animal for having shared and given its life to the hunter.

Medicinal plants are gathered respectfully knowing full well their power to heal and recognizing that they were given freely by Nature, thus requiring that we share these freely. The Alaska Native person is aware that if we do not use these gifts of Nature regularly, mindfully and respectfully, they will begin to diminish through disuse or misuse. The essential elements of earth, air, water, fire and spirit must always be in balance, as each has an important niche to play in the ecological system.

With this concept in mind, we must carefully examine the lifestyles and technology that is extant in this world. Our lifestyles have become materialistic and we are given to technological devices and gadgets galore that are not always geared to sustainability. Our modern cities with their complex network of buildings, transportation structures, communications systems, and commodity distribution centers are often disjointed and given to fragmentation.

Likewise, the studies of natural resources are often approached in a fragmentary way, where an expert in harbor seals may not know what the expert in herring fish has discovered in the same ecosystem. Such research has the effect of objectifying the species studied, often for commercial purposes, and contributes little to sustaining Mother Earth. However, in the Western world of science and technology there also exists many alternative approaches that are nature-friendly and sustainable. They await the time when the global societies evolve from consumerism and materialism to an orientation toward conservation and regeneration.

Perhaps, now might be a proper time to begin to use the traditional ecological knowledge of indigenous people as a “strange attractor” that can serve as a catalyst to bring meaning and understanding to the mountains of data on phenomena across a vast spectrum of possible knowledge. We need to pay heed to the warnings and recognize the consequences of the over-manipulation of Nature: wonder drugs of a generation ago are producing new resistant forms of bacteria; our aseptic hospitals are generating iatrogenic diseases; we are losing agricultural lands at a terrific pace; deforestation is accelerating; and global warming is a fact of life today.

I, as a Yupiaq, taught in a traditional and Western way, worry about my seven grandchildren and the legacy that I will leave behind for them. Will they be able to enjoy the biological diversity and freedom that I had growing up in a traditional Yupiaq household and village? Will they experience starvation and want because the carrying capacity of the lands has been atrociously outpaced? This behooves all of us to rethink whether our objectification and commodification of natural resources has led to the verge of catastrophe. We must strive to have the various ways of teaching and learning converge to give new direction for living, regeneration, cooperation and sharing, and thus forging a new pathway to a vision of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Thank you.

How Does the Crane Keep Its Language?

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 5, Issue 5

“When I was a little bitty baby, my momma would rock me in the cradle, in them old tundra hills back home,” and as I rocked I would hear the voices of my ancestors just as the crane chicks in their nest hear the mother crane making its call.

I don’t know if the crane has the genes in its DNA to make its own distinctive call or if it learns it from its mother and other members of its own kind, but it does learn to speak the crane language. Baby cranes do not make a call like that of a seagull’s raucous, squalling sound or like any other member of the bird family. Each species has its own distinct call—a language readily identifiable as its own—and all those unique languages continue to be passed on from one generation to the next.

As Native people, we too have our own unique languages which have been passed on from one generation to the next for many millennia. So why are we losing our Native languages so rapidly? Could it be because we, as parents, grandparents and villagers, do not speak to our children in our own Native language anymore? Why is it that we do not speak to them in our languages? One of the reasons is that our primary language has become English, which is a voracious language that eats up our Native languages. Perhaps this is brought about as a result of the remembrance of some Elders and parents of the shaming, abuse and punishment they received in school for speaking their own Native language. We must begin to freely talk about such experiences and the hurt feelings and shame so the healing process can begin.

So what must we do to keep from losing our Native languages? For one thing, we can look at other indigenous people who have been successful in re-enlivening and revitalizing their languages. We can take a look at the Maori language nests or the Native Hawaiians’ programs and then put into practice that which is proving to work. We must consult with our Elders to see what we, as Native people, need to do to save our Native languages. This is a very tough and complicated charge for those of us engaged in teaching, research and role modeling. Head Start teachers, parents, Elders and villagers have the grave responsibility of teaching our Native youngsters their Native language. After all, they are our future.

Why teach our Native languages that are often looked upon by the modern world as useless, nontechnical and incapable of conveying profound meaning and concepts? As Alaska Native people we need to convince ourselves and our young ones that our Native languages are important and can convey deep meaning and complex thinking. As I have said in the past, using our Native languages thrusts us into the thought world of our ancestors. We can talk about our traditional hunting and gathering ways and sophisticated technology by using our Native languages. For example, our Yupiaq word, pinaa, which means “his, her or its strength,” can mean physical strength of a person, of a bow, of the oogruk skin covering the qayaq or of water. It can mean intellectual prowess of a person, place or thing. It can mean emotional or spiritual strength and stability, all depending on the context in which it is used. Or take qalluq, our word for rolling thunder or electrical discharge. It is now our word for electricity. Who says our Native languages are not technical? They can be very technical and profoundly spiritual at the same time. Don’t ever believe anyone who puts forward such feeble reasons for encouraging us to lose our Native languages. Manu Meyer, a Native Hawaiian, puts it this way: “We practice abstract thinking, but it is tied to purpose and a meaningful existence.” We—ourselves and our youngsters—need to learn and understand this important philosophical thought.

There are other reasons why we should not lose our Native languages. They allow us to articulate spiritually and emotionally and convey the deeper meanings of life. Richard Littlebear of Montana has pointed out that our languages allow our people to articulate the subtle attributes and meaning associated with self-governance, law and order, jurisprudence, literature, a land base, spirituality and sacred practices. We, as well as the rest of the world, cannot afford to diminish the diversity of cultures. To have but one language and one culture in this world would be boring indeed and would put our very existence as a species at greater risk.

The most important part of growing up is when children are developing a beginning understanding of their language, culture and place. However, human beings do not have a built-in mechanism for learning a particular language. Unlike the crane, Native children have no such genes in their genotype, so they have to listen, imitate and learn to utter the sounds found in their own languages. It is like having to learn English, German, Russian or any other language—they have to work at it. The children have to be talked to in their own language during play, so they can imitate, mimic things and ask a lot of questions. They have an acute curiosity to learn during their early lives. We must encourage this attribute by doings things that they can learn from in association with their families, friends and communities. By doing things that are important to their families and communities, their curiosity and willingness to learn will never diminish. In the school, however, they are often learning about things that are foreign to them and find no application in the surrounding community so that by the time they get into the fifth and sixth grades, their inborn curiosity to learn has been leached out of their minds. Sad, but true. We have too many dropouts from high school and others who drop out intellectually and emotionally long before they enter high school.

I have a problem when history is written by an outsider, especially when it deals with Alaska or Alaska Native history, because it is often just one interpretation, usually from a limited perspective. You know where our history is found? It is in our quliraat (mythology) and qalumciit (stories). So invite the Elders to come into the classroom to tell the stories in their own language. You will find that the values and those qualities that make us a strong people are embedded in our Native words and stories. The youngsters will begin to understand and yearn yulunii pitallqertugluni—being a person who is living a life that feels just right. Alaska Native mythology contains the power and wisdom for guiding us in making a life and a living that feels just right. Alaska Native languages enable us to show proper respect and express courtesy for all elements of Mother Earth.

Another important language activity is to arrange for the Elders to teach the youngsters singing, dancing and drumming. In doing so, the children will become acquainted with the technical words ascribed to rituals, ceremonies and sacred practices. By learning the songs, they will begin to cultivate an identity and connection to place. As hunter-gatherers, we had no need for written history because our history was embedded in place, stories, songs, dances and movement from place to place according to the seasons.

The youngsters should be brought outdoors to begin to appreciate and experience the beauty of nature such as the caterpillar, chamomile and tree. They must be taught that we are connected to everything. The caterpillar eats vegetation, turning it into excrement which is useful to the tree. It gives off carbon dioxide which is also used by the tree. The tree provides a home and food for the caterpillar and gives off oxygen which is used by the caterpillar. As shown by the abbreviated cycles above, everything must go somewhere. Everything that is done in nature is done for some purpose.

Human beings cannot have everything that we want. We must learn to live with limited needs. We must learn to respect and be satisfied with what we have. Life is the greatest gift that we have and we must nurture that which makes life meaningful. Most importantly in that regard, we must maintain our languages because language, more than anything else, shapes who we are, just as it does for the crane. By maintaining our languages, we are sustaining the ultimate standard of health and endurance of the human species.

Nurturing Native Languages

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 7, Issue 1

Many Americans are intolerant of diversity, be it cultural with its concomitant languages, or biodiversity in an ecological system. Instead, we see notions of human and cultural superiority with designs for a monolingual and monocultural society in which the English language and its associated culture presumes to become the language and culture of the world. Thus indigenous cultures have to contend with a language and its ways that has a very “voracious appetite,” as phrased by Richard Little Bear. We, indeed, have a formidable enemy which absorbs our Native languages and cultures very readily, unless we are cognizant of its hunger and take protective steps. This mass culture can be most appealing to young people. Its behaviorisms, codes of dress, languages and sometimes destructive proclivities inveigle young people to its world.

We know ourselves to be made from this earth.

We know this earth is made from our bodies.

For we see ourselves. And we are nature.

We are nature seeing nature.

We are nature with a concept of nature.

Nature weeping. Nature speaking of nature to nature.

—Susan Griffin, Woman and Nature

Griffin’s observations ring true to me because my Yupiaq language is nature-mediated, and thus it is wholesome and healing. It contains the creatures, plants and elements of nature that have named and defined themselves to my ancestors and are naming and defining themselves to me. My ancestors made my language from nature. When I speak Yupiaq, I am thrust into the thought world of my ancestors.

Let me cite two examples of the elements of nature naming and defining themselves. The first is anuqa—the wind. It is telling its name and telling me what it is. It is the moving air which is needed for life. The other is lagiq—the Canadian goose. It’s call is “lak, lak, lak” giving its name to us and by its behavior telling us its habitat and its niche in the ecological system. “We are nature with a concept of nature.” Truly!

We, as Native people, have seen our languages become impoverished in the last several centuries. Many of us now speak our Native languages at the fourth and fifth grade levels (if such a grading system existed for us). We look at the wounds in our minds and we see that the wounds also exist in nature itself. “We know ourselves to be made from this earth” and it makes us weep when we see the destruction and pollution around us. We realize that the relationship between ourselves and our places is a “unity of process” (Joan Halifax). We know that there cannot be a separation between the two.

As we lose our Native languages, more and more of us begin to take part in the misuse and abuse of nature. We use English predominately in our everyday lives today. We don’t realize that English is a language contrived by the clever rational mind of the human being. The letters were derived by the human mind. The words are a product of a mindset that is given to individualism and materialism in a techno-mechanistic world. For us to think that we can reconstruct a new world by using English and its ways will not work. We need to return to a language that is given to health and healing. To try to make a paradigmatic shift by using the consciousness that constructed this modern world is bound for failure. Albert Einstein stated something to the effect that “you cannot make change in a system using the same consciousness used to construct it.” This should be very clear to us as a Native people.

In my Yupiaq ancestral world egalitarianism was practiced. In this form of governance no creature, plant or element becomes more important than another. All are equal. In the great state of Alaska, I can incontrovertibly state that racism is alive and seems to be gaining strength. This is a circumstance which is unconscionable and reflects a very destructive and alienated stance in the larger society.

How is it that we “stabilize indigenous languages”? I think that we must once again speak the Native languages in the home a majority of the time. If we expect only the school to do it, it will surely fail. The school must become a reflection of a Native speaking family, home and community. During the waking hours of the day, the children must hear the Native language being spoken—in the home and in school. The one-to-one and family conversation in the local language must be the standard of the day. The community, family, parents and especially the children must begin to know place. How is this to be done? By the Elders, parents and community members speaking to one another in their own language and from the Yupiaq perspective.

To know self, one must learn of place. How does one learn of place? You begin by telling quliraat, the mythology, stories of distant time, which are powerful teaching tools still applicable to the present. You learn of the times when our ancestors were truly shape-shifters. It was easy to change from one form to another, and one was in control of self. Values and traditions are taught by these stories which are so ancient that we call them myths. From these you can tease out problem-solving tools and discern characteristics that make for a healthy and stable person living in a healthy and sustainable place. Told by an Elder whose inflections, facial and body language add to the words, these myths teach not only discipline for the members but more importantly self-discipline. We must re-inculcate self-discipline in our people as a matter of survival.

The qalumcit must be told, as they are the stories of us as a Native peoples. They tell us how we got to be at this place, our movements, problems encountered and resolved, years of plenty and scarcity and how to read the signs foretelling events, how we made sense of time and space, how trade and exchange of goods and services was accomplished and how genetic diversity in the community was maintained.

The rituals and ceremonies must be relearned and practiced. The loss of these have developed schisms in our lives. We have become fractured people. These rituals represent revival, regeneration and revitalization of our Native people.

The yuyaryarat—the art and skills of singing, dancing and drumming— brings one to a spiritual level. Our word, yuyaq, means to emerge into a higher plain, a higher consciousness through concentration on the movements when singing and drumming.

We must also seek to relearn the Native names of places. It is incomplete knowledge for us to know the distance between two places in miles. It is also important to be able to “guesstimate” the time it will take to go from point A to point B and to know the history and place names between the two points. Then it becomes whole and useful knowledge.

I just recently returned from Hilo, Hawaii where I was a participant in a planning meeting for revitalizing the Hawaiian language and culture. One interesting side trip was a visit to a Native Hawaiian charter school a few minutes from Hilo. I learned that the local Native people had begun landscaping unkempt property and refurbishing dilapidated buildings. This was initiated even before grant funds were made available for the project. This is true determination and motivation to reconstruct education which is meaningful and effective for the Native people. When my hosts and I arrived, we were met by the students at the entrance to their school. They sang in their own language and several students made welcoming remarks again in their own language. When protocol called for my response, I responded in my Yupiaq language. To see and hear the protocol that had been practiced for millennia by their people made my heart feel good. This happening after hundreds of years of barrage to change their language and culture gave me hope that we, too, can save our Alaska Native languages.

It was refreshing and energizing of spirit to look at the landscape and see the work that had been done. The best part was a plot of land where only the original flora of Hawaii had been planted—a very ambitious endeavor which required research and feedback from the few Elders still with them to determine which plants are native to the land. One building had photovoltaic panels on its roof to power some of their computers and filter pumps for their fish hatchery tanks. At another location, young men were preparing food in the traditional manner of heating rocks with the ingredients placed in baskets on top and covered over with banana leaves and canvas. The food was eaten prior to the graduation exercises.

If you find yourself in a situation where there is a minimal number of myths, stories, rituals and ceremonies available, then I would suggest that you find sources that are well written and your Elders deem to be true. Translate these into your own language with the help of Elders and knowledgeable community members that may be familiar with the technical language contained in that treatise. When satisfied with the final translation, read it to the group for approval. Then it would behoove us to read it to the youngsters who will become the historians of the community—the future keepers and practitioners of sacred knowledge.

To bring the above back into practice is to know who you are and where you are. This would contribute broadly to the important notion that it is alright to be Native, to speak the Native language and to use Native tools and implements in play and work. After all, our technology was made by our ancestors to edify our Native worldviews. Please, what ever you do, do NOT give to the youngsters the idea that modern technology has an answer for everything. It does not. Use it merely as a tool and use it minimally and judiciously. Remind the students that technological tools are intensive in the use of natural resources and energy. To accept technology blindly is to negate the painful works to revitalize our Native languages and cultures. I wish you all the wisdom of the Ellam Yua, the Great Mystery in your continuing efforts. “We are nature.” Quyana

References

Russell, Peter. The White Hole In Time: Our future evolution and the meaning of the now. Harper: San Francisco. 1992.

Halifax, Joan. The Fruitful Darkness: Reconnecting with the body of the earth. Harper: San Francisco. 1993.

Griffin, Susan. Woman and Nature. Harper Collins Publishers. San Francisco. 1978.

Richard Littlebear speech delivered to the Fourth Annual Stabilizing Indigenous Languages Symposium. Flagstaff, Arizona, May 1997.

Joy Means Being Touched by the Elements of the Earth!

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 8, Issue 1

How many of you have been out in nature fishing, picking berries, snow-shoeing, hiking, cross country skiing or just relaxing? What do you feel when you are out on the river, on the tundra or in the mountains?

Think of the time that you were away from the village or the city experiencing the interplay of light, air, snow and soil—just yourself wrapped up in your own thoughts. When first out there, what did you think about? Did your thoughts begin to absorb your immediate environment? What did you begin to notice? Tree, flower, ant, raven, mouse, moss, ptarmigan, ice, stream, hill? Do these things of Mother Earth have a right to be, to have life? Does the tree have a community of life? Yes, it stores water, the roots have bacteria, it nourishes insects, soil, undergrowth, humus—a living community! Does the mouse have a community? It has a house, food storage, spouse, children, connecting tunnels, time for play, protection, shelter—carrying out life as all living creatures do. You see all soil, rivers, mountains, lakes, trees, wolves, bears, amoeba, e. coli, lichen, red squirrels, camp robbers, caigluq, cranberries, salmonberries—they all live with us in a large community.

You and I, who go out to be in and with nature, should know how to bond with all forms of life. They have a right to be, to live! All things are like us in many ways—they process energy, grow, reproduce, face dangers and do their best when the conditions of their homes and place are most suited to their needs. To be out in nature is to feel that you are cleansing yourself and getting a joy that can arise from being in touch with natural things, the creations of Ellam Yua.

This feeling of family is the most powerful of human bonds! We have to realize that they share our home in the cosmos, eat at our table, share our air and water and play with our children. We are composed of their bodies and they of us. Each of us are here on earth for a very short time. We let others see us for a while then, as other things, we must recycle. We are all related!

When we really experience the joy of life we become more polite and kind to all in the vast community. Being with and in nature, we begin to build love and respect for all life. Love is probably the strongest force in our world! Why love? Because love of the world around us causes us to limit the demands we put on Mother Earth, how much we buy and sell, moderating our needs and wants. It is this love that will allow us to give up some things and begin to limit what we have.

When we build up this respect, love, kindness and politeness in being with nature, we will not have to rely on alcohol and other things that bend the mind, because we become balanced physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually. From such a balance will come joy in life.

Have a safe and happy holiday and new year!

Alaska RSI and Annenberg Rural Challenge Plans for a New Year

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 3, Issue 1

There have been consortium meetings in each region this fall. I had the opportunity to attend two of the meetings. Both meetings left no question that education must change to accommodate the Native world views. The first was in Bethel with elders and educators. Educators is an inclusive term involving all within the community as teachers. The people with MOAs were apprised of the expectations for the forthcoming year.

Participants at the Southeast Native/Rural Education Consortium in Juneau

The parameters and end process products were discussed with the group so that no misunderstandings or misconceptions arise during the new calendar year. The cultural standards elicited a lively response. Several changes were advanced by the group. The term “teacher” for the “Standards for the Teacher” was changed to “educator” because it included all in the village. The term “balance” was defined in Yupiaq as pitallgerturluni which is to say that a person walks a life that feels right. The person is living a life that they deem right to become the very best that they can be. The life essences of spirit, emotion, intellect and physical are upheld to meet the ultimate standards of the Native values and traditions.

The meeting in Unalaska was no exception in my mind. The leaders and educators expressed a need to relearn the Aleut language and dialects and to reconstruct Aleut history. As with other Alaska Native tribes, their history and language is replete with words and technology that intimately describe and suit their world views. They, as with other Native villages, recognize that interchanges of Aleut and English when speaking Aleut or vice versa debilitate the use of either language. So that many of the people and students never master either language. The Native people can be in an all or predominately English speaking community and not use “standard” English. A good question is “why”? I am sure that there are many variables to the answer but I can say, without reservation, that we will be able to answer this in the near future.

The Elders Academy was discussed and plans made for future meetings for elders and cultural camps. The term “tradition” and its definition was discussed. It was finally agreed that it was the Native ways of making a life and a living with all their concomitant rules for life, cautions and precepts for living a good life.

The regional meetings show that Alaska Native people have many world views on different paths but the ultimate vision is the same.

Active Reality Research

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 2, Issues 3, 4, & 5

During recent times many articles have been produced that address ethical values of doing research in the North. I will not address them except to say that confidentiality is important, that villagers know what they are participating in and that research results be provided to the villagers. It has been too long that Native people have been subjects of research without the honor, respect, reciprocity and cooperation due them. It is now time that we recognize that they are human beings with particular ways of knowing, being, thinking, behaving and doing. They have successfully survived for many thousands of years.

For the Yupiaq people, culture, knowing and living are intricately interrelated. Living in a harsh environment requires a vast array of precise empirical knowledge to survive the many risks due to conditions such as unpredictable weather and marginal food availability. To avoid starvation they must employ a variety of survival strategies, including appropriate storage of foodstuffs that they can fall back on during the time of need. Their food gathering and storage must be efficient as well as effective. If this were not so, how could they possibly hope to survive? To help them achieve this balance, they have developed an outlook of nature as metaphysic.

The Alaska Native world views and technologies are conducive to living in harmony with the universe. Their lives, subsistence methods and technology were devised to edify their world view. After all, the Alaska Native creator is the raven. So, how could the human being be superior to the creatures of Mother Earth? How could their hunting and trapping implements be made of offensive materials to animals that they have to kill in order to live? Thus, their tools were fashioned from resources which were not refined, but formed and shaped using the natural materials. Their tools, housing and household utensils had to be with and of nature. Harmony was the key idea behind this practice. They believed all plants, creatures, winds, mountains, rivers, lakes and all things of the earth possessed a spirit, therefore had consciousness and life. Everything was alive and aware, requiring relationships in a respectful way so as not to upset the balance.

The four values of honor, respect, reciprocity and cooperation are conducive to adaptation, survival and harmony. The Native people honored the integrity of the universe. It is a whole living being. As it is living, all things of the earth must be respected because they also have life. The Native people had the ability to communicate with all things of the universe. This is called reciprocity. From observing nature, the Alaska Native people learned that the earth and the universe are built upon the premise of cooperation. Researchers must implement these tour values to advance knowledge and expand consciousness. The constructs and understandings of the Alaska Native people must be honored for their integrity on the level of the modern scientific holographic image.

The holographic image does not lend itself to reductionism nor fragmentation. Reductionism tries to break reality into parts in order to understand the whole without realizing that the parts are merely patterns extant in a total web of relationships. The Native world views do not allow separation of its parts as each part must be understood in its relationships to all other parts of the whole. Respect for the Native people who formalized this view must be practiced. The Native people have transcended the three-dimensional, quantifying and sensory constricted studies of nature practiced by the modern world. It behooves that there be cooperation between the researcher and Native people. The researchers must forget about human superiority to things of the universe and to people considered primitive and backward. The Native people must be treated as equal human beings with powers of observation, critical analysis and a gift of intuition and the magical.

Following are some examples that make the practice of the four values difficult or impossible from the perspective of the modern world for doing research in a Native world.

The tools of mathematics have given us some ideas about patterns and forms as well as abstract and esoteric formulae that sometimes leave us confused and questioning the use to which they will be put. For example, when will the hunter need to know the exact distance across a river using trigonometric functions? However we agree with a lot of mathematical and scientific theories and concepts, such as the shortest distance between two points is a straight line; that a circle is a line that keeps falling in toward the center; that the radii in a circle are equal length; that the circle has no beginning and no end; and so forth. These are common sense ideas that indigenous people can readily subscribe to.

To the Native people there are many things in this universe that are cyclical and describe a spiral or a circle. Examples of these include the seasons, the solar system, the Native timepiece of the Big Dipper going around the North Star, the atom, the raven’s path across the sky visible at certain times (part of the Milky Way spiral), an eddy in the river, a whirlwind and many other examples. In each instance there is a drawing force in the center. In the Native world view, we can think of this as the circle of life. In each Native person’s life the central drawing force is the self (Fig. 1). Down through many thousands of years, this is what kept the individual in balance. The energy (self) kept the values, attitudes, and traditions from being flung out. It allowed the Native individual to be constantly in communications with self, others, nature and the spirits to check on the propriety of existing characteristics of life. They knew that life is dynamic. In the process of change in the world views, many of the values have remained the same and are very applicable today.

With infringements of new people from other parts of the world, came a weakening of the self with all its strengths of what to be and how to live. At first the circle remained strong. However, with the encroachment of missionaries from various Christian religions, traders, trappers, miners and explorers came diseases unknown to the Native people. Following this came a calamity surmounting any experience that the Native people have ever had. Many elders, shamans, parents, community members and children died as a result of these unknown diseases. With the loss of so many people, especially the shamans who until this time were the healers, left the Native people questioning their own spirituality. Was it really the work of the devil and his evil allies that the Native people subscribed to and believed in as the missionaries pointed out? This dealt a crushing blow to a people who had direct access and communications with the natural and spiritual worlds through their shamans. The first rent to the circle of life was in the spiritual realm (Fig. 2), and we have been suffering from a spiritual depression ever since. Alaska Native spirituality can in no way be wholly replaced by orthodox Christian religions, Eastern or other ways of knowing about a spiritual life.

Where the break occurs, one side of the curved line becomes more linear to reflect confusion. Through this break occur leaks for new ideas, values and ways of life that cause much doubt about their own world and beliefs. A maelstrom of values, beliefs and traditions result causing a confusion of what to be and what to do. The sense of self becomes weakened, thus its drawing force is weakened causing some original and traditional ideas of life to be lost. The turmoil, like that of a tornado, continues. The amalgamation of Western and other cultures from throughout the world are mixed with Native traditions. Although the Alaska Native people did not readily accept modern education and religions and gave initial resistance, breaks eventually occurred. If conditions had been different, the Alaska Native people could have controlled what was allowed into their world view. But such was not the case. The encroachment of various peoples and their cultures overwhelmed the Native people. Not only did these new people come with new ideas, but with new species of dogs, plants, domesticated animals, bacteria and viruses. This not only caused turmoil for the human beings but also caused ecological havoc. Armed with their new technological tools—hunting, trapping and fishing devices—along with the need to make money to buy these “needed” items, the newcomers battered down sacred ideas of harmony in many Native people.

The next onslaught was in the emotional realm (Fig. 3). Not feeling good about themselves because of the message being told them by the missionaries, teachers, miners, trappers, traders, federal agents and so forth, they became emotionally depressed. They had been told that their languages and cultures were primitive and had no place in the Western or modern world. The educational system was established to dissipate and destroy their languages, spirituality and cultures. The barrage came in many forms from institutions of the colonial hegemonic force. The once proud hunter/provider and successful homemaker now felt little worth living for in their ravaged world. There was nothing promising left to allow them to feel good about themselves, have confidence for self-governance or self-reliance. Only despair was left.

The intellectual arena was the next rupture to occur in this circle of life (Fig. 4). Rationality and empiricism coupled with intuition had been the Native peoples’ forte´. Nature was their metaphysic and thus they lived in reality. They had successfully devised their world view to allow them to live life with all its difficulties but developed coping tools and skills to deal with the hard times. Now with their spirituality and emotions on a downward spiral, the people became intellectually dysfunctional. They became docile and robot-like, expecting everything to be done for them. Their original clear consciousness or awareness was now unclear, as if being viewed through a stigmatized and scarred corneal lens. Things were dim, shaded, with some channels opaque and confusion followed. A framework for assimilating new experiences no longer existed.

The last fissure occurred in the physical well-being whereby the Native people in their demoralized state became susceptible to diseases such as tuberculosis, influenza, cancer and many nutritional deficiencies and psychosocial maladies (Fig. 5). The foundations upon which a whole person was produced by the culture was now broken asunder with a new fragmented culture, a mix of many cultures represented by newcomers, producing fragmented Native youngsters susceptible to new ideas, diseases and yearnings.

The ruptures allowed some aspects of Native characteristics to flow out or become modified by allowing new fragmented ideas, ways of being, thinking, behaving and doing to seep in. This has caused much confusion among the Native people.

The Native ways of science have always been multi-dimensional to include the human, natural and spiritual worlds. This was a conscious effort to keep in balance. Everything on earth, including earth and self, was endowed with a spirit, therefore life. And because of this spirit or energy from the Spirit of the Universe (Ellam Yua), the Native people must do things in ways that no harm nor disrespect happen to life on earth. It then required that the Native people come up with elaborate rituals and ceremonies to pay homage to all, to maintain or at times to regain balance in one’s life or that of the community. They had transcended the need for quantifying and establishing laws of nature.

Much of the subject matter in the schools’ curricula is one-dimensional because it is linear. The vaunted mathematical and scientific disciplines and their offspring, the technologies, are often one-dimensional. These tools have the wonderful capacity for new discoveries in other worlds but because of the Western society’s need to learn to control nature they lead to confusion and a feeling of being weaned from the life force and its inherit relationships. They are bereft of the values extant in the indigenous societies which open doors for new world discoveries. Western mathematics, sciences and technologies have values, however, they are proscribed to ambition to learn in depth and greed to use this knowledge for gain. This is arrogance, a senseless and meaningless ambition, leading to the disintegration of the human experience. Through them, the more we know, the less we know about life. This says to me that Western mathematics, sciences and technologies have been superficial, never getting to the meat of things. What has been missing from the great potential of these and the other disciplines?

From all indications, nature thrives on diversity. Look at the permutations of weather during a day, month or year. Climates differ from one part of the earth to another. Flora and fauna differ from one region to another. Continents and their geography differ. No two snowflakes are exactly alike. The stars, constellations and other heavenly bodies seem to be unchanging, yet our learned astronomers tell us that many changes are taking place. According to them, novae, supernovae, black holes, stars dying and being born and so forth are happening in the universe. The science of chaos and complexity shows us a diversity of patterns we never thought existed in nature. These all point to diversity—the balance that makes nature thrive. The Alaska Native people knew this and strove for harmony with all of life.

Alaska Native people have come full circle and are seeking to heal the breeches that have put life asunder. Seggangukut, we are awakening, we are being energized, is what the Yupiaq say. They have nature as their metaphysic and have drawn energy from earth whereby things in times past were often quite clear and thus could be attended to or a resolution reached. One aspect of energy exchange that has often been spoken of by Native people who are ill is that of being visited by various people from the community to show care and love for the ill person. They have expressed the feeling that some people will cause the person to feel worse while another person will make the person stronger and clearer of mind. It is said that in the former case, a person who does not have the right mind or balance in life will draw energy from the ill person thereby making the ill person worse than before the visit. On the other, there will come a person who is kind, upright and is with a mind of making you better. Instead of drawing energy from the ill person, this person shares some of his/her energy with the sick person. The ailing one feels better.

Another example of energy exchange is the story of a man out on the ocean. He gets caught on an iceberg that gets cut off from shore and drifts out. He has no choice but to try to keep warm and survive the night. The next day, he finds that the iceberg is stationary but is not attached to the shore ice. New ice has formed overnight in the water between. He remembers the advice of his elders that to test the newly formed ice and its ability to hold up a person, he must raise his ice pick about two feet above the ice and let it drop. If the weight of the ice pick allows the point to penetrate but stops where it is attached to the wooden handle, he can try crossing on the ice. If, on the other hand, it does not stop at the point of intersection, then it will not hold up the man. In this case, the former happened. The man looked around him at the beauty, the might of nature, and realizing the energies that abound, he gets onto the ice. He must maintain a steady pace for if he stops or begins to run he will fall through because he has broken the rhythm and concentration. The story goes that when he began his journey across, there was a lightness and buoyancy in his mind. This feeling was conveyed to his physical being. Although the ice crackled and waved, he made it to the other side. He drew energy from nature and was in rhythm with the sea and ice and, coupled with lightness and buoyancy, made it safely to the other side.

In the another story, two youngsters come into being and they find themselves in an abandoned village. It has been some time since the people disappeared by indications from the decay of semi-subterranean houses and artifacts in the village. One possible explanation of why the people were gone might be that these Yupiaq people may have reached the apex of spirituality which is pure consciousness. Their bodies became the universe and their pair of eyes became part of Ellam iinga, the eye of the universe, the eye of awareness. This could explain how some communities became mysteriously deserted.

Western physics with its quantum and relativity theories say that we are mostly energy. Why then should not our spirit or soul be energy? Scientific technology has given proof of energy fields, personal aura, findings from near death experiences and many other human experiences. Theory of relativity tells us that matter is condensed energy and also conveys that the world is made up of relationships. Can we not then say that our spirit is made up of energy? If this is true, the Alaska Native must be able to draw energy from earth because we are a part of it. All life comes from earth. Alaska Native peoples’ metaphysic as nature becomes corroborated by the Western theories. This also strengthens the argument that the laboratory for teaching and learning should be placed where one lives. Being outdoors in nature enjoying its beauty and energy, and becoming a part of it, energizes the youngsters. This could bring back the respect of personal self, and if one respects oneself then certainly one would be able to respect others, nature and the spirits that dwell in and amongst all things of nature. The students will be able to whet their observational skills while learning from nature and drawing energy to themselves. They can again attain love and care with all its concomitant values and attitudes that give life. It is imperative that the students from all walks of life begin to experience and get close to nature. There is a vast difference in learning about the tundra in the classroom and being out in it. Being in and with it the whole year round, they can experience the vicissitudes of seasons, flora, fauna, sunlight, freezing, thawing, wind, weather permutations, gaining intimate knowing about place and using their five senses and intuitions to learn about themselves and the world around them.

It is this drawing of energy from nature that will allow the self to again become strong so that the breaks in the circle of life become closed. Then the individual and community can allow chosen outside values and traditions to filter in which they think will strengthen their minds, bodies and spirits. The Alaska Native people will again become whole people and know what to be and what to do to make a life and a living. They will have reached into the profound silence of self to attain happiness and harmony in a world of their own making. Quyana!

Alaska First Nations Research Network

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 2, Issue 1

Mokakit—to strive for wisdom. What a singularly appropriate word that our Canadian relatives share with us, the Alaska Native people. With the goals and objectives of the Alaska Rural Systemic Initiative and Alaska Rural Challenge, it is timely that Alaska Native educators, teachers, teacher aides, bilingual teachers, parents and elders establish a chapter of Mokakit called the Alaska First Nations Research Network (AFNRN).

The objectives of Mokakit are:

• to foster higher education among First Nations,

• to promote and enhance individual and group research initiatives,

• to review and highlight current research information,

• to organize and host conferences related to Mokakit concerns,

• to conduct workshops and seminars in research methodology,

• to provide a resource base for First Nations communities,

• to maintain an inventory of research studies in Native education,

• to identify critical areas for research in Native education which are not being addressed and

• to encourage Native graduate students to address these areas in their research theses and dissertations.

The objectives are certainly those to which we subscribe. As we embark on pathways to Native education, to include Native languages, ecosophy, spirituality and lifeways, and seek ways to incorporate English and the various disciplines from the Western world to the newly developed courses of study, calls for such an organization. Ecosophy is the seeking of wisdom from the ecological system in which one finds oneself. Nature is the university of the universe. Ellam Yua has placed many models of knowing within it, all we need to do is seek with mind and soul to get a sense of knowing and letting it work in our lives. For example, we get a message of wonder from the raven—it is never bored and it is constantly exploring its surroundings. Water has the ability to take the form of its container and yet has the potential of awesome power. From it, we learn patience and the practice of soft power. The objectives as recounted above are qualitative and comprehensive. They will help in setting ways to assess the change processes in Native language acquisition and learning of Native ways of creating identity, developing uniqueness, seeking natural models of knowing and getting a sense of accomplishment. Educators who are trained in research must begin to develop partnerships with teachers, aides, parents and elders in doing research. We realize that trained researchers are not the only ones capable of doing noteworthy and useful research. On behalf of Mokakit and AFNRN, I encourage anyone interested in education to join as we need all the expertise that is out there.

Yupiaq Mathematics:
Pattern and Form in Space and Place

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 2, Issue 2

The Alaska Native people have always had a way of seeing and understanding patterns in the land (nuna) around them. They identified patterns in plants, rivers, weather, landforms, animals and the heavens. Upon the careful observation of patterns, they were able to make predictions for the future. This critical analysis involved the past histories, the present conditions and thus presented sensemakers for the future. This is the practice of ecopsychology at its finest. Everything that one needs to know about life and to seek freedom and happiness are found in Nature. As stated by Barry Lopez, the landscape becomes the mindscape and the mindscape becomes the landscape (1986).

For Yup’ik people, according to elders Joshua Phillip and Fred George, the various parts of the body were their measuring instruments. The outstretched arms became the measure for the length of a fishing net. The closed fist defined the opening of the blackfish trap. Other units of measure, such as one arm’s length, the distance from the elbow to the tip of the index finger, the span between the thumb and index finger extended, stepping off to mark the diameter of the qasgiq and various combinations of these became the units of measure for tasks such as making clothing, tools and shelter. Consequently, the clothing people wore and the tools needed for hunting and trapping were made precisely to fit the dimensions of the user.

The women used precise patterns for making parkas and mukluks. The parka required the maker to look at the body of the person for whom it was to be made and to visualize proportions in body form (including bone structure and musculature) and size in order, for instance, to determine the number of ground squirrel skins needed. In sewing together the skins, the sewer is reminded of the family history of the patterns, tassels, decorative designs, and the use of various furs, taking advantage of their beneficial qualities.

The Alaska Native people also had a numbering system (Lipka, 1994). For the Yupiat people, their numbering system used a base of twenty. Ten fingers and ten toes are needed to make a complete person. The digits are attached to appendages which are in turn attached to the body. The counting system was necessary for determining the number of furs needed to make an article of clothing. For example, it takes 45 squirrel skins or six otter skins for a man’s parka. For netmaking, special wooden measuring tools were constructed, again using body parts to determine the width for different species of fish. However, there was no need to count the precise number of dry fish to last the whole winter. This was done by estimating how much storage area needed to be filled with fish to feed the family and dogs, provide for ceremonies and share with others. Always, they had to have food supplies beyond the immediate needs of the family. Sharing and reciprocity were key to their preparations. Thus, for the Yupiat people it was not necessary to quantify in precise numerical terms, but rather in proportional terms relative to size of family, time until next food supply would be available, weather conditions and nutritional uses of various foods.

The Alaska Native people had many geometric designs in the things they made such as utensils, fishtraps, weirs, clothing designs and ceremonial paraphernalia. Again, it was not necessary to quantify in terms such as surface area, degree, angle, volume and other numerical dimensions. Such information alone would be considered insufficient knowledge for you were also required to know the history of the design, its replication of a natural or spiritual form, the meaning of the color and the story behind the artifact.

The Alaska Native people also had no precise measurements for distance such as feet, meters and miles. Rather, distance was calculated qualitatively—measured more in terms of time and terrain than distance. The Yupiaq person would consider the mode of transportation, weather conditions, topography over which he would have to traverse, history of various sites that one would encounter along the way where food is available and, if traveling a great distance, where logical and safe rest areas were located. In considering the above, one can see that units of measure for distance alone would have rendered their knowledge incomplete and unreliable as a basis for moving from one place to another. The all-important knowledge of place would be lacking in the details that are necessary for the landscape to merge with the mindscape.

Space and time were thought of differently too. Space was a multi-dimensional place that the human, spirit and nature occupied at the same time. The self or consciousness was considered to be time and timelessness at the same time. One accomplished what needed to be done at the right time. There was a place and time for everything. Timing in drumming and singing was important, however there was no need for a metronome because it was implicit in the act itself. To pay attention to such a device would detract from the sacredness of song, beat, motion and story. The circadian rhythm of the universe was the sacred timepiece of the Native people.

Western mathematics and sciences, because of their emphasis on objectivity and detachment, introduce us to an abstract and lifeless world that has a tendency to set us apart from the rest of our relationships in the universe. However, with fractal geometry and the new sciences of chaos and complexity, the Western thought-world seems to be shifting from the quantitative and impersonal study of tangible “things” and is becoming more attuned to the qualitative dimensions as more and more of its members recognize the importance of inter-relationships (Capra, 1996). Western scientists constructed the holographic image which lends itself to the Native concept of everything being connected. Just as the whole contains each part of the image, so too does each part contain the makeup of the whole. The relationship of each part to everything else must be understood to get the whole picture (Wilber, 1985). We are finally getting there.

There are many bright Native people who would make excellent elementary or high school teachers. Many of these students have problems understanding mathematics, in part because teachers don’t themselves recognize it as another way of knowing with a language and logic of its own. We present mathematical abstractions as though the purpose was to practice the virtuosity of the human mind and its creativity and we lose sight of its practical applications. Native students often have trouble visualizing abstract mathematical constructs and their application to real life. Perhaps, we can overcome this problematic academic gatekeeper by introducing Native students to recognizing and understanding the patterns and forms in their own world through which they can visualize the problems and then move from qualitative to quantitative explanations. From the tangible we can go slowly into the intangible. The interest that such an approach can spark is evident in the work of the Inupiaq students from Kaktovik, who have created their own system for representing Inupiaq numerals (Bartley, 1997).

We are in a modern world which was described ably by Lewis Carroll in Alice in Wonderland: “Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!” New information is bombarding us from all quarters with entropy setting in and the decay of knowledge brings about confusion. It behooves us then to slow down and see what knowledge and information will help us to build the kind of world that we would like. What aspects of mathematics and the sciences will help free us from the obsession with self and materialism? We can learn from the way our ancestors made sense of the world and used keen observation of patterns and form in relation to space and place to maintain balance between the human, natural and spiritual worlds. You see, our problem is a crisis of consciousness. Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, “Society is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members. Society is a joint-stock company in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty of the eater.” We experience resistance to making change in the world, but our efforts must continue with spirit and determination.

References

Capra, F. (1996). The Web of Life: A New Scientific Understanding of Living Systems. New York: Doubleday.

Lipka, J. (1994). Culturally Negotiated Schooling: Toward a Yup’ik Mathematics. Journal of American Indian Education, 33(3), 14–30.

Lopez, B. (1986). Arctic Dreams: Imagination and Desire in a Northern Landscape. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.

Wilber, K. (1985). The Holographic Paradigm and Other Paradoxes: Exploring the Leading Edge of Science. Boston: New Science Library.

Bartley, W.C. (1997). Making the Old Way Count. Sharing Our Pathways, 2(1), 12. (Available from the Alaska Native Knowledge Network)

Love and Caring for Balance

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 7, Issue 5

Because I have not always loved myself and was thus a parent who did not experience fully the maturation of my children during their teenage years, I missed out in that critical time of their growing up. I have one important piece of advice for those of you who may not have a love for yourself, and that is to do some thoughtful self-examination. The problem may arise due to being dysfunctional as a result of poverty, alcoholism or some sort of mental or physical disability. If you find yourself lacking in self-worth, then you must change yourself first. To love someone else, you must first learn to love yourself. This allows the process of loving your children and others to become a part of your life. I applaud those of you that have this emotional and spiritual quality in you already.

Several issues ago, I wrote an article about talking to, singing to and making the child feel good while still in the mother’s womb. This is important for the child to learn the sounds you make as the mother, the father or the grandparent. They will learn to identify you as parents and as members of the family. They most importantly will recognize the love being shown to them. Through this love they will obtain a sense of belonging—belonging to the mother, the father, siblings and grandparents. At a later time the child will learn that s/he belongs to a village/community, a group of people, and in some instances, a tribe. You as the parents begin to teach the youngster by example. which is a more powerful teaching/learning tool than any formal method you may use.

And now here is my secret, a very simple secret; it is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye (Antoine de Saint-Exupery).

This builds the self-respect and pride of the child by knowing who they are and where they are from. As the Golden Buddha is made of pure gold, so there is a golden essence in each child. We, as parents, must nurture this natural self, so that the child grows up strong with the golden glow of self and never loses it.

Below is a poem written by Kahlil Gibran. Ellam Yua, God, has a plan for each of us. It is these inner assets that the child already possesses that we want to develop so s/he can grow up to become the very best they are capable of becoming.

Your children are not your children.

They are the sons and daughters of Life’s

longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you,

And though they are with you, yet they

belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your

thoughts,

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their

souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,

Which you cannot visit, not even in your

dreams.

You may strive to be like them, but seek not

to make them like you,

For life goes not backward nor tarries with

yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children

as living arrows are sent forth.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of

the

Infinite, and He bends you with His might

that

His arrows might go swift and far.

Let your bending in the archer’s hand be

for gladness;

For even as He loves the arrow that flies,

So He loves also the bow that is stable.

The poem and story were excerpted from Canfield, J. & Hansen, M. C., editors. Chicken Soup for the Soul: 101 Stories to Open the Heart and Rekindle the Spirit. Deerfield Beach, FL.: Health Communications, Inc., 1993.

The modern world has been struggling with the education of our children for quite some time. We in Alaska are trying to change education so that its foundation becomes our Native worldviews using the languages that constructed them. We continue to struggle against those that oppose us, laws that present obstacles and money that is reduced or taken away. Yet, when you think about it, our ancestors and parents knew what they were doing when they provided an education based on knowing who you are and where you are. They produced children with minds that have a home. Many of us have homeless minds because of lack of being told our stories.

I am again going to provide another story from the book, All I Ever Really Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten by Robert Fulghum:

Most of what I really need to know about how to live and what to do and how to be, I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not be at the top of the graduate mountain, but there in the sandbox at the nursery school.

These are the things I learned. Share everything. Play fair. Don’t hit people. Put things back where you found them. Clean up your own mess. Don’t take things that aren’t yours. Say you’re sorry when you hurt somebody. Wash your hands before you eat. Flush. Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you. Live a balanced life. Learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some. Take a nap every afternoon. When you go out into the world, watch for traffic. Hold hands and stick together. Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the plastic cup. The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that. Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the plastic cup—they all die. So do we. And then remember the book about Dick and Jane and the first word you learned, the biggest word of all: LOOK.

Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation. Ecology and politics. Sane living. Think of what a better world it would be if we all—the whole world—had cookies and milk about 3:00 o’clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankets for a nap. Or if we had a basic policy in our nations to always put things back where we found them and cleaned up our own messes. And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out into the World, it is better to hold hands and stick together.

From this we learn that we acquire a lot of knowledge without realizing it from conception to birth to death. For our children in schools, it is necessary that they not only learn the three “Rs”, but include a fourth “R”, relaxation. We have forgotten how to do this. Children from the first grade through high school need time for quiet. A time for reflection, a time to imagine, a time to visualize what one would want to be in the future. Teach our children to dream and then help them make those dreams come true. Quyana.

Parenting & Teaching: One and the Same

By Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 6, Issue 5

Waqaa,

As I begin this article, I am reminded of the Yupiaq woman who had an irritated skin condition on her hands and was given a tube of ointment with an applicator. One night when she was awakened by the irritation, she reached over in the dark to retrieve the ointment and applied it to her hands. The next morning, she woke up and looked at her hands. She was astounded and bewildered. Her hands were completely red. She worried as to what was happening to her skin. She finally looked at the tube of ointment she had applied, and then laughed when she saw that it was a red Bingo dauber!

During the last century or so, we, as parents and teachers, have been working blindly just as this woman because of the promises of the American Dream—promises of a quality education, a good job, a good home, earning top dollars and getting promotions. We have become Americanized to a high degree. In the process, we have been losing our Native languages and cultures. A recent newspaper article suggests that our Native languages are eroding and many will be gone within a generation. Will we, as parents and teachers, allow this to happen? Historically the American way has encouraged the loss of Native languages and cultures. The English language and its cultures continue to have a very voracious appetite and will devour our Native languages and cultures if we allow it.

In the past, our children were born in a sod house or a tent at spring camp or delivered under an overturned skin boat in an emergency. From the outset the newborn is introduced to the voices of the family members, the words of the midwife, the hum of the wind, the sound of falling rain and the call of the Arctic loon. The newborn is already immersed in nature from its first moments of life. During the gestation period and after a given time, the child is talked to, sung to by the mother and exposed to family members eating, sleeping, doing work and playing. The child learns of the sounds peculiar to its parents’ language, love and care bringing an indelible sense of belonging. The child is exposed to and lives within nature all its life. When the mother walks, the child is placed inside the parka on its mother’s back. The child can then look around and see things from the same level as its mother and is treated as a beautiful living being.

As the child progresses through its growing stages, the parents, grandparents and community members assess the talents and inner strengths the child might have. These are nurtured with the thinking that the community will become greater with a responsible and caring member. As the child grows older, the members look for ideas that the child expresses, skills it shows, its interaction with others and its respect for everyone and everything.

There are rites of passage that are practiced as the child grows. The killing of a first mosquito, first pick of berries and other acts are times of joy by villagers and are reinforced by giving support and encouragement for continued growth, physically, intellectually, emotionally and spiritually. Puberty is a time of ceremony—the becoming of a woman or a man. First menstruation of a young lady is considered a time of power requiring that the young lady be housed apart and served only by the mother or grandmother for its duration. No work is required of her.

As the young person matures, the community members may ask the youngster: “Have you counted your blessings lately?” In actuality, they are asking: “Have you counted your inner values, talents, strengths, important relationships and connectedness?” This connectedness is spirituality. Knowing this about oneself will make one beneficial to the community.

With respect to discipline, the home must be a place of love, care, companionship and cooperation. If these are practiced, the child is well-behaved. If such ingredients are lacking in the home, how can the parents expect to discipline the child? If the home is dysfunctional, then where will the child find the love, care, attention and companionship they need? It is possible for a parent to be a teacher, but a teacher cannot really substitute for a parent, yet this is what we sometimes expect of the school. When teachers meet with parents, it is important that they encourage them to be loving, caring and attentive to their child’s needs and then the teacher should reinforce the parents attention.

As educators, we must try to make the classroom an environment where children can be with and of nature. Take them outdoors as much as possible. Have the children express their ideas of what is beautiful that they see in nature; guide them to begin to see beauty in oneself and in others, in one’s village or in one’s neighborhood. The young person will then begin to see the value of their own Native language and culture. This is an invaluable asset in one’s life. From this, you begin to see that “community/place is an experience that is created.” Quyana

Revisiting Action-Oriented,
Multi-Reality Research

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 7, Issue 4

Alaska Native people have often thought of the white man as having capabilities that go far beyond our own abilities as creators and inventors, forgetting to consider some of the long-term side-effects of our infatuation with the Euro-centric ways. That feeling of awe and wonder is fast changing as we see our world deteriorate, driving us to action for a change in consciousness and returning to our own eco-centric worldview.

For the last several centuries, native/tribal people have been inundated with the products of a materialistic and techno-mechanistic society. We have marveled at the power of the rational mind and ingenuity at producing many and varied gadgets that are getting more complex and thus more difficult to understand and operate. The Euro-Americans have used the scientific method, objectivity and reductionism to produce these wonders. They have made gadgets galore and produced boundless knowledge of the physical universe. But we should pay heed to the words of Gregory Peck in the movie, The Snows of Kilimanjaro, when he said, “Just because the airplane goes faster than the horse does not mean that we are better off now than we were then.” We now suffer from overpopulation, erosion of natural resources, violence and a loss of faith and trust in our clergymen, politicians and other institutional leaders.

The Euro-American scientists are coming to the North in droves to do research in places that they know little or nothing about, and often fumble around in the dark, almost blindly. Yet the indigenous people who have lived on this land for millennia are left out of the research projects in many instances. These original people who know the history and how to keep their place sustainable are ignored and seen as being primitive, having only anecdotal and place-specific knowledge. Native people are led to believe that they will find the problem and fix it with some form of new technology. However, there are seldom technological solutions to biological, mental or spiritual problems.

Western science seeks to identify symptoms of problems and then develop treatments, whether it involves physical, intellectual, emotional or spiritual phenomena. This is well and good to a limited extent, but it has a obvious weakness. These generalized inclinations have thrust insights drawn from the physical world into a world of abstractions1. The phenomena studied becomes absorbed by the generalized approach to solving problems. This outmoded notion of reductionism and objectivity gets in the way of compassion and cooperation and denies emotional and spiritual connection between the human, other creatures, plants and elements of Mother Earth. However, indigenous people can only be understood as part of their environment, part of their place.

Early in our heritage as we experienced change, our Elders recognized that this technical world produced much to purportedly make life easier, but they also warned that there is a danger in this trend. Too much of the resources are being used and wasted and the refining and manufacturing processes involved require excessive use of energy. In extracting minerals and timber, much land is laid to waste and it takes a long time for it to recover. These processes do not take into consideration the needs of the seventh generation. Will our descendants be able to enjoy the resources in a similar state of abundance and savor the beauty of Mother Earth as our ancestors did?

Psychologist Carl Jung has written of the “collective consciousness” and other scientists have used a holographic metaphor to convey the complexity of our relationship to our past and to each other. I can readily appreciate this as it lends itself to explaining our ancestral memory and ways of knowing. During gestation in the mother’s womb, a chord is struck which resonates in the universal holographic mind. Early in life, certain notes in this chord vibrate stronger than others, such as for suckling, crying when hungry or hurting, smiling to show love and joy and so forth. As the child gets older these early notes become weaker as others become stronger, from which emerges an outgoing personality, a spiritual attitude, a love of music, a mathematical or scientific interest and so forth. These will continue to grow while others begin to shrink as we mature.

There is a story of a hunter about to cross a newly frozen body of water. He remembers his Elders telling him that he should test the strength of the newly formed ice by dropping his ice pick. If it penetrates and does not stop, don’t try crossing because the ice will be too weak. If the pick stops where the wooden handle and bone point intersect, the hunter can try to cross. To do so, he has to gather energy by looking at the sky, the sun, currents, wind, moon and stars from which he gains a feeling of lightness in his mind. He starts across the ice establishing a rhythmic gait, and he makes it to the other side. The energy chord produced from his observations has struck a resonant chord in the holographic mind bringing his body in rhythm with the surrounding environment.

It behooves us, as Native researchers, to redesign research methodologies that go beyond those we have learned in the Euro-American universities. We must first try to find balance in our own lives before we attempt to establish a meaningful and dynamic relationship with those we are seeking to understand. In some instances we may have to rely on spiritual methods altogether. This will allow us to truly interpret data that we have gathered by asking questions, observing and directly participating in an experience. We, as Native people, thrive on first-hand experience as the primary source of knowledge.

We have heard stories about tuberculosis being healed by drinking juice of the spruce needle, or the remission of cancer by drinking stinkweed juice. These treatments require belief and faith from one’s own worldview, using the whole mind and body to try to explain and understand. If no rational explanation is found, then one has to accept this on belief and faith of something greater than you and I. In using this method of knowing it presents a new frontier of research methods using the whole self. The self is consciousness without knowing. It has been said that mysticism is a dialectic of feeling, while science is a dialectic of reason. We must work toward the integration of the intellectual with the mystical for the healing process to be complete. Albert Einstein noted that spirituality is the strongest and noblest motive for scientific research and as such is a philosophical/psychological prerequisite for research.

Most research methodologies in vogue today require that we only use a part of our self. However, the modern scientific method combined with Native ways has the potential to produce a new breed of scientists and engineers who are able to exercise all their capabilities with compassion and a sense of greater purpose as they strive to build a technology kinder to the human, the environment and the spirit that resides within all of us. These scientists will work for restoring balance, healing and living a life that feels just right. This is action-oriented, multi-reality research which will put Alaska Native people on a pathway to greater control of our past, present and future.

Revitalizing Harmony in Village and School Relationships

By Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley and Dixie Dayo

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 4, Issue 5

The relationships between Alaska Native people and the schools have often been adversarial. This may be due to Alaska Natives’ mistrust of the outside educational system and its practitioners. For too many years the schools did not acknowledge the different ways of knowing and ways of making sense of this world extant in the villages. Instead, another way of making a life and living was espoused by the newcomers.

After making a visit to Alaska in the 1880s, Sheldon Jackson approached the United States Congress for money to educate Alaska Native people. The money he received for this purpose was very limited so he approached religious organizations to establish schools, many of which were associated with the church-run orphanages that sprung up after the viral epidemics. In their minds they were doing God’s work, with the very best of intentions. However, they were also carrying out the assimilation policies of the times, in which Alaska Native students were to lose their Native language and ways of making a living. After many years of experiencing this type of education (under both church- and government-run schools), Alaska Native people began to recognize that schooling in pursuit of the American Dream was a largely unattainable goal made up of empty promises. As a result of this bifurcation of purpose, many of the teachers who served as the purveyors of the new knowledge through the schools never became a part of the community in which they taught. This split has contributed to the debilitation of the villages to the point where many villagers have abdicated their educational responsibilities with an attitude of “Let’s leave things alone, they know better.” In this way, the educational system has failed Alaska Natives and, in turn, Alaska Native people have contributed to that failure. So, what can be done to overcome this legacy of adversarial relations between school and community?

In the not-too-distant past, when newcomers came into Alaska Native communities, they were welcomed as visitors and made comfortable. The Alaska Native people shared their food, homes and knowledge about the surrounding flora and fauna. They shared the arts and skills of hunting, trapping and survival in a sometimes harsh environment. They found some of the early newcomers had left behind their individualistic and competitive world in search of another way of making a life and a living—one compatible with Alaska Native peoples’ inclinations. These newcomers grafted themselves to the lifeways of the community in which they settled and became a part of it. They allowed any feelings of superiority to dissipate in the wind. However, they were followed by another group of people some of whose goals and motivation were driven by a different mindset—that of ambition and greed to gain land and take natural resources for attaining riches.

The original host-visitor relationship was broken asunder and the Alaska Native people found themselves thrust into smaller and smaller pockets of land differientiated by artificial boundaries and restrictions. This was now a conqueror and conquered relationship. The Native people found themselves struggling for survival in their own land. They found themselves subjected to new laws, values and institutions. They experienced new diseases and poverty, as well as the language, arts and skills that were now being taught to them. The Native peoples’ perception of harmony in life practices which upheld the recognition that the whole can be greater than the sum of its parts was disrupted. This is a sad commentary for a people who were once self-sufficient and practiced a spirituality that edified this harmonious way of life and making a living.

More than a century has elapsed and it is time to reexamine the relationship between community and school in rural Alaska. This recognition was brought about by a recent trip to New Zealand of Alaska Native educators and our subsequent participation in the World Indigenous Peoples Conference on Education (WIPCE) held in Hilo, Hawaii in August. At every Maori marae (meeting house) that we visited in New Zealand, the protocol of welcoming the visitors was performed. On the first day WIPCE, the Hawaiian people performed a traditional welcoming ceremony for the 2000 guests who came to the Islands to attend the conference. All of these were awe-inspiring experiences that engendered a feeling of being a part of the host community and confidence in knowing what would be expected of you as a visitor.

The Maori marae and many of the Hawaiian settlements have become bastions of indigenous spirituality, philosophy, identity, language and values. Because these ceremonies are so steeped in spirituality, there is a feeling of respect for place, people and all that they have and stand for. These are places where real teaching and learning can take place because they are working for the good of the community with spirit and feeling.

Why don’t Alaska’s villages do the same for incoming administrators and teachers? It is time we take the initiative and get involved in providing a more holistic education for our children. This can only happen when we change the adversarial relationship between the village and school. We must realize that we cannot expect the school to raise our children. This has been happening for too long and the result has been a school that is too often a battleground between teachers and students, as well as with the parents and villagers. The time is ripe for putting the statement, “It takes a whole village to raise a child” into practice. Let us briefly suggest how a process like this might begin. It is up to each of you to do the rest.

No matter where Alaska Native people come from, they have had a way of welcoming the allanret—the visitors. We should revive these practices, starting with welcoming the principals and teachers who come to the village to help in the education of the children. They are with us the greater part of the year and spend much of their waking hours with our children. So it is only fair that we make them feel welcome. These welcoming ceremonies must include local speech makers. The Alaska Native speakers should include (in general terms) what is expected of the administrators and the teachers. The principal and teachers can respond by briefly stating what their philosophy of education is, what and how they meet the expectations of the villagers and to ask where they may need help themselves. It is important that everyone come to mutual terms on what can be done to improve the education of the village children.

The same appreciation should be accorded those Native educators who have chosen to obtain a higher education to acquire a teaching certificate. Those who return to the village should be treated with a similar welcome, in a manner that is well endowed with love, care and nurturing to help them become successful teachers. There should be no expressions of jealousy or alienation shown toward these individuals. Villagers should allow the spirit to act as the mediator to elevate these Alaska Native people who have taken the risk of failure, suffered through times of depression or bewilderment, confronting insensitive administrators and faculty and experience financial hardship to gain access to the profession of teaching. Alaska Native educators have a willingness to excel and they know the village situation well—thereby earning our support.

These acts of harmony and compassion contribute to the healing process on all sides. Villagers need to participate in board meetings to clarify any questions that arise, let the participants know what is being accomplished to meet village expectations and what needs further work. This must be done with honesty and in accord with Alaska Native values. Compassion, cooperation and teamwork have always been the hallmark of Alaska Native hospitality. This must be resurrected to function as an organism with all its parts working together for the good of the whole village. It is admirable to note that this is already being done in some villages. This is where synergy really begins to kick in with each part working for the good of the community and thus making it stronger than its individual parts. The ways of Alaska Native people may become the model for the future. Tuaii, piurci.

Blowing in the Wind

by Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley

Sharing Our Pathways, Vol. 9, Issue 2

There are messages for us, as a Native people, blowing in the wind that are older than any of our Native languages. I think one message is telling us that we can make change for the better in our lives through dedication, motivation, tenacity and traditional creativity to overcome the limitations of the current education system. This means that we educate our Native people in their Native languages and English to become articulate in both. This will enable them to think in their own worldviews for answers to their problems and exercise the means of control of the modern world to clearly and effectively articulate demands for change.

I use the tetrahedral metaphor as a way of trying to explain the synergistic process of keeping balance in ones life. The base is a triangle with the human, natural and spiritual worlds as the foundation of the worldview. I have read a book which analyzes the number three as a “breaking through to a world of infinite possibilities” (Brailsford, 1999). He further points out that three symbolizes creation and that one and two are the parents of number 3, the first born. If I think of it in this manner then the triune God of the Bible comes into mind. For the tetrahedral, it is the spiritual power that is eternal and omnipresent. Mother Earth is created and from its rocks comes all life, including the human being, thus serving as the basis of all life. This process presents infinite possibilities of solutions for overcoming a mechanical worldview that is so destructive to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It then behooves the Native people to pursue education diligently in their own thought world as well as in the disciplines of the modern world. This enables Native people to use their own problem-solving tools as well as those of the mechanical world to effect change.

I have often said and heard that sense of place serves as the basis for identity and a home for the mind and heart. In some schools, students have been engaged in cultural mapping activities to identify the Native geographic names associated with the features of a particular place. This gives a cultural grid to place over the land, that provides order, meaning and stability to those who live on that land. To know place is to know oneself, which empowers us to do things with courage and determination.

I have experienced a process in New Zealand whereby Maori Elders were taken to landmarks of the Waikato traditional lands. They were reviewing a booklet that had been prepared citing important places, what had transpired there and myths associated with that place. A guide was appointed who gave a running dialogue of points of interest and what was known about them, which the Elders then critiqued. The process was very constructive as it entailed correction of pronunciation of place names and added information to what was already known that sometimes led to significant revisions to the name and what actually happened there. This authentication process is needed as the Maori want to rewrite their history, not from the point of view of an outsider, but from within.

Wouldn’t it be advisable for Alaska Native people to engage in a similar process? For urban areas such as Fairbanks, a group of knowledgeable Native Elders could be taken to various historical sites whereby the traditional Native name is given and the story told as to its use, occupancy, burial places of leaders, old migration trails, battle skirmishes, peacemaking, kinship, alliances, particular resources and so forth. All this information would be recorded by video and audio tape, transcribed and edited and later the Elders would again gather to piece together a story acceptable to all. Some beginning examples of this are already available, such as the Minto Mapping Project (www.ankn.uaf.edu/chei/mapproj.html), the Angoon Cultural Atlas (ankn.uaf.edu) and the traditional map and book assembled by Howard Luke (Luke, 1999).

A portion of the traditional map included with Howard Luke: My Own Trail.

I can foresee a caravan of snow machines transporting Elders to different areas such as camp sites, places of warrior skirmishes, hunting grounds and burial places where the correct name and what transpired there would be clarified. In the summer, boats loaded with Elders could be taken to significant sites agreed upon to tell their stories. I can envision a bus full of Elders slowly going around Bethel recounting the old sites of fish camps, the kasegiq, the original location of Mamtellrilleq south of the Kuskokwim River by the old Air Force airport, and the island that once was in front of the present site. They could explain why the original Yupiat did not settle in the present site, the history of Kepenkuk (now Brown Slough) and orutsaraq (place for gathering sphagnum moss for caulking), the location of old reindeer corrals and so forth. This would give our Yupiat a sense of kinship and belonging to a place that one could call home and mean it, because it has a well-documented story from the perspective of the Yupiat people.

I would encourage teachers to take their students out into nature whenever possible, where the local language and culture can come alive in natural ways. By doing this, you are not limiting what is taught to knowledge alone, as the school typically does, but paying attention to the deeper needs of the student and the community. Within the classroom, the natural rhythms of life can be tapped into through singing, dancing and drumming, as well as other traditional activities that are acceptable to Elders and parents. The essential balance that is represented in the tetrahedral metaphor requires attention to all the realms of life, including the human, natural and spiritual. This message is blowing in the wind—a message older than our Native ways.

References

Brailsford, Barry. Wisdom of the Four Winds. Stoneprint Press: Christchurch, NZ, 1999.

Luke, Howard. Howard Luke: My Own Trail. Fairbanks: Alaska Native Knowledge Network. 1999.