October 15, 2018

(Flyer)

Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) will sponsor the following lectures and special events in honor of Native American Heritage Month and Walter Soboleff Day.  All lectures are free and open to the public:

Thursday, Nov. 1

• Lecture: Oral Accounts of the Tlingit Kaagwaantaan Origin and Migration presented by David Kanosh and accompanied by Nels Lawson. David Kanosh is from Shdéen Hít (Steel House) of the Deisheetaan clan. His Tlingit names are Kaajisti.Eesh and Yookisk’ookeik. David is a child of the Kaagwaantaan. Nels Lawson, whose Tlingit names are Naa Íx̱t’ Éesh, Kadánjaa, G̱oochdaa, and Ḵudeinahaa, who is from the Keet Hít in Klukwan and is the clan leader of the Sitka Kaagwaantaan.  He is a Kiks.ádi Yádi.  He will accompany David to ensure that social and spiritual balance is maintained.  Noon, Living History Room. Free, all are welcome.

Tuesday, Nov. 6

• Lecture: LAWÁAK (Klawock): The First Cannery in Alaska and the Path Not Taken presented by Steve J. Langdon, Ph.D., professor emeritus at the University of Alaska Anchorage, Department of Anthropology. Over his 45 year career, Dr. Langdon has conducted research projects on many public policy issues impacting Alaska Natives. He has advocated for policies that enhance and promote rural Alaska Native communities and their cultures in such areas as fisheries, lands, tribal government, cultural heritage, customary trade and co-management.  His book, The Native People of Alaska, is a widely used introduction to Alaska Native people. Noon, Living History Room. Free, all are welcome.

Thursday, Nov. 8

• Lecture: Paleogenomics, Community Engagement and Evolutionary Histories of Indigenous Peoples of Northwest North America presented by Ripan S. Malhi, Ph.D., Richard and Margaret Romano Professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with affiliations in Anthropology, School of Integrative Biology, and the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology.  His research interests include using DNA analysis to infer the evolutionary histories of Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Noon, Living History Room. Free, all are welcome.

Friday, Nov. 9

• Lecture: Re-Awakening Ancient Salish Sea Basketry, Fifty Years of Basketry Studies in Culture and Science presented by Ed Carriere and Dale Croes, Ph.D. Carriere, a Suquamish master basket maker, is 84 and has woven baskets for more than 55  years. He learned the art from his great-grandmother, Julia Jacob of the Suquamish Tribe, who raised him from infancy. When his great grandmother’s hands weakened with age, she told Ed he would have to make the baskets. He was 15 years old. Croes is an adjunct professor at Washington State University, Department of Anthropology. He is a wet site archaeologist whose research focus has been on ancient basketry artifacts from Northwest Coast wet (waterlogged) archaeological sites. Noon, Living History Room. Free, all are welcome.

Wednesday, Nov. 14

• Walter Soboleff Day: SHI will host a lunch-hour viewing of items from its collections relating to Dr. Soboleff and his legacy. Noon, Walter Soboleff Building Lobby. Free, all are welcome.

Thursday-Friday, Nov. 15-16

• Any Given Child Arts Excursion: All second-grade students in the Juneau School District will visit the building as part of a national program established by the John F. Kennedy Center to provide experiences in the arts to all children. Organized in collaboration with the Juneau School District and the Juneau Arts & Humanities Council.

Tuesday, Nov. 20

• Lecture: The Names We Carry presented by Ernestine Saankaláxt Hayes, a professor of English, arts, and sciences at the University of Alaska Southeast and Alaska Writer Laureate. She is Tlingit of the ̱Gooch Hít of the Kaagwaantaan clan. She is best known as the author of American Book Award recipient Blonde Indian, an Alaska Native Memoir, which also received an Honoring Alaska Indigenous Literature Award and was finalist for the Kiriyama Prize and PEN Nonfiction Award. Noon, Living History Room. Free, all are welcome.

Tuesday, Nov. 27

• Lecture: Gwál Yisikóo Yá Yéil: Maybe You Know This Raven presented by X’unei Lance Twitchell, associate professor of Alaska Native Languages at the University of Alaska Southeast. Lance Twitchell carries the Tlingit names X’unei and Du Aaní Kawdinook, and the Haida name Ḵ’eijáakw. He lives in Juneau with his wife and bilingual children, and is from the Tlingit, Haida, and Yupʼik Native nations. He speaks & studies the Tlingit language, and advocates for Indigenous language revitalization. Noon, Living History Room. Free, all are welcome.

Thursday, Nov. 29

• Lecture: Highlights from a Video Archive of Yakutat Indigenous Knowledge presented by Aron Crowell, Ph.D., an Arctic/Subarctic archaeologist and anthropologist whose research and publications have focused primarily on the peoples of the Gulf of Alaska region, where he is currently leading an NSF-funded study of the human and environmental history of Yakutat Bay in partnership with the Yakutat Tlingit Tribe. Crowell is the Alaska director of the Smithsonian Institution’s Arctic Studies Center in Anchorage and curator of the Center’s collaborative exhibition Living Our Cultures, Sharing Our Heritage: The First Peoples of Alaska. Noon, Living History Room. Free, all are welcome.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. Its goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.

CONTACT: Amy Fletcher, SHI Media and Publications Director, 907.586.9116, amy.fletcher@sealaska.com