We Are the Real People

Teresa and Agie John gather smelt (cikaat) from the Nelson Island coast, 1981. JHB

We call ourselves Yup'ik or "Real People." In our language, yuk means "person or "human being." Then we add pik meaning "real" or "genuine." We are the real people.

Map of the U.S. state of Alaska. The blue shaded area is home to nearly 20,000 Yup'ik Eskimos.

Today close to 20,000 Yup'ik Eskimos make their home in the Yukon-Kuskokwim delta of southwestern Alaska. The Bering Sea coast supports abundant resources, including sea and land mammals, waterfowl, and fish. Prehistorically, this abundance supported the development and spread of Inuit culture. Some scholars have called the coast the "cradle of Eskimo civilization."

Goose hunters return to Bethel, circa 1920. MA (Ger.)

Until the 1940s, a dearth of commercial resources made southwestern Alaska unattractive to non-Natives. The elders of today were born into a world very much like that of their ancestors, especially in their reliance on the harvest of fish and game.

Village of Chevak, 1995. JHB

Rapid change has come to coastal communities. The social reforms of the 1960s, the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act in 1972, and the Alaska oil boom of the 1980s supported the establishment of modern villages. Each of the modern villages have its own high school, corporation store, daily air service to the regional center of Bethel, electricity, television and telephone service, and, in some cases, running water. Despite these changes the Yup'ik language remains the first language of children born in coastal communities, and many traditions—especially dancing and elaborate community gift-giving—remain living links to the past.

Albert Atchak holds a dance stick and acts as dance director while younger members of the Chevak dance group perform. Cama-i Festival, March 1994. JHB

Yup'ik people remain one of the most traditional groups of native Americans, with an interest both in preserving their past and in carrying vital traditions--such as dancing and mask-making--into the future.