West Cook Inlet: Ethnographic Overview and Assessment for Lake Clark National Park and Preserve
Stanek RT, Fall JA, Holen DL. 2007. West Cook Inlet: Ethnographic Overview and Assessment for Lake Clark National Park and Preserve. Ethnographic Overview and Assessment
This report describes the culture and history of the people and communities of western Cook Inlet, southcentral Alaska. A primal'f goal is to identify the traditional and contemporary associations between the people and communities of western Cook Inlet and the Lake Clark National Park and Preserve. The Division of Subsistence of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game prepared this report under a cooperative agreement with the lake Clark National Park and Preserve (Cooperative Agreement No. CA9088A0008). This report is part of the overall l ake Clark National Park and Preserve Ethnographic Overview and Assessment. The research featured working With the people of Tyonek, the single remaining Oena'ina community of west Cook Inlet. The Park and the entJre west Cook Inlet area share a common cultural heritage - that of the Dena'ina Athabascans. The Dena'ina of Cook Inlet most likely arrived on the Pacific Coast from the area now occupied by the inland Dena'ina associated with the Park. The two Dena'ina regional bands of west Cook Inlet, the Tubughna ("Beach People") and the Qezdaghdna ("Point People"), maintained cultural and economic ties with inland Dena'ina communities, as evidenced by a common language, place names, social organization, and belief system. Trade of subsistence products, intermarriage, and participation in ceremonies such as the potlatch supported these ties. A common history also links coastal Cook Inlet and the inland communities in and near the Park, beginning with the establishment of the fur trade by the Russians. The fur trade built upon established Dena'ina subsistence patterns, traditional knowledge, and social relationships. Connections between Dena'ina communities were likely enhanced as traditional routes through passes and along the coast facilitated travel to trading posts at Tyonek or across Cook Inlet at Kenai. Results included the exchange of goods and ideas, intermamage, and the expanded transactional activities of Dena'ina political leaders and middlemen called qeshqa.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Stanek, Ronald; Fall, James; Holen, Davin
- Date of Issue
- 2007
- Units
- HIST , LACL
- Keywords
- Belief System, Commercial Fishing, Demography, ehistory, Fur Trade, History, Minerals, Mining, Organization, Population, Religion, tradition