| NSF Org: |
OPP Office of Polar Programs (OPP) |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | July 11, 2017 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | July 11, 2017 |
| Award Number: | 1738508 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Colleen Strawhacker
colstraw@nsf.gov (703)292-7432 OPP Office of Polar Programs (OPP) GEO Directorate for Geosciences |
| Start Date: | July 15, 2017 |
| End Date: | June 30, 2019 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $17,833.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $17,833.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
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| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
1776 E 13TH AVE EUGENE OR US 97403-1905 (541)346-5131 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
P. O. Box 69 Quinhagak AK US 99655-0069 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
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| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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| Parent UEI: |
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| NSF Program(s): | ASSP-Arctic Social Science |
| Primary Program Source: |
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| Program Reference Code(s): |
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| Program Element Code(s): |
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| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.078 |
ABSTRACT
The goal of this project is to collect information about gender and Yup'ik lifeways of the past from residents of Quinhagak, Alaska, and to apply this knowledge to archaeological interpretations of social life at the pre-contact site of Nunalleq. Interviews with Yup'ik residents of Quinhagak will focus on how Yup'ik communities defined gender in the past, and how gendered identities may be visible archaeologically in the artifacts and built spaces of Nunalleq. Using community knowledge as the cornerstone for archaeological interpretations ensures that Yup'ik perspectives are honored in the research process and that gendered social identities are considered in a complex and contextual manner. As a community-based project, this research is part of a larger disciplinary movement towards Indigenous community involvement in the planning and implementation of archaeological projects and the interpretation and analysis of resultant data. The benefits of such approaches are myriad: not only does community-based research attend to the specific needs and conditions of Indigenous communities (many of whom are marginalized), but such strategies often result in more robust and publically-relevant research questions and analysis. Together, the Nunalleq site and the neighboring community of Quinhagak provide a unique opportunity for community-based research on gender. Located just a few miles outside of Quinhagak, Nunalleq has long been a fixture in local histories, and its links to the 13th-17th century Bow and Arrow wars connect it to a broader regional heritage that has been little explored. Nunalleq has been subject to remarkable permafrost preservation, with artifacts of unusual quality being recovered in very high numbers. The confluence of having high-quality archaeological data alongside a community with knowledge of and interest in the site creates an ideal setting for community-based research on gender and social identities, themes that are best explored with robust archaeological and oral historical data. That themes of gender and social identity have received little attention in regional archaeological studies further suggests the importance of this study, as does Nunalleq's status as an archaeological resource increasingly threatened by environmental change.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
This grant was used to fund ethnographic and collections-based field work in Quinhagak, Alaska that provided data for Co-PI Sloan's doctoral dissertation. Sloan's research examines the gender and social identities of past inhabitants of the Nunalleq site, a pre-contact Yup'ik settlement located on Alaska's Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta that was primarily occupied between the late 16th and 17th centuries AD. This site is currently the subject of an interdisciplinary collaborative research effort by archeologists from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland and the village of Quinhagak, and Sloan works alongside these colleagues for her dissertation.
The primary goals of this research were to 1) document Quinhagak community understandings of gender and social life in the present and the past, and 2) utilize this community-derived ethnographic data to assess Nunalleq's material culture from a perspective grounded in local Yup'ik values, ideas, and philosophies. In order to accomplish this, Sloan engaged in two main research activities over the course of two field seasons: semi-structured ethnographic interviews with Quinhagak residents, and stylistic analysis of Nunalleq artifacts.
In 2017, Sloan spent five weeks in Quinhagak using a semi-structured interview format to collect ethnographic data from Yup'ik residents on a multitude of subjects, including gender categories; traditional Yup'ik gender roles; perceptions of gender in Yup'ik society; Yup'ik social identities outside of gender; and how subsistence practices, space, and material culture relate to gender and social identity for Yup'ik people. This research was predicated upon the idea that Indigenous peoples hold deep knowledge about their societies and those of their ancestors, and that this expertise should be honored in archaeological study. Over the life of the project, Sloan collected a total of 46 interviews with 29 women and men between the ages of 24 and 82. Sloan's analysis of this ethnographic data suggests that themes of gendered embodiment, family affiliation, intergenerational teaching and learning, and subsistence-based obligations within the household are the paramount ways that Quinhagak's Yup'ik residents conceptualize sociality.
With this knowledge, Sloan returned to the field in 2019 for three weeks of work in the Nunalleq archaeological collections, now housed locally at Quinhagak's Nunalleq Culture and Archaeology Center. Using the 2017 ethnographic data results as a guide, Sloan identified three primary artifact categories for analysis: 1) artifacts related to bodily adornment (e.g, labrets, dolls with labrets or tattoos); 2) uluaq, or women's knives, which are one of the primary tools used for gendered subsistence tasks in the household; and 3) bentwood vessels with family affiliation markings. Sloan photographed all accessible artifact specimens within the above categories, resulting in a total of 5082 images of 563 artifacts. With the help of a local research assistant, Sloan also collected 3-dimensional measurements on a subset of the labrets. Artifact analyses are ongoing, but Sloan's preliminary analysis on labrets has yielded a typology of eight styles, within which nine distinctive decorative motifs have been identified. This considerable variability within the labret assemblage suggests that people were ornamenting their faces in a multitude of ways, likely a sign of a manifold and complex social landscape.
The ethnographic and collections-based research funded by this doctoral dissertation improvement grant is contributing to a deeper understanding of the Nunalleq site and the people that once lived here, considered ancestors by Quinhagak's contemporary community. Nunalleq is a large site with abundant and remarkably preserved material culture, and is one of the only sites of this size and breadth to ever be excavated in this region. Located on an eroding bank of the Bering Sea, it is also increasingly threatened by landscape shifts brought about by climate change. As such, research on Nunalleq not only fills a considerable gap in our current archaeological knowledge of pre-contact life on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, but also contributes to better understandings of cultural resources that are now critically endangered.
The participation of the Quinhagak community has been essential to this project, and in fact crucial to its mission. Community involvement when exploring questions of social identity is necessary for good practice, because human social worlds are deeply culturally constructed. Learning from community members about these questions not only contributes to more accurate and well-rounded research, but can also play a role in instilling pride in community heritage and reaffirming cultural sovereignty. The products of this research are being shared with the village of Quinhagak: a copy of all audio-recordings will be given to Qanirtuuq, Inc., Quinhagak's village corporation, to be kept for local research purposes, along with written documentation of the interviews, including a thematic index.
Last Modified: 10/26/2019
Modified by: Anna C Sloan
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