The Yupʼik or Yupiaq (singular and plural) and Yupiit or Yupiat (plural), also Central Alaskan Yupʼik, Central Yupʼik, Alaskan Yupʼik (own name Yupʼik sg Yupiik dual Yupiit pl; Russian: Юпики центральной Аляски), are an Indigenous people of western and southwestern Alaska ranging from southern Norton Sound southwards along the coast of the Bering Sea on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta (including living on Nelson and Nunivak Islands) and along the northern coast of Bristol Bay as far east as Nushagak Bay and the northern Alaska Peninsula at Naknek River and Egegik Bay. They are also known as Cupʼik by the Chevak Cupʼik dialect-speaking people of Chevak and Cupʼig for the Nunivak Cupʼig dialect-speaking people of Nunivak Island.
The Yupiit are the most numerous of the various Alaska Native groups and speak the Central Alaskan Yupʼik language, a member of the Eskimo–Aleut family of languages. As of the 2010 U.S. Census, the Yupiit population in the United States numbered over 34,000 people, of whom over 22,000 lived in Alaska. The vast majority of these live in the seventy or so communities in the traditional Yupʼik territory of western and southwestern Alaska.U.S. Census Bureau. (2004-06-30). "Table 16. American Indian and Alaska Native Alone and Alone or in Combination Population by Tribe for Alaska: 2000". American Indian and Alaska Native Tribes for the United States, Regions, Divisions, and States (PHC-T-18). U.S. Census Bureau, Census 2000, special tabulation. Retrieved on 2007-04-12. About 10,000 speak the language.Alaska Native Language Center. (2001-12-07). "Central Alaskan Yupʼik." University of Alaska Fairbanks. Retrieved on 2014-04-04. The Yupʼik had the greatest number of people who identified with one tribal grouping and no other race (29,000).2010 Census Shows Nearly Half of American Indians and Alaska Natives Report Multiple Races In that census, nearly half of American Indians and Alaska Natives identified as being of mixed race.
Yupʼik, Cupʼik, and Cupʼig speakers can converse without difficulty, and the regional population is often described using the larger term of Yupʼik. They are one of the four Yupik peoples of Alaska and Siberia, closely related to the Sugpiaq ~ Alutiiq (Pacific Yupik) of south-central Alaska, the Siberian Yupik of St. Lawrence Island and Russian Far East, and the Naukan of Russian Far East.
The Yupʼik combine a contemporary and a traditional subsistence lifestyle in a blend unique to the Southwest Alaska. Today, the Yupʼik generally work and live in western style but still hunt and fish in traditional subsistence ways and gather traditional foods. Most Yupʼik people still speak the native language and bilingual education has been in force since the 1970s.
The neighbours of the Yupʼik are the Iñupiaq to the north, Aleutized Alutiiq ~ Sugpiaq to the south, and Alaskan Athabaskans, such as Yupikized Holikachuk and Deg Hitʼan, non-Yupikized Koyukon and Denaʼina, to the east.
Naming Originally, the singular form was used in the northern area (Norton Sound, Yukon, some Nelson Island) while the form was used in the southern area (Kuskokwim, Canineq [around Kwigillingok, Kipnuk, Kongiganak, and Chefornak], Bristol Bay). Certain places (Chevak, Nunivak, Egegik) have other forms: , , and .
The form is now used as a common term (though not replacing and ).Jacobson, Steven A. (2012). Yupʼik Eskimo Dictionary, 2nd edition. Alaska Native Language Center. comes from the Yupʼik word , meaning 'person', plus the postbase (or ), meaning 'real' or 'genuine'; thus, literally means 'real person'.Fienup-Riordan, 1993, p. 10. The ethnographic literature sometimes refers to the Yupʼik people or their language as Yuk or Yuit. In the Hooper Bay-Chevak and Nunivak dialects of Yupʼik, both the language and the people are given the name .
The use of an apostrophe in the name , compared to Siberian , exemplifies Central Yupʼik orthography: "The apostrophe represents gemination [or lengthening] of the 'p' sound."Steven A. Jacobson (1984). Central Yupʼik and the Schools: A Handbook for Teachers . Alaska Native Language Center. Developed by Alaska Department of Education Bilingual/Bicultural Education Programs. Juneau, Alaska, 1984.
+ 'Person/People (Human Being)' and Ethnic Self-Name in Yupʼik DialectsDialectSingularDualPluralSingularDualPluralNorton Sound (Unaliq-Pastuliq) (< ) ~ General Central Yupʼik () (< ) ~ Chevak () Nunivak () Egegik ~
The following are names given to them by their neighbors. Alutiiq ~ Sugpiaq: (Northern Kodiak), (Southern Kodiak) Deg Xinag Athabaskan: [lit. 'downriver people'], [lit. 'coast people'] Holikachuk Athabaskan: [lit. 'coast people'] Iñupiaq: Koyukon Athabaskan: [lit. 'coast people'] Denaʼina Athabaskan: , Upper Kuskokwim Athabaskan: sg. , pl.
History
Origins The common ancestors of the Yupik and the Aleut (as well as various Paleo-Siberian groups) are believed by archaeologists to have their origin in eastern Siberia. Migrating east, they reached the Bering Sea area about 10,000 years ago.Naske and Slotnick, 1987, p. 18. Research on blood types and linguistics suggests that the ancestors of American Indians reached North America in waves of migration before the ancestors of the Eskimo and Aleut; there were three major waves of migration from Siberia to the Americas by way of the Bering land bridge.Naske and Slotnick, 1987, pp. 9–10. This causeway became exposed between 20,000 and 8,000 years ago during periods of glaciation.
By about 3,000 years ago the progenitors of the Yupiit had settled along the coastal areas of what would become western Alaska, with migrations up the coastal rivers—notably the Yukon and Kuskokwim—around 1400 C.E., eventually reaching as far upriver as Paimiut on the Yukon and Crow Village (Tulukarugmiut) on the Kuskokwim.
For centuries, the Yup'ik had fought amongst each other in the Bow and Arrow Wars. According to oral traditions, they may have begun a thousand or 300 years ago, with various different theories as to how the wars begun. Yup'ik tribes constantly raided each other and destroyed villages. The excavation site of a Yup'ik village, Nunalleq, indicates that it was burned down sometime in the seventeenth century. These wars ultimately ended in the 1830s and 1840s with the establishment of Russian colonialism.
Before a Russian colonial presence emerged in the area, the Aleut and Yupik spent most of their time sea-hunting animals such as seals, walruses, and sea lions. They used mainly wood, stone, or bone weapons and had limited experience fishing. Families lived together in large groups during the winter and split up into smaller huts during the summer.
United States colonization The United States purchased Alaska from the Russian Empire on March 30, 1867. Originally organized as the Department of Alaska (1867–1884), the area was renamed as the District of Alaska (1884–1912) and the Territory of Alaska (1912–1959) before it was admitted to the Union as the State of Alaska (1959–present).
During the Early American Period (1867–1939), the federal government generally neglected the territory, other than using positions in territorial government for political patronage. There was an effort to exploit the natural resources in the years following the purchase of Alaska. Moravian Protestant (1885) and Jesuit Catholic (1888) missions and schools were established along the Kuskokwim and lower Yukon rivers, respectively. The Qasgiq, ceremonial buildings for Yup'ik men, disappeared due to missionary coercion. During the early American period, native languages were forbidden in mission schools, where only English was permitted.Sybil M. Lassiter (1998), Cultures of Color in America: A Guide to Family, Religion, and Health. Greenwood Press.
The economy of the islands also took a hit under American ownership. Hutchinson, Cool & Co., an American trading company, took advantage of its position as the only trader in the area and charged the natives as much as possible for its goods. The combination of high costs and low hunting and fishing productivity persisted until the Russo-Japanese war cut off contact with Russia.
The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) was signed into law on December 18, 1971. The ANCSA is central to both Alaska's history and current Alaska Native economies and political structures.Marie Lowe (2007), Socioeconomic Review of Alaska's Bristol Bay Region. Prepared for North Star Group. Institute of Social and Economic Research, University of Alaska Anchorage.
Historiography Before European contact (until the 1800s), the history of the Yupʼik, like that of other Alaska Natives, was oral tradition. Each society or village had storytellers (qulirarta) who were known for their memories, and those were the people who told the young about the group's history. Their stories (traditional legends qulirat and historical narratives qanemcit) express crucial parts of Alaska's earliest history.
The historiography of the Yupʼik ethnohistory, as a part of Eskimology, is slowly emerging. The first academic studies of the Yupʼik tended to generalize all "Eskimo" cultures as homogeneous and changeless.Ahnie Marie Al'aq David Litecky (2011), The Dwellers between: Yupʼik Shamans and Cultural Change in Western Alaska. Thesis. The University of Montana
While the personal experiences of non-natives who visited the Indigenous people of what is now called Alaska formed the basis of early research, by the mid-20th century archaeological excavations in southwestern Alaska allowed scholars to study the effects of foreign trade goods on 19th-century Eskimo material culture. Also, translations of pertinent journals and documents from Russian explorers and the Russian-American Company added breadth to the primary source base. The first ethnographic information about the Yupʼik of the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta was recorded by the Russian explorer Lieutenant Lavrenty Zagoskin, during his explorations for the Russian-American Company in 1842–1844.
The first academic cultural studies of southwestern Alaskan Indigenous people were developed only in the late 1940s. This was due in part to a dearth of English-language documentation, as well as competition in the field of other subject areas. American anthropologist Margaret Lantis (1906–2006) published The Social Culture of the Nunivak Eskimo in 1946; it was the first complete description of any Alaskan indigenous group. She began Alaskan Eskimo Ceremonialism (1947) as a broad study of Alaskan Indigenous people. James W. VanStone (1925–2001), an American cultural anthropologist, and Wendell H. Oswalt were among the earliest scholars to undertake significant archaeological research in the Yupʼik region. VanStone demonstrates the ethnographic approach to cultural history in Eskimos of the Nushagak River: An Ethnographic History (1967). Wendell Oswalt published a comprehensive ethnographic history of the Yukon–Kuskokwim delta region, the longest and most detailed work on Yupʼik history to date in Bashful No Longer: An Alaskan Eskimo ethnohistory, 1778–1988 (1988). Ann Fienup-Riordan (born 1948) began writing extensively about the Yukon-Kuskokwim Indigenous people in the 1980s; she melded Yupʼik voices with traditional anthropology and history in an unprecedented fashion.
The historiography of western Alaska has few Yupʼik scholars contributing writings. Harold Napoleon, an elder of Hooper Bay, presents an interesting premise in his book Yuuyaraq: The Way of the Human Being (1988). A more scholarly, yet similar, treatment of cultural change can be found in Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley's A Yupiaq Worldview: a Pathway to Ecology and Spirit (2001), which focuses on the intersection of Western and Yupʼik values.
Yuuyaraq