The Chugach Eskimo

Birket-Smith, Kaj

Book

The Chugach Eskimo

Nationalmuseets publikationsfond • 6 • Published In 1953 • Pages: ix, 261

By: Birket-Smith, Kaj.

Abstract
This source is the result of the First Danish-American Expedition of 1933 in which the author represented the National Museum of Denmark; he was accompanied by Dr. Frederica de Laguna who represented the University of Pennsylvania University Museum. By making use of native informants, museum collections, excavations, the accounts of early explorers, and other written sources of information, the author has attempted to reconstruct the culture of the Chugach Eskimo. Included is information on: the discovery of Prince William Sound in 1778; the Russian, British, and Spanish expeditions; geographical features; climate; flora; fauna; territory occupied; economic life; the eight tribes of the Chugach; the holdings of museums (Berlin, Copenhagen); boats; housing; tool making; decorative art; men's and women's occupations; family and kinship; property system; games and sports; festivals and feasts; musical instruments; dancing; intertribal relations; death; crime; time division; ideas about the weather; disease theory and cures; taboo and magic; concepts of the universe; shamans; and religion and folklore. The author also shows the distribution of cultural elements, traces the origins of Chugach cultural elements, and provides an outline of culture history. As a result of this investigation, the author concludes that the culture of the Chugach is Eskimo, and is based on Paleo- and Neo-Eskimo foundations with some archaic and local traits which have been modified by foreign (Asian, Alaskan interior, American Northwest Coast) influences.

Historical reconstruction

Division of labor by gender