Aleut / Valentina Vasilʹevna Antropova [and seven others].

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Antropova, Valentina Vasilʹevna, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Eskimos--Alaska.

Eskimos.

Ethnology.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Place of Publication:

New Haven, Conn. : Human Relations Area Files, 2008.

Summary:

At the time of initial Russian contact in 1741, Aleuts occupied all the Aleutian Islands west to Attu Island, the western tip of the Alaska Peninsula, and the Shumagin Islands south of the Alaska Peninsula. In the 1990s, some thirteen Aleut villages remain, mostly in the Pribilofs and eastern Aleutians. The Aleut collection contains 44 documents published between 1785 and 1992 that cover the period from 1741, when the Russian explorer Bering discovered the Aleutians, to 1990. The accounts by and of early English, German, and Russian explorers include Cook, Sauer, Coxe, Sarychev, Langsdorf, and Pallas. The last source contains a good review of this literature. The priest Veniaminov wrote the classic ethnography of the Aleut, referred to again and again in the literature. An interest in the origins and physical anthropology of the Aleut is found in Dall, Jochelson (1925), Candella, Hrdlicka, and Laughlin (1949). The early American period (1867-1940) produced several expeditionary reports and cultural overviews of the region (Petroff, 1884; Elliot, 1886 and 1880; Jochelson, 1913; Muir, and Jochelson, 1928). More focused work included studies of hunting and head gear, basketry, folklore, and burials. The later American period (1940-1960) saw renewed fieldwork activity and studies due to the importance of the islands in the Second World War and later Cold War period. Cultural overviews are found in Quimby (1944), Collins, and Shade (1949). More specific topics examined are textiles, semaphore signals, whale poison, language, folklore, animal and plant life, pottery, harpoons, a life history, attitudes towards strangers, prehistoric art, health, anatomical terms, girl's puberty ceremony, medical lore, and social effects of technological change. In the recent period (1960-1990), one finds two more overviews (Antropova, 1964 and Lantis 1984), two studies of social change and adaptation by Jones, and an economic study of seal hunting (Veltre 1987). All but ten of the documents in this collection are excerpts.

Notes:

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.