Doctoral Dissertation Research: Yupiaq Well-Being and Fisheries Management in Southwest Alaska

University Of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison WI

Investigators

Abstract

When many Alaskan Natives describe factors important to their health and well-being, they speak about sustaining relationships with fish and wildlife. Statistics about well-being, morbidity, and mortality of Alaska Natives have been collected by the State of Alaska and federal agencies that manage fish and wildlife, but the collected data are often limited in their definition of well-being to state and federal specifications. Expanding upon fourteen months of ethnographic research in an Alaska Native (Yupiaq) village in rural southwest Alaska, this project explores these definitions further and focuses on how salmon are central to Yupiaq peoples' understandings and experiences of well-being. This research analyzes how resource management policy can affect the well-being of Yupiaq peoples and how the management of fisheries in the State of Alaska is related to Yupiaq food security and health. This study sheds light on Yupiaq peoples' understandings and experiences of well-being that broaden conceptions of health and illness beyond standard medical categories. This ethnographic research has three primary objectives: 1) to investigate the relationship between well-being and fisheries management among Yupiaq peoples; 2) to assess the effects of salmon fishing and related practices on well-being; and 3) to understand peoples' relative capacity to obtain and maintain well-being in the contexts of fishing regulations and declining Chinook salmon populations. This project employs quantitative methods, including participant observation, interviews, and focus groups. Data include transcripts and recordings from interviews and focus groups, in addition to field notes on fishing and other aspects of daily life. The researchers draw upon scholarship on human-animal relations within anthropology to provide insights into how Yupiaq peoples' understandings and experiences of well-being encompass not only physical and material dimensions of fishing, but also cultural and social dimensions. This knowledge is critical not only because Alaska Natives experience severely high rates of morbidity and mortality, but also because statistics can often obscure everyday practices of resilience and care in rural Alaska. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.