We Have a Partnership with Nature

To the coastal Tlingit people, home is the narrow mainland coast, islands, bays, and fjords of southeast Alaska. The people reside in the dynamic region where the land meets the sea, building their villages on narrow rock beaches wedged between the tidewater and the dense forests rising into lofty mountains, an area of human occupation for the last 10,000 years. Heavy rainfall creates a luxurious rainforest environment and a temperate climate.

Tlingit villages have always faced the sea. The peoples' lives revolve around the harvest from the sea outside the front door and from the forests and rivers outside the back door. The waters of southeast Alaska provide one of the richest maritime environments in the world. As the Tlingit people make their seasonal rounds, they catch fish and sea mammals and collect shellfish and sea plants.

The Pacific salmon is preferred above all other fish. Every year five different species of salmon follow one another in succession, journeying from the sea to swim upriver.

Halibut fishing requires the greatest ritual attention because it is the most dangerous fishing activity. The halibut grows to be the largest and most powerful fish in the region.

In the past, fishermen used a specially carved hook, weighted by a rock and suspended downward, so the halibut would see its decoration and be influenced by it. Today Tlingit fishermen still believe that success in fishing depends on the willingness of the fish to make itself available to humans. In selecting the image to carve on the hook, fishermen often chose a powerful creature, perhaps itself a good fisher. Its spirit would entice the fish to the bait.

To this day, when fishing and preparing fish, Tlingit people continue to respect traditional practices

Mythology

According to Tlingit mythology, animals were once humans who were frightened into the woods and the sea by the daylight that Raven let out of a box. Traditional Tlingit people believe that people and animals are relatives who can cross into each others worlds. Animals have the ability to appear before people in human form and to interact with them in meaningful ways. In some Tlingit stories, such as The Woman Who Married the Bear, animals and humans even marry and raise families. Similarly, as in the story of Salmon Boy, humans can be transformed into animals in supernatural encounters and experience life in the animal world.

Bear, the most important land animal, typifies this relationship between humans and animals. In nature a bear behaves like a human and competes for the same resources. It can walk on its hind legs, fish for salmon, and use its dexterous paws to eat berries and nuts. When pursuing a bear, the hunter carefully carries out a special ritual, for he is killing a creature whose soul is akin to his own.

Raven also moves between the creature and human worlds, bestowing gifts yet playing tricks on humans in an extensive series of stories. He has a dual personality. As a culture hero and transformer, Raven is credited with shaping much of our world. As a trickster, he is driven to outlandish adventures by his selfishness, greed, and hunger.

Connections with the Ancestors

Crests, or emblems, of Tlingit families and clans represent creatures with whom an ancestor has interacted in the legendary past. Through purchase by the ancestor, often in exchange for his or her life, the descendants receive from the creature the right of ownership to the crest and the accompanying story, song, name, and sometimes more.

Community memory is embedded in the heirlooms that display the crests. By alluding to familiar stories, the crests evoke a rich cultural history in the same way that the Christian cross alludes to an entire spiritual tradition. Relatives identify with the objects through their genealogical connection and keep track of who has possession of the heirlooms now, who had them in the past, and who will have them in the future.

When used in ceremonies, the crest treasures refer to the ancestral spirits and even call upon the spirits represented for healing, courage, strength of purpose, and assistance in the removal of grief. When Tlingit people wear items that contain the crests they are in the presence of their ancestors.

When Many Came

Alaska's natural resources have drawn many nations to its shores. Russian, Spanish, French, British, and American explorers and fur traders all arrived in their sailing ships in the last quarter of the 1700s. At first Russia dominated the market, establishing fur trading headquarters in southeast Alaska. Tlingit elders still tell the story of their ancestors' first meeting with white men. Except for introducing diseases, early trading encounters did not greatly interrupt traditional Tlingit life.

The United States purchase of Alaska in 1867 brought settlers, missionaries, educators, gold prospectors, and fish canneries. This influx of outside philosophies and economic interests severely impacted Tlingit land ownership, language, culture, and self-esteem.

Alaskan Tlingit people have a unique status in the United States as a result of their historic Indian rights movement that began early in the twentieth century. As a result of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, Tlingit people do not reside on reservations but are shareholders in their own regional corporation, Sealaska Corporation, and a dozen smaller village corporations that manage tribal lands and natural resource enterprises.