CAST 237 - Alaska Natives and the Environment

FC SSCI CD

4 credits
Alaska is home to twelve Indigenous linguistic and cultural groups and over 220 of the federally recognized tribes in the United States. Their homelands in what is now known as the state of Alaska are as environmentally and ecologically diverse as they are. Since time immemorial they have developed and adapted complex social, political, economic, and epistemological structures and systems that inform their daily lives, identities, and relationships to each other and the homelands they share with countless other-than-human relatives. This diversity has attracted European and Euro-American corporate interests since the mid 18th century as they sought to exploit the region’s fur seal, whale, salmon, minerals, timber, and oil. This course will examine the impacts of this long history of capitalist extractivism in the broader context of global climate change, focusing on the strategies Alaska Native communities developed to guarantee their political and cultural survival throughout the 21st century and beyond.

Community-Based Learning
Sustainability
This course is appropriate for new students.
This course is cross-listed with ENVS-237