Riordan

Staff

Ann Fienup-Riordan, Research Associate

An independent scholar, Ann Fienup-Riordan received her Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from the University of Chicago in 1980. She has lived, worked, and taught in Alaska since 1973. During the last twenty years, she has changed the way she works in response to changing needs. In 1976-77 she carried out field work on Nelson Island in the "classic" anthropological tradition of participant observation, publishing the results in her first book, The Nelson Island Eskimo. Since then she has been involved in half-a-dozen collaborative research projects including work for the Association of Village Council Presidents, the Yupiit Nation, the Toksook Bay Traditional Council, and most recently for the Coastal-Yukon Mayors' Association and the Anchorage Museum of History and Art in their efforts to organize the Yup'ik mask exhibit "Agayuliyararput: Our Way of Making Prayer".

In 1978 when her daughter Frances was born, she came to the conclusion that of the three things she wanted to do -- write, teach, and raise kids -- she could juggle no more than two. She has since divided her time between research and writing projects Eskimo Essays, The Real People and the Children of Thunder, Boundaries and Passages, Freeze Frame: Alaska Eskimos in the Movies, and The Living Tradition of Yup'ik Masks, and her children, Frances, Jimmy and Nicky. In recognition of her work in the field, she was named "Alaska Humanist" by the Alaska Humanities Forum and 1991 "Historian of the Year." At present she is working with the Association of Village Council Presidents on an NSF funded project "Elders in Museums: Standing Fieldwork on it's Head."

Education

Ph.D., Cultural Anthropology, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois. 1980

M.A., Cultural Anthropology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan. 1973.

B.A., Religious Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan. 1971.

Experience

Associate Editor, Arctic Anthropology

Editorial Board, Etudes/Inuit/Studies

Research Associate, Smithsonian Institution

Research grant from the National Science Foundation. Project Title: Yup'ik Elders in Museums: Central Yup'ik Indigenous Knowledge Project. January 1997-December 2000.

Curator, Agayuliyararput: The Living Tradition of Yup'ik Masks, Exhibit at the Anchorage Museum of History and Art, funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Rockefeller Foundation, January 1994-December 1996.

Research grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, National Archives. Project Title: Central Yup'ik Oral History Project. March 1992 through February 1994.

Research grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities Division of Interpretive Research. Project Title: A Comparative History of Missionary/Native Encounter in Western Alaska. July 1989 through December 1991.

Research grant from the Alaska Humanities Forum. Project Title: The History of Yup'ik Eskimo Warfare and Interpersonal Violence. July 1989 through December 1989.

Research grant from the American Association for State and Local History. Project Title: The History of Yup'ik Eskimo Warfare and Interpersonal Violence. January 1989 through September 1989.

Contributor, Smithsonian Crossroads Exhibit, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

Principal Investigator under a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities Regional Studies Program. Project Title: Social and Cultural History of the Yup'ik Eskimo of Western Alaska and Siberia. January 1985 through October 1986.

Assistant Professor, Anthropology, University of Alaska, Anchorage. September 1983 through April 1984.

Assistant Professor, Alaska Pacific University, Social Science Department, Anchorage, Alaska. 1980 through 1983.

Publications: Books

1996 The Living Tradition of Yup'ik Masks. Seattle: University of Washington Press

1995 Freeze Frame: Alaska Eskimos in the Movies. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

1994 Boundaries and Passages: Rule and Ritual in Yup'ik Eskimo Oral Tradition. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.

1991 The Real People and the Children of Thunder: The Yup'ik Eskimo Encounter with Moravian Missionaries John and Edith Kilbuck. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.

1990 Eskimo Essays: Yup'ik Lives and How We See Them. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

1988 The Yup'ik Eskimos as Described in the Travel Journals and Ethnographic Accounts of John and Edith Kilbuck, 1885-1900. Kingston, ON: Limestone Press.

1986 When Our Bad Season Comes: A Cultural Account of Subsistence Harvesting and Harvest Disruption on the Yukon Delta. Prepared for the Alaska Council on Science and Technology. Aurora Vol. 1. Alaska Anthropological Association.

1983 The Nelson Island Eskimo: Social Structure and Ritual Distribution. Anchorage, AK: Alaska Pacific University Press.

1980 Shape Up With Baby: Exercise Games for the New Parent and Child. Seattle, WA: Pennypress.

Publications: Selected Articles

1994 "Clearing the Path: Metaphors to Live by in Yup'ik Eskimo Oral Tradition." American Indian Quarterly 18(1):61-70.

1993 "Introduction" to Eskimo Artists by Hans Himmelheber. Fairbanks: University of Alaska Press.

1992 "Social Status among the Yup'ik Eskimos of the Lower Kuskokwim as told to the Reverend Arthur Butzin by Alaskuk." Anthropological Papers of the University of Alaska 24 (1- 2):33-49

1992 "Culture Change and Identity Among Alaska Natives: Retaining Control." Alaska Native Policy Papers. Institute of Social and Economic Research, University of Alaska Anchorage.

1990 "Following the Star: From the Ukraine to the Yukon." In: Russian America: The Forgotten Frontier, ed. Barbara Smith and Redmond Barnett. Tacoma, WA: Washington State Historical Society.

1990 "The Bird and the Bladder: The Cosmology of Central Yup'ik Seal Hunting." In: Hunting, Sexes, and Symbolism. Etudes/Inuit/Studies 14(1-2):233-38.

1989 "Eskimo War and Peace." In:Keynote Speeches from the Sixth Inuit Studies Conference, Copenhagen, October 1988. pp. 90-107.Jens Dahl, ed. Copenhagen: Institut for Eskimologi

1989 "The Central Yup'ik Eskimos." In: Encyclopedia of World Cultures. New Haven, Connecticut: Human Relations Area Files

Honors

1996 Award for Excellence, Museums Alaska.
1991 Alaska Historian of the Year, Alaska Historical Society
1988 Alaska History Award, Alaska Historical Society
1983 Alaska Humanist of the Year. Honor Conferred by the Alaska Humanities Forum.