Bashful No Longer

Traditionally the Kuskokwim Eskimos of southwestern Alaska valued restraint, modesty, and deference-traits for which they adopted the English word bashful. However, since their first encounter with Western culture two hundred years ago, these people have become much less willing to defer to Westerners. Bashful No Longer-based on Russian-American Company records; writings of traders, missionaries, and explorers; newspaper accounts; and fieldwork conducted by the author-documents and describes the cultural change among the Kuskokwim Eskimos as first the Russians and then the Americans settled among them. In the early 1980s the Kuskokwim people originated the Native Alaskan sovereignty movement, not only to reaffirm their identity as Eskimos but to regain their earlier autonomy. The future of this cultural renaissance is difficult to predict, but one thing is certain: when intercultural conflict reached a critical level in their lives, the Kuskokwim Eskimos, in a far-reaching collective response, shed their bashfulness. "Bashful No Longer has performed a service, not only for all students of Alaskan history, who can benefit from this overview of the Yup'iks' past, but for all scholars who seek to understand what happens when cultures meet. Journal of American History Volume 199 in The Civilization of the American Indian Series Wendell H. Oswalt, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology, University of California, Los Angeles, is the author of This Land Was Theirs: A Study of Native North Americans and numerous books and articles on Alaskan Eskimos.