Lately there has been an enormous amount of absolute crap written about Alaska. Beyond the obvious (We are the first line of defense against Putin!), there have also been all the stories running around about Alaskans getting monthly checks from the state, Alaska having enough oil to keep the country driving forever, everyone hunts everything there, everyone walks around draped in fur and we all hate polar bears.
And those are just the ones I could think of off the top of my head.
The truth, as I'm sure everyone suspects, is much more complicated. Fortunately I had two books on Alaska sitting on my shelf when Sarah Palin was added to the RNC ticket so while the madness swirled around me I was able to read the work of authors who had a clue about the state. More importantly, they wrote about life in rural Alaska - otherwise known as the bush - and showed how different that life is from urban AK. A lot of people see bush AK as something exotic but in many ways it is like life in any rural or remote area in the US, which these days means struggling against a multitude of economic issues. One interesting thing of course is the wilderness nature of much of AK which both the books I read and reviewed this month focused on a lot.
Seth Kantner lives in NW AK and his essay collection, Shopping for Porcupine, is a gorgeously illustrated (with mostly his own photographs) look at what it was like to be born and raised in the bush. I met Seth a couple of years ago when his first book, a novel based on his childhood, was published. He's done a really good job in Porcupine of showing what it is like to live a rural way of life and what is good and bad about it. Here's a bit of my review:
Kantner’s family lived a subsistence lifestyle and he writes about how subsistence has become a flashpoint for the state’s politics and a source of division between urban and rural populations. As eloquent as he is when writing about wolves, moose and caribou, his questions about hunting and subsistence carry a valuable weight to those seeking to understand the “real� Alaskan way of life. Although he uses a camera more often than rifle now, the author clearly still has a great deal of respect for a lifestyle that incorporates “wild food from the land.� But he is not so certain that claims for subsistence hunting privileges are fair when balanced against reliance on “Hondas and Arctic Cats and airplanes� and when enjoyed by those who “eat chicken more often than muskrat.� The definition of life in the Bush has changed radically in the days since he was born and while tradition demands one thing, modern living tends to veer in another direction. Kantner is as conflicted as anyone else on this subject but he bravely asks the questions and voices the concerns that usually go unheard. When you couple this with his observations about the changing climate in his “backyard,� the book becomes a powerful exploration of our rapidly evolving world and a primer for understanding the dichotomy between the two strongest versions of Alaskan life.
Shopping for Porcupine is truly a beautiful book and I highly recommend it.
I also reviewed Karsten Heuer's Being Caribou which is a nature title like few others. Karsten and his wife Leanne decided to follow the Porcupine caribou herd on their annual migration from Canada to the calving grounds in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The herd treads on very political ground as ANWR is a flashpoint in the argument for drilling. Gov. Palin wants very much to drill there but Congress has consistently (albeit barely) voted against opening the refuge, largely because of the herd. Heuer, a wildlife biologist, wanted to see just how much the caribou relied on their migration and how significant ANWR is to the herd. It was a brutal journey (they also made a documentary) and very much worthy of the cover blurb from Farley Mowat. But in visiting the village of Kaktovik (physically in ANWR and pro-drilling), Heuer was able to get a firsthand look at the complexity of the drilling fight:
In need of a few days break from the hike, Heuer and Allison fly out of the Bush and stay in the small settlement on the Beaufort Sea (current population approx. 300). It is here that the many complicating issues surrounding the decision to drill or not drill come into focus. Officially, Kaktovik, which lies within ANWR, supports drilling. There are those who point to the experiences of the village of Nuiqsut, a coastal village near Prudhoe Bay, as a cautionary tale however and worry about might happen if the rigs arrive. Heuer mainly serves the role of curious visitor in these conversations, carefully navigating the territory between topics of potential economic advancement and collapsing boomtown. Back in the wilderness he and Allison must then measure the significance of the herd against the hard truths in Kaktovik’s struggles. Biologists are not certain just how oil drilling would affect the Porcupine herd (and the many animals who live off of it) and there is also the cultural consequence on the region’s Gwichin people, whose close ties to this herd in particular have led to their strong opposition to the drilling.
The Gwichin are Alaskan Natives who live primarily in the villages of Ft Yukon and Arctic Village and as much as the folks in Kaktovik want to drill, they do not. These are people who have long cultural and traditional ties to the herd so the drilling issue is personal to them. Really, it's just a complicated issue but what I liked about Being Caribou was the Heuer shows that you can't just fly over the region and think you know everything about the migration and both authors express you can't just read a few articles or watch some lame reality shows and think they tell you everything about life in the 49th state. You have to be there - actually on the ground in AK - if you want to understand it. How much time Sarah Palin has spent in the bush (and I mean in the bush - not flying over it or snowmachining through it) and looking into drilling and the caribou, I don't know. But really it doesn't matter - her opinion is only one and governor or not, there are a lot more opinions that need to be considered before a final decision can be met.
That's why we call it democracy folks - and its one of the truly great things about living in America. (And if you have ideas about democracy be sure to get a post ready for Blog the Vote on Monday, November 3rd.)
[Post pic from AK Fish & Wildlife of caribou in ANWR]
