| book details |

The Great Land: An Indigenous History of Alaska

By (author) Thomas Michael Swensen, Series edited by Charlotte CotÃ©, Series edited by Coll Thrush

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normal price: R 784.95

Price: R 706.95

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| book description |

Alaskaâ€™s past is often told through Russian and US imperial histories. In The Great Land author Thomas Michael Swensen overturns those narratives by reconstructing Alaskaâ€™s history from Indigenous perspectives, showing how Native communities forged the regionâ€™s political, economic, and cultural foundations. He constructs a timeline based on Indigenous archives, oral traditions, and Native-authored sourcesâ€”what he terms first space. Beginning with Indigenous encounters with Russian expeditions in Unangan territory in the 1740s, Swensen traces how key features of modern Alaska emerged from Indigenous labor and knowledge. The book demonstrates that after being drawn into coercive relationships with the Russian American Company, Native people navigated the territoryâ€™s transfer to the United States in 1867 and engaged democratic institutions to pursue citizenship and political influence by the early twentieth century. Across more than two and a half centuries, Alaska Native communities defined the region and stateâ€™s cultural and political lifeâ€”from designing the state flag to leading movements that culminated in the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. The book details that through statehood, Cold War tensions, and the Exxon Valdez oil spill, Indigenous people articulated cultural beliefs and practices that are central to Alaskaâ€™s political life. By framing Alaska as an Indigenous homeland rather than a colonial frontier, The Great Land offers a powerful new understanding of how Native peoples shaped the modern Alaskan state.