The purpose of this page is to capture and share resources and reporting on the topics related to Alaskan Native's mental health. The hope is that this will help lead to further discussions on the topic with an underlying hope that circumstances will improve through updated policy actions that potentially include increases in infrastructure funding. With respect and dignity to human life, we have consolidated many valuable sources that provide insight and a starting point to understanding different aspects of "Indian Country".
Introduction
The Aleut Region in Alaska is home to the Native Aleut (a-lē-ˈüt) Peoples. There are mental health disparities that have become a contemporary part of their culture. In looking broadly at the issues, it can be seen that PTSD is part of the explanatory model that then sheds light on such issues as alcoholism in the older generations and now includes substance abuse within the younger generations.
History and Culture
The earliest settlers, now known as the Paleo-Aleuts, arrived in the region now known as the Aleutian Islands around 4,000 years ago. Russian fur traders gave the name Aleut to the Unanganin people. This traditional name means “original people”. The Aleut are culturally and linguistically related to the Inuit Eskimo. The Aleut population was estimated to have an inclusive population of around 25,000 prior to colonial contact. Their population dropped to a low of 2,000 after disease decimated their population. By the 1990 Census, the population was a reported 11,941 with approximately 17,000 people identifying with Aleut ancestry (Alaskan Natives, 2020). In 1741, the Russian government sent Vitus Bering and Aleksei Chirikov to explore the Alaskan coast, and they claimed the territory for Russia and eventually sold the territory that now comprises Alaska to the United States in 1867 (Henson, 2008). In the 1820s, the Russian-American Company resettled many of the Aleut families from the broader region to the Commander and Pribilof Islands, where Aleut communities continue to reside (Alaskan Natives, 2020). Although few Russian actually settled in Alaska, those who did had a considerable impact on the indigenous peoples they encountered (Henson, 2008). By, 1910, the Russian presence, though few in numbers, resulted in few full-blooded Aleut remaining. The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971 (ANCSA) saw the beginning of the Aleut Corporation. At the inception, only about 2,000 enrollees could prove the ¼ blood quantum (Alaskan Natives, 2020).
Collaboration and Findings
Overall health, that includes mental health, is influenced by many factors. These factors include the social determinants of health. The CDC identifies that economic and social conditions influence the health of a community and the social determinants that are factors in this include: early childhood development, education, employment and employment status, food security, access to health care, living conditions, income level, social inclusion or exclusion, residential segregation, language, culture, and the digital divide (CDC, 2020). The following paragraphs give insight to disparities (past and ongoing) that are demonstrative of the social determinants of health and that shed light on their broader implications to the overall mental health of Alaskan Native populations, including the Aleut.
The engagement in subsistence activities such as, hunting, fishing and gathering, is a core cultural identity for many Alaskan Natives. In addition to the cultural aspect, these activities are also a source of cash income for communities. In the 1990s, the subsistence harvest averaged 375 pounds per person – that was almost doubled in western and interior Alaskan communities. The ability to be economically self-sufficient contributes to the overall well-being across cultural and social dimensions (Henson, 2008). The salmon population has decreased by almost a third due to increased ecological and industrial practices. The limited availability of the salmon can add to both economical and food stability factors in conjunction with mental health.
Another example of a stress causing determinate can be seen with the collapse of the canned salmon industry in Southeast Alaska caused the abandonment of most of the non-native towns in the region, resulting largely from the lack of local population (or some segment of population) willing to bear (or who could be made to bear) the rapidly increasing costs of social reproduction caused by the closure of every small town’s main industry (Dombrowski, 2003, p.372-372). Additionally, until the brief timber boom late in the 1980s, most native villages had significant population losses. And, showed signs of strains in the ability of villages to successfully reproduce themselves: rises in the levels of poverty, the undermining of household health and well-being, the disappearance of almost all commercial fishing and fish processing enterprises, the collapse of village based tribal governments and Indian Reorganization Act organizations, high levels of suicide and alcoholism, and rising levels of welfare dependency (Dombrowski, 2003, p.372).
The unbelievable stress that comes from being removed or relocated from your homeland is described, “Those who experienced what some have called the genocide of their culture and removal from their lands, natural resources, and specific ecosystems on which their belief systems were intricately connected were also generationally traumatized by the violence and unresolved grief. This is evidenced today in the high rates of social problems and illness that confront Native American youth as they search for their identity. Maria Yellow Horse Brave Heart and Lemyra De Bruyn, in researching the lives of survivors of the Jewish Holocaust suggest that grief, if left unresolved, contributes to the extreme rates of disorder and illness that are seen among Native American peoples today.” (Calabrese, 2013, p.256).
Additionally, “In the context of Colonial domination, Native Americans focused on cultural revitalization and self-healing movements, such as the well-known Lakota Ghost Dance, which resulted in genocide and religious persecution. This led eventually to the creation of the Native American Church as a new religious movement. Its emphasis is on personal transformation that would help people to survive the postconquest world, rebuilding communities and avoiding postcolonial disorders, such as addiction to the alcohol introduced by the colonizers. This followed the theological guidelines of the religious traditions of most Native American cultures, which emphasized living a balanced spiritual life and often focused on the beneficence of the natural world and the responsibility to care for nature and their specific ecosystems.” (Calabrese, 2013, p. 256).
“A discussion of mental health of Unangan/s in the Aleutian and Pribilof Islands would be incomplete without discussing the problems these communities do face, such as substance abuse, which is strongly associated with suicide completion in other Indigenous groups" (Hicks, 2007). Substance abuse in Aleutian and Pribilof communities is pervasive and damaging but has received limited attention from the social- science community (with some exceptions: e.g. Berreman 1956; Reedy-Maschner 2010). Reedy has observed a shift in Unangax communities from experiencing a predominantly alcohol- based problem to one of alcohol use combined with increasing use of illegal and prescription drugs, a sentiment echoed by Jennifer Harrison (personal communication, 2016) at Eastern Aleutian Tribes.” (O’Rourke et al, 2018).
The above information provides insight to the historical context of how the community has gotten to where they are. There are positive initiatives surfacing. The CDC has a survey, the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. The purpose of the survey is to collect information on health conditions and behaviors. What the survey fails to do is to provide culturally adapted surveys that would serve the Native Tribes and Alaskan Natives. The Urban Indian Health Institute has implemented their own survey called, Caring for Our Urban Native Truth (COUNT). It uses information collected is being used to evaluate a number of factors, including disparities in health outcomes, behaviors and risk factors. The goal is to implement interventions grounded in indigenous values (UIHI, 2020). This is an example of some of the positive assets the Tribes are using to further their advantages going forward
While conducting research on the mental health disparities of the Aleut region our goal was not to strictly assemble a list of problems or issues with possible recommendations. But to identify the strength and endurance of a population that has faced severe adversity throughout generations. Alaska’s unforgiving climate and natural secluded beauty has captured the eye of some of the world’s most amazing scientist and researchers. Even with the amount of reporting and information that exist there is yet to be discovered, in our opinion, a more resilient culture who still remain on their ancestral homelands.
The Indian Health Service (IHS) is an agency within the Department of Health and Human services. The IHS maintains that it strives for “maximum tribal involvement in meeting the health needs of its service population, who live mainly on or near reservations and in rural communities.”(IHS, 2020) https://www.ihs.gov/newsroom/factsheets/disparities/
Henson, E. C. (2008). The state of the Native nations: conditions under U.S. policies of self-determination: the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development. New York: Oxford University Press.
Calabrese, J. D. (2013). A different medicine: postcolonial healing in the Native American Church. New York: Oxford University Press.
O'Rourke, Sean R., Nadine Kochuten, Chantae Kochuten, and Katherine L. Reedy. "Cultural Identity, Mental Health, and Suicide Prevention: What Can We Learn from Unangax Culture?" Arctic Anthropology 55, no. 1 (2018): 119-141. https://www.muse.jhu.edu/article/711943
Dombrowski, K. (2008). A companion to the anthropology of American Indians. (T. Biolsi, Ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub. Ch. 19: 360–382.
