Did the Russians or the Americans have any claim to any part of Alaska at all? Did they have a legitiment claim when they had lived in their settlements for a few generations? Is there a claim on Alaska for Americans, or should they leave? At which point are grievences of the past, and at which point are grievences an issue that has to be resolved? At which point should we fight for our rights,and at which point should we forget and end the fight?
What is our duty now?
Another point I would like to make: I do not think the Russians or Americans ruled in the best way. Their governments supported, actively and by silence, some of the evil actions of their people here, on purpose or by accident. I do not think that Americans or Russians in Alaska are bad by definition, but that they did not always rule well. Of course, this is a broad statement. There were many good things done by good leaders, but that I do think there were a lot of mistakes made about what to do with the Native people. I think that there were many good people in Alaska, both Russian, American, and Native, but that justice did not happen until recently, for the most part, concerning Alaska Native Claim Settlement.
I Didn't mean to say that now was the time to forget about it, per say, but I would like to hear peoples opinion on this subject
ReplyDeleteIf I really think about it, I don't believe Russia or America ever owned Alaska. That it's still purely Alaskan Native lands. The Russians came over, decided that they owned the land, and then sold the land to the Americans. The Alaskan Natives never sold their land.
ReplyDeleteOn another prospective, Alaskan Natives didn't own the state. They owned several acres of land, they had winter camps, summer camps, fall camps, and spring camps. Each of those camps came with an area of land that they fished, hunted, or gathered food and tools from. That meant that patches of the land didn't belong to anyone but the animals. Like how people own a house and property. They own an area of land but the rest of the land belongs to someone else or no one at all. Yet the U.S. own the whole state and all the land in it. So there are two ownerships, a person owns this part of the land and they can kick the president and all the government's representatives off their land for all they care. The government owns that state and the land in it, including your property, but instead of owning it personally, they more so seem to own it on a wider basis where they impose their believes, values, and ideas on that land while another government own this other land where they impose their believes, values, and ideas but can't impose those ideas with the land that belongs to another government. If that makes any sense. Perhaps Russia did own it as a government and America does currently own it as a government, and so imposes their ideas, values, and believes on us and fight to keep us away from other governments.
Either way, I still see it as natives losing land as they did lose land they traditionally used. The ideas of these new governments hurt their culture and tradition. I believe we should continue to hold our own on native rights and traditions, but except that we are progressing into the future and so changes are occurring.
I agree with that sentiment. I just think that nowadays, you do not have the government activly influencing the beliefs and values of Native people. Instead, I see a widespread expression of ideas on a personal measure, person influencing person, idea influencing idea, with the government standing back and not upholding a winner.
ReplyDeletei strongly agree with this BLOG statement. i dont think the Russians or Americans actions were the best and yes they have made mistakes. such as the Russians they enslaved some Natives and "traded" with them. but at one point my people (the Tlingits) fought the Russians and that outcome was devastating to both sides. i think that the name of the fight was the Battle of Sitka. or it was at least near there and in the end the Russians took it back with a fleet of Navel Battleships.
ReplyDeleteI agree. What I was saying was that the Russians should have stayed in the settlements on the lands the Natives allowed them and to not pursue any sort of dominion over Natives
ReplyDeleteWell i never known the the Tlingits fought with the Russians. And we never wanted to sell our land that we have been using for many many years. Vashti I totally agree with you we must keep our traditions and cultures.
ReplyDeleteIf the Russians did not land on Alaskan shore, there would be one less exposure to alcohol to the Alaska Native population. It was the Russians who exposed alcohol to the Alaska Natives and it was even documented on how they had to cut off the alcohol supply due to the locals heavy drinking. It would have been much better if Russians did not accidently discover Alaska at all, it could have prevented many harmful things that happened to Alaska Natives as a whole. And I kind of rambled on but it wasn't the Russians or Americans land in the beginning, they easily looked past us and assumed control because the Alaska Natives were a "savage race."
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