Alexander Dolitsky: A woke professor declares a dead language to be undead, and other follies of false history

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By ALEXANDER DOLITSKY

Ethnic minorities, religious refugees, and other groups segregated by a dominant society have developed and implemented strategies and tactics to protect their national identity, religious practices, ancient traditions, and community cohesiveness.

In most cases, the tactics and strategies of these unique orthodox groups, created to secure cultural continuity and “living memory” among their members, have historic roots and have resulted from cognitive rational choices.

This process of assimilation in which an individual has changed so much as to become dissociated from the value system of his group, or in which the entire group disappears as an autonomously functioning social system is evident in today’s many ethnic minority, religious refugee, and immigrant groups in the United States, including Alaska, and, presumably, in other free democratic societies around the world.

In his article of Aug. 29 Juneau campus gives esteemed speaker invite to woman who sees racism in study of Arctic ice, Joel Davidson of the Alaska Watchman reported:

“Dr. Jen Rose Smith is a young academic who has dedicated her early career to studying Arctic ice through the critical race theory lens of colonialism, white privilege and racism. On Aug. 30, the publicly-funded University of Alaska Southeast (UAS) will host Smith for its prestigious Egan Fall Lecture Series, where Smith will pontificate on her forthcoming book, ‘Ice Geographies: The Colonial Politics of Race and Indigeneity.

“Like many emerging critical race theorists on the cultural left, Smith holds to the belief that racism, colonialism and white privilege lurk hidden in myriad corners of Western civilization, both past and present—even in our understanding of ice and kelp.”

I attended Smith’s presentation at the Egan Library in Juneau on Aug. 30. Indeed, not only are her ideas simply convoluted, but it is also false and poorly researched.

At the end of her presentation, I commented that about 15 years ago, the last fluent speaker (an elderly woman) of the Eyak language passed away. It was well documented by the Anchorage Daily News, Juneau Empire, several anthropologists in Alaska, etc.

Nevertheless, Dr. Smith was visibly offended by my comments, stating that, “It depends how you define a ‘speaker’ of languages.”

I responded that, “Speakers of languages communicate in full sentences and fluently convey messages to each other; not just limit their communication by saying ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’ or few other common words or expressions.”

I also argued that disappearance, revival and/or evolution of languages has only partially to do with colonization politics and influences of Western civilization; and many other factors and causes involved in cultural changes, including evolution, extinction and revival of languages. 

For example, while in Alaska in the mid-19th century, Russian Orthodox Bishop Ivan Veniaminov learned the Aleut language, for which he invented an alphabet and charted a grammar. 

However, Presbyterian missionaries in Alaska in the 19th and early 20th centuries were known for suppressing Native languages in Alaska, forcing Natives to speak only English.

Indeed, if languages of ethnic minorities are not institutionalized (the process of becoming a permanent or respected part of a society, system, and organization) or contribute very little to socio-economic development of the dominant culture, then those languages will eventually decline or become a symbolic representation of a given ethnic minority. It happened to many native languages in Siberia, Alaska, Africa, etc.

Yes, languages of ethnic minorities decline, change and become extinct every year worldwide. Typically, languages have become extinct because of the process of cultural assimilation leading to language shift, and the gradual abandonment of a native language in favor of a foreign lingua franca, largely those of European countries.

Israel’s revival of the authentic Hebrew language (a Semitic language—a subgroup of the Afro-Asiatic languages spoken across the Middle East) from 1948 (i.e., when Israel was re-established by the United Nations) has resulted in a gradual disappearance of the Yiddish language (West Germanic language) that was historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe.

In fact, Yiddish is a German dialect which integrates many languages, including German, Hebrew, Aramaic, and various Slavic and Romance languages. Today, Yiddish, a language of my parents and grandparents, is at the stage of extinction and its unfortunate destiny has nothing to do with colonial politics.

In her presentation, Smith argued that there are many speakers of the Eyak language left in Alaska.

Alaska Native Language Archive, however, describes it otherwise.

Eyak is not an Athabaskan language, but a coordinate sub-branch to Athabaskan in the Athabaskan-Eyak branch of the Athabaskan-Eyak-Tlingit language family. Eyak was spoken in the 19th century from Yakutat along the south-central Alaska coast to Eyak at the Copper River delta, but by the 20th century only at Eyak. It is now represented by about 50 people but no surviving fluent speakers. With the passing of Marie Smith Jones on January 21, 2008, Eyak became the first Alaska Native language to become extinct in recent history.

Frankly, most people in the audience could not understand Smith’s awkward concepts of ice, open space, and colonial politics. However, new UAS Chancellor Dr. Aparna Dileep-Nageswaran Palmer was delighted by Smith’s convoluted presentation.

In short, “Professor Jen Rose Smith” is a new version of the far-left woke ideology in our troubled country and a clear representation of the poor scholarship.

Alexander B. Dolitsky was born and raised in Kiev in the former Soviet Union. He received an M.A. in history from Kiev Pedagogical Institute, Ukraine, in 1976; an M.A. in anthropology and archaeology from Brown University in 1983; and was enroled in the Ph.D. program in Anthropology at Bryn Mawr College from 1983 to 1985, where he was also a lecturer in the Russian Center. In the U.S.S.R., he was a social studies teacher for three years, and an archaeologist for five years for the Ukranian Academy of Sciences. In 1978, he settled in the United States. Dolitsky visited Alaska for the first time in 1981, while conducting field research for graduate school at Brown. He lived first in Sitka in 1985 and then settled in Juneau in 1986. From 1985 to 1987, he was a U.S. Forest Service archaeologist and social scientist. He was an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Russian Studies at the University of Alaska Southeast from 1985 to 1999; Social Studies Instructor at the Alyeska Central School, Alaska Department of Education from 1988 to 2006; and has been the Director of the Alaska-Siberia Research Center (see www.aksrc.homestead.com) from 1990 to present. He has conducted about 30 field studies in various areas of the former Soviet Union (including Siberia), Central Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and the United States (including Alaska). Dolitsky has been a lecturer on the World Discoverer, Spirit of Oceanus, and Clipper Odyssey vessels in the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. He was the Project Manager for the WWII Alaska-Siberia Lend Lease Memorial, which was erected in Fairbanks in 2006. He has published extensively in the fields of anthropology, history, archaeology, and ethnography. His more recent publications include Fairy Tales and Myths of the Bering Strait Chukchi, Ancient Tales of Kamchatka; Tales and Legends of the Yupik Eskimos of Siberia; Old Russia in Modern America: Russian Old Believers in Alaska; Allies in Wartime: The Alaska-Siberia Airway During WWII; Spirit of the Siberian Tiger: Folktales of the Russian Far East; Living Wisdom of the Far North: Tales and Legends from Chukotka and Alaska; Pipeline to Russia; The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in WWII; and Old Russia in Modern America: Living Traditions of the Russian Old Believers; Ancient Tales of Chukotka, and Ancient Tales of Kamchatka.

22 COMMENTS

  1. Thankfully, the author of this article, a credentialled academic in his own right, has enough clarity of thought, and grasp on reality, to see things from a realistic perspective. Hopefully there are many other exponents in all levels of academia who retain similar insight. Thank you Professor Dolitsky.

    • Colonialism, a new political euphemism of the radical left, is really just exploration and technology transfer. It’s a fact of reality that developed nations have always wanted to export their superior knowledge of the world by sharing it with undeveloped countries and to indigenous people with far less knowledge and skills. Thus, colonialism has passed along many advantageous benefits to people around the globe. The radical professors and their brainwashed, obsequious students of colonialism miss that point entirely.
      Imagine a modern day moose hunt by Natives in Alaska, without a pick-up truck, snow mobile, a four-wheeler, a side-by-side, a high-powered rifle with scope, a range finder, a cellphone, a satellite phone and a phone number to call the nearest McDonalds for take-out in case the moose can’t be found that day?
      “Honey, do you want fries with your McNuggets?”

      • Paul, actually Natives primarily snared moose, caribou, and birds. The effort vs. success is expotentially greater when a family’s life is on the line. In the interior region moose are cyclic, during the hundred years or so depressed population density cycles another technique was to hunt the wintering yards. Once on a moose, the men would relay, one tracking, others resting, as moose tire relatively rapidly, until exhausting the animal and killing it. It’s the same technique wolves use. Once killed, the extended families would camp on the carcass until consumed. There is no comparative relevance to the modern, Wasilla/Anchorage/Fairbanks ignorant urban cowboy style hunting. People didn’t rely on sno gos, 4 wheelers, scopes and freeze dried foods. They relied on actually knowing the lands and the behavior of the animals being harvested. There was no pizza or other disgusting urban options, people simply died due to failure. Just as outside people remove the fat and leave the heads, tongues and organs which is insane. That’s why our grandparents’ families tended to have a dozen, or more children as starvation was an ever present reality. Just as Koyukon people enjoy black bear and hunt them in their dens, as the brown bears do. Brown bears were occasionally killed, but only the fat was eaten at men’s parties, as eating brown bear makes women mean. They didn’t rely on rifle hunting, which is iffy. “Really developed” nations don’t “share” their superior technology, they use their advanced weapon technology to dominate and exploit the natural resources, take women, grazing lands or whatever they want from those conquered. It is not a racial trait, it’s a human trait to exploit others, whenever possible. While Dr. Smith personifies the dangerously illiterate “educated” class, combined with ignorance of the basics in recent history, economics and modern politics amongst the working class has destroyed our country.

  2. Just because someone claims to be an “Alaska Native” and a PhD does not mean they know Jack—- about their own culture. Many people like this, and not just “Alaska Natives” have an ax to grind. In many cases, it’s because they think they have found a way to cash in on a cultural wave.

    In this case, she’s just plain dumb. The book Smith wrote won’t sell more than 2 or 3 copies, and those will go to people who think just like her (but I use the word “think” loosely because they really are incapable of thinking at least in the way normal people do).

    Taxpayers very likely paid for her education, and I want my money back.

  3. What could possibly be a more useless field, or demeaning to the discipline of higher learning and the abuse of the term “doctor”. There is zero scientific basis in the discombobulated construct for a “critical race theory”. Example debunking all aspects of CRT is Shaka Zulu, who aside from not being a White European, was a dispossed minor prince in a minor clan of Nguni speaking cattle herders who rose to historical prominence by instituting novel weapon technolgy, modifying the largely ceremonial throwing assegai spear into a deadly iklwa stabbing spear to genocide the various surrounding clans into subjegation of a powerful Zulu Empire. All males from clans conquered over 12 years old were killed with the women and cattle distributed amongst his generals and warriors. As his power grew, his regiments colonized an immense region in southern Africa using the successful colonial dominance template he masterminded. To further discredit the basis of Dr. Smith’s racist racial behavior “theory”, one of Shaka’s generals, Mzilikazi, defied Shaka by refusing to send the big guy his 10% of the loot, cattle and women his regiment conquered. Knowing he was a dead man walking, Mzilikazi migrated north into what is now Zimbabwe, instituting the Mfecane, scorched earth of killing every person, animal, burning every village, to prevent Shaka from exacting revenge. His clan became the Matebele colonizing traditional Shona territory. The Matebele colonizers later fought with the British Rhodesian colonizers against the Marxist backed Shonas in the 1960s-1970s. Dr. Smith fits the description of the minimally part AK Natives (indigenous is an insulting term, we are human beings, not species of fauna or flora) who know nothing of their language or culture. She is useful being used as a prop by predatory liberal University administrations to promote intellectual garbage used for political purposes above critical reproach by craven so called “conservatives” due to playing a race card. The abusive physical and psychological methods American colonizers used to extinguish the use of the Iñupiaq language and destroy the culture focused on creating a sense of cultural and racial inferiority. Now that it is politically useful to enact destructive policies against free enterprise, reliable energy and critical mineral resource extraction, using subjucated Natives by White liberal lawyers as useful props in forming narratives to justify these suicidal policies are convenient. Not to personally denigrate Dr. Smith, she simply has no self awareness of how she is being used and professionally degraded by the academic elite. She is neither formally educated nor a beneficiary of the accumulated traditional wisdom that allowed Natives to survive for thousands of years. At one time the Unakleet Iñupiat Eskimos raided the Athabascan Indian village of Nulato, killing every man they found and bringing the women back to their village. Unakleet people still speak Iñupiaq as the women were assimilated into the community. Contrasted to the Shungnak/Kobuk Iñupiats who maintained relatively peaceful trade relationships with their Koyukon Athabascan neighbors. This is reflected in the dialect spoken which is a mix of the languages, you can hear in the syntax of a mix of Iñupiaq and Koyukon. The languages and cultures are more distinct than English to Mandarin. The most personal disqualifier for Dr. Smith’s version of CRT, is her ancestors the Tlingits, were extremely bad ass warriors and slavers who regularly raided the NW coast into Puget Sound, pillaging, looting, raping and taking slaves from those soft but resource rich tribes. They were very cruel masters and no love lost to some imagined Native “brotherhood” concocted by liberal white university wonks. Dr. Smith’s being offended by Alex’s comments indicates she is threatened by her own ignorance. She has no clue what she is talking about. ‘Ice Geographies: The Colonial Politics of Race and Indigeneity’ is a meaningless word salad, written by an air headed academic. I disagree with Alex that the supression of Native languages was limited to Presbyterian missionaries. It was a comprehensive policy of all the denominations and the territorial government to assimilate Native peoples as 2nd class citizens to ease their acceptance of exploitation and gain access to their resources. Simply killing off the Natives was no longer acceptable even by American standards, but organized mass sexual abuse of the children destroys family and cultural cohesion, eliminating the ability for organized resistance to outside control, and was kept hidden.

    • Great and comprehensive comments, Brian. I brought Presbyterian missionaries in my article as one of the examples of the supression of Native languages and cultures in Alaska. Of course, there were others.

      As my good friend noted in our private correspondence: “Not surprising at all the UAS and its new chancellor (most likely another product of affirmative action or political correctness) invited such a speaker for a “prestigious” lecture and were enthralled by her nonsense. Of course, that fits with the whole UAS joke of a “university.” But it also is typical of what’s going on across the United States today— “intellectuals” not knowing the difference between their own bottoms and a hot rock, and proudly demonstrating it.”

      • Alex, your posts in general bring up very interesting and complex issues effecting everyone while specially touching on and pertinent to Alaska Native peoples. The corruption and rot permeating the entire education system in Alaska continues to handicap our youth. It would take generations to grow out of, if this problem is ever addressed. Very disturbing that the University leadership itself is literally out of touch with reality, while actually believing they should be respected and honored as though they are themselves educated and members of an earned elite class. We need an elite class of actual engineers, scientists, educators, highly skilled industrial technicians, pastors, medical doctors, not self absorbed idiots who dictate societal suicidal policy. As though CRT is some novel concept recently developed to analyze colonialization, racism, and cultural dominance strategies, which in a multitude of variants have been used for thousands of years by every race of human beings against those targeted for exploitation. Dr. Smith’s reaction to your comments clearly confirmed she is linguistically clueless. It isn’t just the ability to mechanically speak, a language is dead when the associated culture is dead, defined by there being no one left who thinks and expresses their deepest emotions in it.

  4. There is a saying out there. ” if you can’t dazz!e with brilliance, baffle with B.S.! It’s almost the governing principle of the Woke Academic set.

  5. Professor Dolitsky,
    Thank you for another interesting article.

    “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another”

    I’ve long marveled at how a people’s culture adapts when there is an
    exposure of new technology and or language into that culture.

    Some 32 years ago it was my pleasure to win the bid to rebuild the Totem Bight Clan house just North of Ketchikan. The project required that all of the Cedar be hewn by local carvers with an adze.
    It was an immersion into Native culture as much as it was a State of Alaska Construction Contract. All of our crews had a wonderful time.

    Upon completion the Dept of Parks held a dedication ceremony. The Parks leader or Master of Ceremony arrived wearing a then fashionable scratchy looking Alpaca sweater and Birkenstock footwear. Surrounded by Tlinget people in their traditional regalia his opening remarks were concerning him being enthralled by the spiritual nature of the regalia and hewn timbers. After his remarks no fewer than 6 Native leaders took the podium. Everyone of them began their remarks by expressing their faith in Christ!

    • The Eyak man I worked with told me the old people learned English by reading the Bible.
      He said, for some reason, the Bible was an easy way for the elders to learn to read English.
      He works in mysterious ways.

      • Rural Alaska has deteriorated to an overwhelmingly chaotic, lawless and ghetto status due specifically to the loss of the authority of Elders and eschewing Christianity over the past 30 years. The public schools, fed and state agencies which control the economic structure are overtly anti Christianity. All the grants and programs solve nothing, they reinforce the decay, addictions and dependency.

  6. I have never read so much dribble in one article in all my years. Trying to justify stupidity. Have you ever tried to justify looking for something that wasn’t lost?

  7. Critical Race theory (CRT) divides us all. Good for a cheap elective in community colleges under special interest category. But main stream study? Forget it. Basket weaving, dog grooming, yoga, and pickleball offer so much more for unification.

  8. I worked w/ an Eyak carpenter many years ago. (70’s)
    It was his two aunts, at the time, that were the last speakers.
    Articles were written about his aunt’s being the last speakers.
    He was very “americanized” himself, owned a couple of small apt buildings, but probably knew some Eyak.
    The Eyak people are a very small population, compared to other Native groups.
    How clueless is this lib professor? ….. I’m an uneducated, blue collar person & even I knew this!

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