Chugach , Chugach Sugpiaq or Chugachigmiut is the name of an Alaska Native people in the region of the

Kenai Peninsula The Kenai Peninsula ( Dena'ina: ''Yaghenen'') is a large peninsula jutting from the coast of Southcentral Alaska. The name Kenai (, ) is derived from the word "Kenaitze" or "Kenaitze Indian Tribe", the name of the Native Athabascan Alaskan trib ...

and

Prince William Sound Prince William Sound ( Sugpiaq: ''Suungaaciq'') is a sound of the Gulf of Alaska on the south coast of the U.S. state of Alaska. It is located on the east side of the Kenai Peninsula. Its largest port is Valdez, at the southern terminus of the T ...

on the southern coast of

Alaska Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U.S. ...

. The Chugach people are an

Alutiiq The Alutiiq people (pronounced in English; from Promyshlenniki Russian Алеутъ, "Aleut"; plural often "Alutiit"), also called by their ancestral name ( or ; plural often "Sugpiat"), as well as Pacific Eskimo or Pacific Yupik, are a so ...

(

Pacific Eskimo The Alutiiq people (pronounced in English; from Promyshlenniki Russian Алеутъ, "Aleut"; plural often "Alutiit"), also called by their ancestral name ( or ; plural often "Sugpiat"), as well as Pacific Eskimo or Pacific Yupik, are a so ...

) people who speak the

Chugach dialect Chugach , Chugach Sugpiaq or Chugachigmiut is the name of an Alaska Native people in the region of the Kenai Peninsula and Prince William Sound on the southern coast of Alaska. The Chugach people are an Alutiiq ( Pacific Eskimo) people who spea ...

of the

Alutiiq language The Alutiiq language (also called Sugpiak, Sugpiaq, Sugcestun, Vocabulary comparison The comparison of number terms and month names in the two dialects: References Further reading * Bass, Willard P., Edward A. Tennant, and Carl Anahona ...

Name

Their autonym ''Sugpiaq'' derives from ''suk'', meaning "person" and -''piaq'', meaning "real." The term ''Alutiiq'' derives from the Russian term for the

Aleut The Aleuts ( ; russian: Алеуты, Aleuty) are the indigenous people of the Aleutian Islands, which are located between the North Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea. Both the Aleut people and the islands are politically divided between the ...

people. According to Ethnologue, earlier terms for the Chugach such as Chugach Eskimo, South Alaska Eskimo, Sugpiak Eskimo, and Sugpiaq Eskimo, are pejorative.

Settlements

Chugach villages include

Chenega Bay Chenega (; Alutiiq: ) is a census-designated place (CDP) on Evans Island in the Chugach Census Area in the U.S. state of Alaska. Located in Prince William Sound, the CDP consists of the Chugach Alutiiq village of Chenega Bay, which was established ...

, Eyak, Nanwalek (English Bay),

Port Graham Port Graham, also known as Paluwik (pah-LU-wig) in the Alutiiq language, is a census-designated place (CDP) in Kenai Peninsula Borough, Alaska, United States. At the 2020 census, the population was 162. Geography Port Graham and Nanwalek are lo ...

, and Tatitlek.

History

The Chugach people have lived in the region around Prince William Sound for millennia, according to archaeological finds. They were the first indigenous Alaskans to encounter the

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

n explorer

Vitus Bering Vitus Jonassen Bering (baptised 5 August 1681 – 19 December 1741),All dates are here given in the Julian calendar, which was in use throughout Russia at the time. also known as Ivan Ivanovich Bering, was a Danish cartographer and explorer in ...

in 1741. The Russians were followed by Spanish, English, and American explorers. The Chugach have at times traded with or fought against neighboring groups, the Eyak, Ahtna, and the

Tlingit The Tlingit ( or ; also spelled Tlinkit) are indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. Their language is the Tlingit language (natively , pronounced ),

. In 1964, a

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater exp ...

generated by the

Good Friday earthquake The 1964 Alaskan earthquake, also known as the Great Alaskan earthquake and Good Friday earthquake, occurred at 5:36 PM AKST on Good Friday, March 27.

destroyed the Chugach village of Chenega, Alaska. The fishing-based Chugach economy was badly affected by the environmental damage caused by the ''Exxon Valdez'' oil spill in 1989.

Language

Chugach people speak one of two dialects of the

Pacific Gulf Yupik language The Alutiiq language (also called Sugpiak, Sugpiaq, Sugcestun, Vocabulary comparison The comparison of number terms and month names in the two dialects: References Further reading * Bass, Willard P., Edward A. Tennant, and Carl Anahona ...

; the other being Koniag. These Central Yupik languages belong to the Alaskan Yupik language family. Once written in

Cyrillic script The Cyrillic script ( ), Slavonic script or the Slavic script, is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking co ...

, the language is now written in the

Latin script The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern I ...

."Yupik, Pacific Gulf."
''Ethnologue.'' Accessed 5 February 2013.

Social structures and gender

There are historical accounts of some androgynous

third gender Third gender is a concept in which individuals are categorized, either by themselves or by society, as neither man nor woman. It is also a social category present in societies that recognize three or more genders. The term ''third'' is usuall ...

two spirit Two-spirit (also two spirit, 2S or, occasionally, twospirited) is a modern, , umbrella term used by some Indigenous North Americans to describe Native people in their communities who fulfill a traditional third-gender (or other gender-variant ...

individuals among the Chugach, known as ''aranu'tiq''.''Pacific Homosexualities'' (2002, ), page 209 According to anthropologists writing in the 1950s, these individuals were considered to be male on one side of their bodies and female on the other. Some had descriptive names like "Tyakutyik" ("What Kind Of People Are These Two?"), but this description was given to many types of people in the community, and was not related to gender expression.

Namesakes

The Chugach people gave their name to Chugach National Forest, the

Chugach Mountains The Chugach Mountains of southern Alaska are the northernmost of the several mountain ranges that make up the Pacific Coast Ranges of the western edge of North America. The range is about long and wide, and extends from the Knik and Turnagai ...

, and

Chugach State Park Chugach State Park covers 495,204 acres (2,004 square kilometers) immediately east of the Anchorage Bowl in south-central Alaska. Though primarily in the Municipality of Anchorage, a small portion of the park north of the Eklutna Lake area in t ...

, all located in or near the traditional range of the Chugach people in southcentral

. Chugach Alaska Corporation, an Alaska Native regional corporation created under the

Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) was signed into law by President Richard Nixon on December 18, 1971, constituting at the time the largest land claims settlement in United States history. ANCSA was intended to resolve long-standing ...

of 1971, also derives its name from the Chugach people, many of whom are shareholders of the corporation.

Notes

External links

Chugach Alaska Corporation

Chugach National Forest
{{Authority control Alaska Native ethnic groups Alutiiq