I traveled to Savoonga in the summer 2022 to carry out focus groups for the forthcoming research to measure predominant wind direction changes in SLI. We gathered input from elders, hunters, and clan leaders on the importance of watching the weather the Siberian Yupik way, focusing on observation of grass lay as an indicator of wind direction.
Maddie traveled to Savoonga and Shaktoolik in January 2019 to interview young adults on their use of Siberian Yupik. The language is being used less and while young adults say they would like to use it more, they do not see that happening, although some new social media apps offer promising opportunities to use the language more going forward. Maddie was interested in how language loss is part of a larger problem of cultural drift many native peoples experience with globalization.
Jesse worked on the storm surge project. He spent part of the summer of 2017 traveling to remote beaches near Shaktoolik and Savoonga sampling driftwood. Cross-sections samples were taken to be evaluated by the Tree Ring Laboratory at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks. From these samples we were able to estimate the river of origin of the logs and the age of the logs, both help narrow the range of storm dates that may have deposited the wood.
