Adventures in Fieldwork Part 4

 Adventures in Fieldwork Part 4

Note: This essay is about my own culture shock and is not in any way intended to be disparaging towards the people in Village. The conditions there are complex and I am not being critical of the place or the people. My focus is on my own mindset and shortcomings in this situation.

All photos by Shari Burke

One and a half years after I left Village, I was preparing to return.  I’d switched my research focus to language preservation, thinking that this might be more useful to the Native people I hoped to be working with. Also, I was quite fascinated by the topic. I had another grant and had managed to convince myself that since I had experienced the culture shock last time, I would be better prepared for the trip this time.  I kept repeating this to myself as if that would make something wonderful happen. Instead, I spent the week between Christmas and New Year’s with an upset stomach and headaches. I would leave on January 2.  

   This time, I would not be able to stay with my friends.  They were in Fairbanks and in their house were two of their daughters, their boyfriends and assorted children.  My friend thought I’d be more comfortable elsewhere and she wanted to be the one to find a place for me to stay. I would have rather done this myself, but she was adamant and I did not want to insult her. I was told not to worry—I could either stay with this woman from the Park Service, or with some relatives I had met last time I was there—since I was Kuukpiaq, she felt they would be happy to have me there, if they were in town. Besides, it would be better to stay with the relatives I was told.  The woman from the Park Service would be a last resort since she was white woman.  I stopped myself before I could remind her that I, too, was a white woman!

    On January 1, I heard that the call from the relatives had come—they would be happy to host me for the week I was there, I was told.  All I had to do was call and let them know when I would be arriving.  I did that immediately.  My call was answered by a barely intelligible drunk young man who informed me that his parents would not be home that night.  There was nothing else to do but to wait until morning.  I slept little that night.

    The next morning dawned clear and cold.  I called Village and spoke to a somewhat dazed sounding fellow, who said he would be at the airport later that day.  I left my house and in spite of the cold, found myself drenched in a cold, clammy sweat.  I sat in the plane at the gate for a long time while they waited to see what the weather was like in Anchorage.  I watched them de-ice the plane and prayed  for a blizzard in Anchorage.  Alas, no blizzard appeared and we were soon on our way.  My mental conversation with myself continued all the way to Anchorage and through the next flight.  “Everything will be fine,” I told myself.

 

I got to Village and walked out the back end of the plane and down the steps.  We headed toward the terminal building and I scanned the crowd looking for the people who were to meet me, but there was no sign of them.  By the time I got inside, the luggage was already being unloaded and there were stacks of beer cases duct taped together.  A couple of minutes before my suitcase appeared, my hosts rushed in.  They exchanged glances when they saw my suitcase, but I told myself it meant nothing.  It was just my nervousness.  I kept up the stream of cheerful chatter that was flowing out from my mouth.

    We rushed back to their house and wolfed down some dinner.  then we sped over to the school where a basketball tournament was being held.  In an Alaskan village, basketball tournaments are like the Super Bowl.  We settled into the bleachers as the game was starting.  I was informed that both teams were from Village, but one was Native and one was White.  As I dutifully began to cheer for the Native team, they relaxed and got into the game.  I started to relax, too.

    That was a bit premature, however.  We went back to their house after the game and engaged in small talk for awhile.  Then they told me that since as far as they knew their son hadn’t been home in a week, I would sleep in his room.  “I hope he doesn’t come home and get into bed with you, “ they said laughing.  I smiled weakly and thought of the drunken man I had spoken to on the phone.  I knew in my gut that he’d be home that night.  Then they finally got to the point.  “How long are you staying?” they asked.  I tried to be upbeat as I told them I’d be in town for a week.  Their faces fell and my heart began to pound.  They then proceeded to spend 15 minutes explaining why I could not stay there.  I told them that I could get in touch with the woman from the Park Service.  Acid dripped from every word as they asked with disgust, “Is she WHITE?”  “I think so,” I responded and felt very, very tired.  I said I would go to bed.

Adventures in Fieldwork Part 3

Adventures in Fieldwork Part 3

Note: This essay is about my own culture shock and is not in any way intended to be disparaging towards the people in Village. The conditions there are complex and I am not being critical of the place or the people. My focus is on my own mindset and shortcomings in this situation.  All photos are by Shari Burke

As July turned into August, my fear grew.  Suddenly the streets were filled with drunken people.  I speculated that unemployment and/or welfare checks had started to arrive and the bootleggers were getting some beginning-of-the-month business.  Whatever was going on, I did not like it. The same people that were looking at me as an intruder in their part of town now knew where I was and they were quite out of it.  They were not just tipsy, but staggering, falling and slurring their words so much it was impossible to make out what they were trying to say.  They banged on the (lockless) door at midnight and at 6 in the morning.  I was often alone in the house as my friends went to comfort families of the people who had died. I sat on “my” bed in the back corner of the house and wrote frantically in my fieldwork journal, trying to stay ahead of my own thoughts. I became irrationally convinced that I would never make it back to Fairbanks. I also knew that I was having a big bad case of culture shock and was probably not handling it well. I didn’t care. All I knew was that I had strayed way too far out of my comfort zone and I wanted to get back. I wanted to talk to Bill, but there was no way to do that, except at a public phone, where I would be overheard. 

 After what was unquestionably the longest week of my life, the day of my departure arrived.  It had not been a very successful week, as far as my goals to meet people went, other than the first day, when I was paraded around as a novelty. I did meet with one woman, who worked in some official capacity, but she was kind of suspicious of the work I wanted to do. This is unsurprising in retrospect. The situation in Alaska was changing at the time and Native groups and people were starting to be more clear about telling White researchers to back off. I hadn’t realised this when I’d arrived, but the department I was working out of was just starting to transition to Russian studies more than Alaska Native studies as a result. Native people didn’t like the colonial nature of the university and the people working there—a view I rapidly came to share. So on some level, I knew I would have to rethink some things, but at the moment, I just wanted to go home.

My friend went into her freezer in the yard and got out a big salmon for me to take home—for Bill, she said.  She had no box so she put it in a trash bag and used the one thin strip of duct tape she had to close it.  I thanked her for everything and went to the airport.  I was there before the building opened.  I waited by the door with my suitcase and my fish. All week, the radio had been making announcements about cancelled flights and I was terrified that mine would be another one.

   When the ticket agent arrived to open up, she looked at me as though I was the strangest person she had ever seen.  She said it would take her a few minutes to get her computer set up.  I told her that was just fine—I was extra friendly as if that would help ensure that I would get out.  She told me I needed a box for the fish.  I was about to thrust it at her and ask if she wanted it when she told me I could buy one for $10.  She was very apologetic, but I cheerfully told her that would be great and please give me a receipt.  My grant would pay for the box, thought I would have happily paid it myself.  Before long I was officially checked in.  I thought my knees were going to buckle I was so relieved.  The plane was coming and when it left again, I’d be on it!!  YIPPEE!!

    As we taxied down the runway and lifted off, I was repeating, “Thank you, thank you, thank you” in my head like a mantra.  The next thing I remember I was in Anchorage and my name was being called. I went up to the desk and they asked me if I’d mind sitting in first class on the flight to Fairbanks.  I said that would be no problem and inquired whether anyone ever refused this request. They said sometimes people who travel together don’t want to be split up. Not a problem for me and in fact I would have sat in the cargo hold if it meant getting home, but there I was in Row 1 while the extra solicitous flight attendant asked me if she could get me a beverage before the others got on the plane. I was rather amused when I asked for coffee. I had not showered in a week—just taken sponge baths when the house was empty and washed my hair in the yard.  When I went to use the bathroom on the plane, the door reached the floor.  I was getting into more familiar territory.

    I was first off the plane in Fairbanks and my husband was waiting.  As we waited for the suitcase and the fish, I began to tremble.  We were almost home when he asked me, “Well, how was it?”  I burst into tears and sputtered, “It was HORRIBLE!”  He looked at me in shock.  We got home. I greeted our daughter and got into a very hot shower.  I began to scrub my body while the tears that were still flowing scrubbed away the fear, discomfort and disappointment that my own naïve ideas about what village life was like were shattered.  The relief I felt that it was over continued to wash over me long after my shower.  I didn’t stop trembling for a long time and I have never forgotten the pain that I witnessed in Village.

Adventures in Fieldwork Part 2

Adventures in Fieldwork Part 2

(all names have been changed and all photos are by Shari Burke)

Note: This essay is about my own culture shock and is not in any way intended to be disparaging towards the people in Village. The conditions there are complex and I am not being critical of the place or the people. My focus is on my own mindset and shortcomings in this situation.

At the end of July, I boarded the plane for Anchorage—passengers in the back half, cargo in front. I do not remember any of the trip to Anchorage or from there to Village, but somehow I got there and was met at the airport by my friends.  We went to their house and had coffee, then went around town to meet various family members and friends.  Everyone knew I was coming and I was quite a novelty—Kuukpiaq—this white woman who could eat Eskimo food and speak some Inupiaq.  Fortunately for me, there was no niqipiaq—just vats of coffee—although this would change. 

After visiting several homes, we were in the last one for the day and when asked if I wanted coffee, I said, ‘No, thank you, I’ve had a lot today.’ I can drink a lot of coffee without issue, but I’d had so much on that day that I was feeling jittery and I didn’t need any more jitters! Nevertheless, when I was handed a cup of coffee a few minutes later, I took it and said thank you. The next morning, I was told that, since there was no running water in my friends’ house, I should go back to that house and tell them I wanted to take a shower. I was really unhappy about this, but my friend would not have it any other way, so I took a towel and walked over there, hoping more fervently with each step that they would not be at home. They weren’t.

 

I learned quickly how unusual I was.  Village is extremely segregated—Native people live on one side of town and white people, who are virtually all government employees with agencies like Bureau of Land Management and the Park Service lived on the other.  They were not wanted in town and people were suspicious of them. They had good reason to be suspicious of the government agencies, although many of the people working in them meant well. Sometimes whites and Natives mingled at the grocery store, but mostly, they just stayed in “their” parts of town.  My presence in the Native section raised some eyebrows and earned me some hostile stares from people.  My excitement began to dissipate a little and my nervousness grew.

On a practical level, I was learning to overcome some more discomfort.  The house my friends lived in was essentially a plywood room with curtains hung up in front of the beds.  Since there was no running water or septic, the “bathroom” was a bucket next to the furnace in a tiny alcove.  There was a piece of plywood over the bucket with a hole and a toilet seat.  The bucket was lined with a plastic garbage bag and when it was full it was taken into the yard and a new bag was put in.  This is called a “honey bucket” in Alaska.  It is a common system in rural areas.  That was fine—I expected something like that.  What I was completely unprepared for was the fact that the door didn’t reach the floor!  It was about two feet short.  I had never before had to attempt going to the bathroom behind half a door while people were sipping tea a few feet away!!  I began to time my beverage intake so that I could use public restrooms while we were out, but sometimes that didn’t work.  I had to just deal with my discomfort, which wasn’t the worst of it in any case.

 

I had only been there a couple of days when the dying began.  There were three deaths in town the week I was there—a very large number in such a small place.  The first one was a 17-year-old girl who was somehow related to my friends. She died when the minivan she was drag racing in (on a gravel road) flipped over.  I was asked to go along and give my condolences to the family since they were relatives and I was Kuukpiaq.  I went along, and felt awful.  They had never met me, but I was introduced as Kuukpiaq. They glared at me. As I murmured how sorry I was about their loss, I was trying to take in the house.  We walked into a kitchen, which was a plywood room with a cooler on the floor. There was nothing else. A filthy sheet was hanging up beyond that blocking off part of the house.  Everyone was congregated in a narrow dark room with a bed at each end, a couch against the wall and a TV, VCR and cable hook-up on the other wall.  I looked down and saw I was standing in piles of dirt and cigarette butts. I was no longer excited.  I was sad and scared—not an uncommon thing in a new fieldwork situation.

Adventures in Fieldwork Part 1

photo by Shari Burke

Adventures in Fieldwork Part 1

When I started my PhD studies at the university in Fairbanks, my original intention was to learn about the ideology of motherhood in Inupiaq culture. I’d just done my MA research on the same topic with white, suburban women and I was interested to see what was different and what was the same. I knew this would entail fieldwork in a village, if I could work it out with some residents of a village. I was open as to the exact location. When the new Inupiaq teacher arrived and named me after her sister, it seemed reasonable to try to work with her in her village. She was excited about this, so I proceeded in that direction. My advisor was all for it, as there was almost no work published about the area, which I will just call ‘Village’ here. She advised me to plan for a preliminary trip to Village to try to make contacts and set things up for a longer stay in future, and to apply for a particular grant to fund this trip. I worked with my teacher and her husband on the plan and budget.

I applied for and received the grant to go to fish camp for three weeks in the summer.  I would fly to Village, and we would go on a boat across to the mainland and then by 4-wheeler to camp.  I was excited about the prospect, but nervous about doing something like that.  It was far different than anything I had ever done in my life.  I gave my friends the money they said they needed for gas and oil and I shipped food to Village.  They had gone back there when the semester was over and were preparing for my arrival.  They were also planning something I did not know about—at least right away.

photo by Shari Burke

Our friends had kicked the booze in the past, but the stress of the year in Fairbanks had driven them to start drinking again and things were kind of weird when they were drunk. About 4 days before I was to leave, I got a phone call asking me to plan on bringing several cases of beer and large jugs of wine with me—not the small bottles, they emphasized—the big ones.  Village was a damp village-you could bring alcohol in but you could not buy it in town. My nervousness ballooned into near panic.  Was I really expected to travel from Fairbanks to Anchorage to Village with cases of beer and jugs of wine as my luggage?  Did they think that I would feel good about going to a very remote and inaccessible place where there would be guns, knives, strangers, and lots of booze?  But if I didn’t go, I’d have to pay back the grant and some of that money was gone already!  And what about their feelings?  Could I actually tell them that I was scared to go with them because they’d be drinking?  When my advisor invited me to her home for tea and a chat before I was to leave, I told her about the situation and she was very alarmed. She did not come right out and say, ‘Don’t go.’ but she strongly suggested I should not put myself in that situation. Her husband was also on my committee and he called me later that day, telling me that Fiona (my advisor, not her real name) had said that I was aware of the dangers of sexual assault in such situations (I was). He was also strongly suggesting that I not make the trip. I talked it over with Bill, who was also worried and I decided I was not going to go to fish camp. I needed a new plan, because I knew they would not be able to give me back the grant money I’d already given them. Things were also complicated by the fact that they had no phone and to get in touch with them, I had to call the radio station and have them broadcast a message to my teacher so she could then call me from a pay phone. 

I did this and told them that I was not going to bring booze with me and I was not going to fish camp. They were disappointed, and I think they felt bad.  There was relief all around when I managed to change my ticket and make plans to spend a week in town, trying to meet people.  I told them they could keep the oil and gas money if I could stay at their house and we’d call it rent.  Things were back on track.

Festival of Alaska Native Arts 5

Tlingit from SE Alaska in their tradition dress.

Yup'ik performers from SW Alaska

Festival of Alaska Native Arts 4

 Inupiaq Eskimo drummers and dancers

Festival of Alaska Native Arts 3

 If I remember correctly, these are Inupiaq Eskimos.