RSS 1.0University of Alaska Southeast
The University of Alaska Southeast is a student-centered university that provides instruction in liberal arts, professional, and technical fields. On the homelands of the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian peoples, we serve the coastal environments, cultures, economies, and communities of Alaska, through interdisciplinary education, workforce development, and scholarship, research, and creative activity.
UAS is on the unceded territories of the Áakʼw Ḵwáan, Taantʼá Ḵwáan, and Sheet’ká Ḵwáan on Lingít Aaní and we are grateful for their stewardship of these places that are also known as Juneau, Ketchikan, and Sitka, Alaska, which are adjacent to the ancestral home of the X̱aadas and Ts’msyen peoples.
UAS Faculty and other Authors, submit your work to be archived here!
Sub-communities within this community
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Evening at Egan
Annual UAS Fall Semester Lecture Series -
One Campus, One Book
One Campus, One Book is the common reading program at UAS-Juneau. -
Writing Center
The Writing Center advises students from all disciplines on writing projects.
Recent Submissions
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A Wolf Called RomeoAlaska writer and photographer Nick Jans traces the compelling story of Romeo, Juneau's black wolf, through a narrated slideshow, short video clips, and readings from his bestselling book, "A Wolf Called Romeo".
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JWAC/UAS Panel on WaterAs global climate change disrupts the hydrologic cycle and human populations grow, governments face new challenges in efforts to provide water to citizens. This presentation from Stephen McCaffrey, McGeorge School of Law, University of the Pacific, examines whether international law is up to the task of preventing and resolving disputes over water. Part of the Juneau World Affairs Council annual forum: The Politics of Water.
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Strengthening the Spirit of CollaborationCollaboration is at the heart of every successful project, organization, family and relationship. In an interdependent world, working together is critical. Kathleen Macferran and Jared Finkelstein from the Center for Nonviolent Communication share practical, learnable processes that invite each person to be part of a team.
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An Animate WorldAuthor of the 2015-2016 One Campus One Book selection, "Blonde Indian: An Alaska Native Memoir," UAS Assistant Professor of English Ernestine Hayes will read from and discusses her book. She’ll also explore the prevalence of the animistic worldview of Tlingit being and how it is somehow dislocated or dismissed by other cultures.
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A Fulbright scholar's experience in culture, crustaceans, and changing climateUAS Professor of Biology Sherry Tamone was awarded a Fulbright Scholar Research Award to study crustacean biology in Israel for 4 months. As part of her Fulbright experience and in addition to her research, Sherry was able to explore the culture and extensive historical landmarks throughout Israel. The presentation highlights the important role of the Fulbright program for supporting research, teaching, and cultural exchange.
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Indigenous engagement with the Alexander Archipelago Wolf: Cultural context and traditional ecological knowledgeThe U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Alaska conducted a Species Status Assessment in response to a petition to list the Alexander Archipelago wolf under the Endangered Species Act. This federal undertaking could not be adequately prepared without including the voices of the Indigenous People who have a deep connection with the subspecies. The Indigenous knowledge presented in this report is the cultural and intellectual property of those who have shared it. The purpose of the report is to communicate the knowledge shared with us to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to help inform the Species Status Assessment and future tribal consultations, wildlife research, and management. Due to a constrained regulatory timeline, we employed rapid appraisal research to expeditiously develop a preliminary understanding of Indigenous People’s ecological knowledge of wolves. We applied the social scientific methods of qualitative ethnography and inductive coding from grounded theory for text analysis. We conducted archival research and literature reviews on the cultural significance of wolves in Tlingit society and social organization to supplement in-depth conversations with traditional knowledge holders who are local wolf experts. The study was informed by two tribal consultations.
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American Museum of Natural History Educator's Guide: Northwest Coast HallWelcome to the Northwest Coast Hall. Reopened in 2022, it is the result of an intensive five-year collaboration between the Museum and ten advisors from the Indigenous cultural groups featured in the hall. This revitalized hall celebrates Indigenous worldview, artistry, cultural persistence, and the distinct practices and histories of the individual Nations along the Northwest Coast.
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Indigenous use and conservation of harbor seals (Phoca vitulina) at Yakutat, Alaska since the sixteenth centurySustainable Indigenous resource use reflects balance between animal populations and levels of human consumption, influenced by natural cycles of faunal abundance, community size and subsistence needs, procurement technologies, and the requirements of trade or commodity production. Sustainability is “epiphenomenal” when animal populations are preserved, and community needs met, without deliberate measures to prevent overharvesting. Alternatively, Indigenous conservation—cultural practices that moderate use of a resource to prevent its depletion—may play a determinative role. In this study from the Tlingit community of Yakutat, Alaska in the Northwest Coast cultural region, we interweave Indigenous and scientific perspectives to trace the use and conservation of harbor seals (Phoca vitulina) from before Western contact through the Russian and American colonial periods to the present. Harbor seals, which concentrate in large numbers at a summer ice floe rookery near Hubbard Glacier, are the community's most important subsistence food and a key to its culture and history. The Smithsonian Institution and Yakutat Tlingit Tribe undertook collaborative research in historical ecology and archaeology in 2011–2014 including oral interviews with elders and subsistence providers, excavations at sealing sites, archaeofaunal analysis, historical and archival research, and consideration of climate cycles and biological regime shifts that influence the harbor seal population in the Gulf of Alaska. We compare technologies and hunting practices before and after Western contact, estimate harvest levels in different periods, and evaluate the effectiveness of traditional conservation practices that included hunting quotas enforced by clan leaders and the seasonal delay of hunting with firearms to prevent abandonment of the rookery by the seal herd.
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Downstream passage performance of silver eel at an angled rack: Effects of behavior and morphologyThe European eel is critically endangered due to heavy impact of anthropogenic factors, such as habitat fragmentation, overexploitation and climate change. During downstream migration, silver eels may encounter hydropower plants, which often result in delay or mortality from impingement on trash-racks or turbine passage. These problems can be mitigated with downstream passage solutions, such as angled racks that guide downstream-migrating eels to safe passage routes. The importance of bar spacing and phenotypic diversity for passage performance is, however, largely unknown. In this study, we investigated how morphological parameters (body mass, eye and fin indices) and behavioral score (open field test) influenced passage rate at an experimental intake equipped with a bypass and angled racks with either 15 or 30 mm bar spacing. Both racks were efficient in guiding eels into a bypass. There was a strong positive effect of body mass and a weak positive effect of open field test score on passage rate. Other factors such as eye and fin indices played a minor role. These results demonstrate the performance of angled racks with bypasses and form a useful starting point for further research regarding the relationships between individual variation in behavior, morphology and passage solutions for silver eels.
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Optimizing seaweed biomass production ‑ A two kelp solutionInterest in farming kelps has grown beyond using kelp for food, feed or biofuels. There is considerable interest in generating biomass from seaweed for use in bioplastics and other products that would substitute for petroleum-derived products. For these uses to be viable, large amounts of biomass are needed. Very large kelp farms can be expensive to build and maintain, leading to the need to optimize the biomass per unit area. Although close spacing of growlines can lead to poor growth, a viable approach may be to grow two species of kelps together: one that hangs down and one that is buoyant, growing up. This system would increase the spacing in three dimensions. In Alaska, Saccharina latissima is commonly grown hanging down from longlines. One of the buoyant Alaskan kelps is Nereocystis luetkeana. Because there are commercial uses for wild-harvested Nereocystis in Alaska, we undertook a preliminary trial in Kodiak, Alaska, that grew both Saccharina and Nereocystis in the same longline array. Closely spaced lines were seeded the first week of February 2023 and set at 3 m below the surface. The arrays were harvested in late June 2023. Total yields were greatest on the combined arrays, followed by the Nereocystis only and Saccharina only arrays. Despite having 45% fewer grow-lines, the total yield of the Nereocystis on the combined arrays was statistically similar to the Nereocystis only arrays. These results may have significance for large scale macroalgal production.
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Southeast Alaska: Close to nature's heartThank you for your interest in multicultural education in Alaska! This book provides an overview of Southeast Alaska, and includes several diverse lesson plans pertaining to the region. Our content was developed through a project-based study of Multicultural Education and Alaska Studies through the UAS MAT secondary education program. The title is an adaptation of “Keep close to Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in a while, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.” - John Muir quoted by Samuel Hall Young in Alaska Days with John Muir (1915) chapter 7
