"This thesis argues that the costs of electricity in rural Alaska are ecological, economic, and social, and asks whether or not renewable energy can reduce these costs. Two case studies are examined: a wind-diesel hybrid system in Kotzebue, Alaska, and an Organic Rankine cycle geothermal system in Chena Hot Springs, Alaska. In both cases it is found that when compared to the status quo (fossil fuel generated electricity), renewable energy technologies have reduced these costs. Historically, the funding for energy projects in Alaska has shifted from private enterprise investment to state and federal support. This is important in the debate regarding funding for a transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy. The Power Equalization Program is also examined and found to be a paradoxical subsidy that provides economic relief but does not solve the problem of high electricity costs and may act as a disincentive to the deployment of renewables"--Leaf iii

"This thesis examines the geography and history of interior Alaska by tracing the route of Henry Allen's 1885 expedition and evaluating Alaska's physiography from both Clyde Wahrhaftig's and Allen's perspectives. Since the U.S. Army took a leading role in Alaska's era of exploration during the late nineteenth century, specific insights are drawn from Lieutenant Allen's expedition and its context within early Russian and American exploration to interpret the historical geography of Alaska. The purpose of this monograph., however, is more comprehensive than merely tracing Allen's expedition or Wahrhaftig's classification. This study's measure of success will be the extent to which the author's research illuminates the regional geography and history of America's 49th state, interprets Allen's geographic exploration within Wahrhaftig's physiographic framework, cultivates public interest with regard to the Allen expedition, and stimulates further research in fields related to Alaska's cultural landscape"--Leaf iii

"Since before settling on the shores of Teslin Lake, the Inland Tlingit people have fished its waters. Today the people of Teslin also cast their nets along the Alaska Highway to lure tourists off the busy corridor. For small communities along the route, travelers represent both challenges and opportunities. Especially in First Nations communities decisions regarding tourism such as what products to develop, what services to provide, and how much access to allow carry much weight. This research constitutes a case study examining cultural tourism as a means of sustainable economic development for the community of Teslin, Yukon. It describes the broad landscape of tourism, given the history and culture of the Inland Tlingit people who comprise the majority of the community's population. Additionally it explores major events in Yukon history that have contributed to the current tourism landscape, as well as the impacts of land claims settlement, the Umbrella Final Agreement, and development of First Nations governments on tourism, culture, and heritage. This research reveals the gravity of sharing culture through tourism. The findings also suggest that within specific boundaries, Teslin residents perceive benefits from the presence of tourists in their community and often personally enjoy interacting with them"--Leaf iii

This dissertation explores Iliamna Lake ethnogeography, the physical and mental understanding of the landscape, by researching Yup'ik place names and stories about these places from Iliamna Lake Yup'ik perspectives (Yupiit iingitgun). Many Yup'ik place names were forgotten after Euro-Americans arrived and introduced modern education in the early twentieth century. Some Iliamna Lake Yup'ik Elders remember Indigenous place names even though the subsistence resources in the places have declined or they no longer travel there due to environmental and cultural changes. Prompted by the declining population of Iliamna Lake Yup'ik speakers, along with their knowledge, the Iliamna Lake communities requested this study of Iliamna Lake Yup'ik place names and narratives about the places. Using two methods, oral history and a community-based participatory approach, the community participants and the author recorded 219 Yup'ik and over 100 contemporary place names during eight ethnographic field trips conducted from 2016 to 2019. This dissertation used two analytical methods--grounded theory and mindful inquiry--to categorize place names in themes that are relevant to Iliamna Lake community perspectives. This research revealed that place names and stories about these places illustrate community histories, lifeways, and cultural ethics and practices that are grounded in the people's intimate relationships with their homeland. Telling and retelling these stories enables the people to visualize their landscape, while affirming and reinforcing the knowledge and practices that have enabled the Yup'ik people to survive and thrive in the region for many generations. Ethnogeography addresses how these cultural landscapes intertwine with local histories and changes in land use from insider perspectives. Yup'ik names and stories related to these places act as mnemonic pegs or mental landmarks that assist the people in commemorating and continuing to navigate within their homelands. Maintaining their place names with accounts about these places supports Iliamna Lake residents in continuing to share their geographic knowledge, cultural practices, Yugcetun (Central Yup'ik language), and community histories, thereby enhancing community cohesiveness, which in turn promotes community and ecological well-being.

Wanting a higher level of hockey for local youth to aspire to, city hockey officials created the semi-professional Teamsters hockey team in 1975. The team was initially comprised of the best local recreational players, many of whom relocated to Fairbanks to work on the TransAlaska Pipeline from the upper Midwest and Seattle. Two years later the team took on the name Fairbanks Gold Kings (later changed to the Alaska Gold Kings), and quickly began proving itself against teams from Anchorage and the Pacific Northwest. From 1975 to 1995 the Gold Kings were an amateur senior men’s team, and from 1995-1997 they spent their last two Fairbanks years in the professional minor league West Coast Hockey League. Between its inception in 1975 as the Teamsters, and in spite of its relocation to Colorado Springs in 1998 as the Alaska Gold Kings, Fairbanks’ team was a huge success. The Gold Kings won five national championships, played 16 different international and Olympic teams, played overseas in Asia and Europe on multiple occasions, and laid the foundation for the level of hockey found in Fairbanks today.

This thesis examines the literary features of the Letters to Howard, a series of letters to the editor of the Alaskan newspaper, the Tundra Times. Published over the course of several months in 1973, the letters were signed by two semi-fictional characters: an old Eskimo man, Naugga Ciunerput, and a lost VISTA volunteer, Wally Morton, the two lone inhabitants of the imagined Land's End Village, Alaska. Naugga and Wally had a pointed agenda: they were addressing editor Howard Rock and his readership with their concerns regarding the newly-passed Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, or ANCSA. In truth, Naugga and Wally's letters were written by two graduate students, Fred Bigjim (an Inupiaq from Nome studying education) and James Ito-Adler (a law student who had switched to anthropology). The use of irony in these letters is the subject of my analysis here; I focus first on the semantic layers of irony and second on its discursive dimensions. This thesis' ultimate goal is to illuminate the ways in which these letters contest history, frame the nature and distribution of power, and examine the myriad tensions at play between Native peoples' historic, cultural, and political ties to the land.

The Glacial Lake Atna area, a valley between the southern Alaska and Wrangell mountain ranges in Southcentral Alaska, despite its appearance today as remote, thickly forested, and seemingly "wild" in character, has a 10,000-year history of human habitation. The first peoples in Alaska made encampments and harvested subsistence resources on the shores of the glacial lake and its margins, while today residents and visitors to the region continue to inhabit, hunt, fish, gather berries, cut firewood, and generally subsist from the land in ways remarkably similar to their prehistoric forebears. Humans and nature have a long, shared history in the thirteen million-acre Glacial Lake Atna region, and yet, since the mid-1980s, amid the modern-day conservation movement to protect so-called wild places, the region has been bordered and patrolled in ways that separate humans from nature. Wilderness policies under the National Park Service and Bureau of Land Management suggest that wilderness areas are inherently pristine, devoid of human inhabitation, and without the imprint of human work. Alaska lands acts, most specifically the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act of 1980, while allowing for subsistence, did not adequately address work and inhabitation. This thesis questions such policies and, through archaeological, historical, and policy analyses of humans and nature in the region, argues wilderness has never been truly uninhabited and free from work. The idea of "wilderness" lacks introspection as these areas contain quite a lot of human history, and indeed wilderness is a construct of romanticism and post-frontier ideologies.

The history of Indigenous-Crown relations in Canada has varied regionally and temporally. With the Constitution Act of 1982, however, Canada entered a new era. Section 35 of the Constitution recognized Indigenous treaty and land rights, and the Supreme Court of Canada has consistently interpreted this section liberally in favor of Canada's Indigenous Peoples. The Court has upheld the honour of the Crown in emphasizing the national and subnational governments' duty to consult diligently when engaging in development on the traditional territories of First Nations, Metis, and Inuit. The "citizens-plus" model of asserting and protecting Indigenous rights, first coined in the Hawthorn Report of 1966, has proved effective in these court cases, most recently in the Yukon's Peel Watershed case from 2014 to 2017. Yet, engaging with the state to pursue and to invoke treaty rights has forced socioeconomic and political changes among Yukon First Nations that some scholars have argued are harmful to the spiritual and physical wellbeing of Indigenous communities, mainly through alienation from their homelands. The Peel Watershed case demonstrates the unique historical development of Yukon First Nations rights and the costs and benefits of treaty negotiations and asserting Indigenous rights.

This thesis is a qualitative research exercise, which tests the explanatory value of the international relations theory of neoliberal institutionalism in explaining Germany's engagement in the Arctic and in the Arctic Council. The research question further attempts to clarify Germany's economic and environmental interests pursued through its engagement with the AC. This thesis analyzes Germany's engagement in the Arctic from a historical point of view up to Germany's contemporary interests. Germany's first Arctic engagement started with the period of whaling, continued through the age of polar heroes, up to the weather war of World War II. After the two World Wars, Germany struggled to restart its Arctic engagement, but nowadays enjoys a high reputation as an Arctic player. This is due to the well-known German polar research institute, the Alfred Wegener Institut Helholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung, but also due to Germany's engagement in the Arctic Council. As a result of Germany's long history of polar, especially Arctic endeavors, the country became an Observer in the Arctic Council at its founding. As global warming has caused significant melting in the Arctic, Germany's interest has shifted from environmental concerns in the region to a dual emphasis of protecting the environment while pursuing economic opportunities. Today Germany pursues several interests in the Arctic, including economic, political, and environmental interests. Neoliberal institutionalism argues that cooperation can emerge through mutual trust and the building of norms, regimes and institutions. Realism on the other hand emphasizes security competition among great powers within anarchy of the international system, with the main aim to survive. The results of the analysis suggest that the theory of neoliberal institutionalism has better explanatory power for interpreting Germany's motivations for engaging in the Arctic Council than the theory of realism.

In 2011, I worked briefly with the Asbestos and Lead Program for the State of Wisconsin. It was my job to conduct audits of our training providers as well as on-site inspections of work sites. During my time there I discovered a real disconnect between what I saw in the field and what is taught in class. Wisconsin has its own lead rules that are more stringent than the EPA's. After taking a critical look at the EPA's Renovation, Repair and Painting Rule (RRP) curriculum, I saw where the problems lay. The required hands-on training does not present the skills in a logical order and the demonstration is not similar enough to reality to be retained and transferred to a worksite consistently. Instead of contractors and homeowners learning how to conduct a job safely from start to finish, they are presented specific skills broken down into 11 skill sets. Over a four month time span I took the EPA curriculum and wrote scripts, videotaped, edited and narrated training videos with the assistance of Department of Health Service staff to eliminate the disconnect between the classroom learning and the real world. The videos demonstrate lead-safe work practices in a manner intended to increase retention rates. The videos were released in July 2012, and since then inspection statistics show a 13 percent decrease in offenses from certified workers and a 31 percent decrease in violations overall. Data for the first half of 2013 also indicated a positive trend; violations by certified contracts are down an additional percent. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation conducted a study in 1996, finding that 62 percent of Alaska private homes were built prior to 1979. This means approximately 49 percent of all Alaskan homes contain lead-based paint, 14 percent higher than the national average. The use of lead-based paint in colder regions is not uncommon. Lead-based paint was praised for its durability and longevity, making it ideal for regions in the circumpolar north. Americans spend nearly 90 percent of their time indoors. In cold climates, such as the Arctic, people tend to spend even more time indoors (EPA, 2012). Increased time indoors allows for increased wear on friction surfaces in the home. For children, deteriorating lead-based paint and lead in house dust are the primary and often most concentrated sources of lead (CDC, 2012). The Center for Disease Control reports that in 2004 there were 143,000 deaths and a loss of 8,977,000 disability-adjusted life years attributed to lead exposure worldwide. The primary cause was lead-associated adult cardiovascular disease and mild intellectual disability in children. Children represent approximately 80 percent of the disease impact attributed to lead, with an estimated 600,000 new cases of childhood intellectual disabilities resulting from blood lead levels (BLLs) greater than 10 υg/dL(CDC, 2012).