© Alaska Public Media 2020. He noted that early day missionaries set up schools in the area where students were forbidden to speak in their native language and were punished if they did so. It’s not immediately clear what the city’s new Inupiat name means. There is still Barrow High … Residents in the nation’s northernmost community have voted to change the name of the Alaska town to its traditional Inupiat Eskimo name. A resident of the town formerly known as Barrow, Alaska, rides her motorcycle along an Arctic Ocean beach in 2005. All rights reserved. Local American Indians and others are seeking to have it switched to Bear Lodge. In the unofficial results, the votes were tied, but after all of the absentee and questioned ballots were reviewed, the yes votes took a narrow lead. Voters have set in motion the process of changing the name of the northernmost community in Alaska from the English "Barrow" back to the … Phillips, who voted against the change, owns the Barrow Souvenirs and Gifts shop and is a 22-year resident of the town located more than 700 miles north of Anchorage. © 2020 Anchorage Daily News. When asked for an estimate of the percentage of people who are choosing Barrow versus Utqiaġvik, Ipalook said, “I would say about probably 80-20.”A lot of people choose Barrow because it’s easier to spell, Ipalook said.Others have come in to add Utqiaġvik to their ID even though it hasn’t expired yet, just because they’re proud of the name.Robert Nageak, who grew up here, says he respects the change, and uses Utqiaġvik sometimes himself, but he’s not a stickler for what people call this place.“I just don’t have a problem with either/or,” Nageak said.
With the name change, the town also is seeking state approval to change it stop signs to the Inupiat word: “Nutqagin,” the mayor said. Call it an “October surprise.” On Indigenous Peoples’ Day, the city of Barrow, Alaska, population 4,000, voted to change its name to Utqiaġvik (pronounced OOT-kay-AHG-vick). If necessary, the English word “Stop” also will be added, but it will be much smaller than the Native word on the red octagonal sign. The name was first recorded in 1853 as "Ot-ki-a-wing" by Commander Rochfort Maguire, Royal Navy. Alaska’s northernmost town still in transition 1 1/2 years after official name change I have no doubt that these are some of the same blithe souls who maintain that the city at the top of the world and the great mountain, respectively, will always be Barrow and McKinley to them. But what exactly is a name, if not a claim of ownership?The ordinance shedding the city’s colonialist moniker is intended to help the Iñupiat reclaim their beautiful language. The town is now officially called Utqiagvik, its Inupiaq name.
John Simpson's native map dated 1855, records the name "Otkiawik," which was misprinted on the subsequent British Admiralty Chart as "Otkiovik." The importance of this struggle may have been mysterious to many Americans because so few of us truly comprehend the rights, status and aspirations of what amounts to 1 percent of our nation’s population.One symptom of this that I’ve noticed is a cynical approach to the social plagues of Alaska Natives. Last year, the Obama administration decided to bestow the traditional Alaska Native to North America’s tallest mountain, from Mount McKinley to its Denali, an Athabascan word meaning “the high one.” There’s also an ongoing effort to rename Devils Tower National Monument, a giant rock butte in northeast Wyoming. All rights reserved. Democrats were more likely than Republicans to express confidence.Subscribe for unlimited digital access to the news that matters to your community. Enshrined by history, names signal to generations to come which cultures and people are worthy of reverence.Now, a Native American renaissance is underway, crystallized by the successful Standing Rock protest against a pipeline in North Dakota. Yet it is a worthwhile, even a necessary step, now approved by the state’s lieutenant governor. The most northern city in the United States of America.” Some say it means “a place where snow owls are hunted” while others say it essentially means a place for gathering potatoes, even though potatoes are not native to the area. But like the earthen berms that try to shore up Utqiaġvik’s eroding coastline, it could very well prove to be a stopgap, a desperate last stand against the dovetailing losses of language and land. A poll found most Americans, 55%, are “not too confident” or “not at all confident” the 2020 election will be conducted fairly and equally. There are still several steps that must be taken, including the city communicating with state officials, before the name change will come to fruition. The action came on Monday, which was Indigenous People's Day. As the Sounder reported following that meeting, the ordinance's authors wrote: "To do so would acknowledge, honor and be a reclamation of our beautiful language which is moribund." Barrow’s vote follows a high profile name change in Alaska. The city's native name, Utqiaġvik, refers to a place for gathering wild roots.
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