| Summary: | Thesis (M.A.) University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2011 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. Foreword -- Introduction -- 1. Angles on the historical and political scene surrounding "Letters to Howard" -- Alaska Native Land Claims -- The civil rights political climate of the 1960s -- Implications of the Statehood Act -- Understanding oil -- The essentials of ANCSA -- A brief overview of the development of literacy among Alaska Natives -- The role of published news in Native Alaskan history -- Political critics: Fred Bigjim and James Ito-Adler's literary collaboration -- 2. Assemblies of meaning: the semantics of irony -- Markers and method: considering the recognition and attribution of irony -- Understanding irony's edge in "Letters to Howard" -- Parting thoughts -- 3. Discursive dimensions: the politics of irony -- Plural meaning -- A discursive angle on voice and ...
|
|---|