Alaska Grown: Analyzing Alaska Native News Coverage in the Land of the Midnight Sun

• Main Author: Dugdale, Zoë
• Format: Text
• Language: unknown
• Published: Whitworth University 2016
• Subjects: Sociology; Alaska; midnight sun
• Online Access: https://digitalcommons.whitworth.edu/sirc/2016/regular3/1

Through the content analysis of three Alaska Native news sources, I examine articles and ads that discuss the many facets of Native life in rural Alaska. Some of the dominant narratives appearing in these newspapers include the discussion of oil and gas, the environment, subsistence hunting and fishing, crime and violence, economic prosperity, land claims, accessibility to services and resources, etc. These rural newspapers are published on a weekly basis, and I examine each issue published in 2015, cover to cover. I engage in both deductive and inductive coding, employing strong qualitative methodology. I pay special attention to how salient certain issues are to distinct regions within the state. In sum, I focus on how rural news sources that manifest from communities housing a Native majority shape a cultural perspective of Native identity within the state of Alaska.