CENTURY-OLD EFFORT REALIZED IN NATIVE DICTIONARY

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 20, 2000

Fairbanks, Alaska – More than a century ago, Jesuit missionary Jules Jette began collecting notes and sketches depicting the language and culture of the Koyukon Athabaskans of Interior Alaska. The cleric and scholar died in 1927 leaving an unpublished handwritten and hand-bound manuscript in seven volumes. Now, with the collaboration of Alaska Native language scholar and 1990 University of Alaska Fairbanks honorary degree recipient Eliza Jones, their efforts have reached fruition.

The Alaska Native Language Center at UAF has announced the publication of the Koyukon Athabaskan Dictionary, to be unveiled at a book-signing ceremony with Jones at the Doyon building in downtown Fairbanks Friday, Dec. 1 from 4 – 7 p.m.

Jones, an Athabaskan elder from the village of Koyukuk, began work on the Jette manuscript in 1974 while employed at ANLC. Since then, she's devoted more than 25 years to the project, which includes more than 8,800 vocabulary items covering all aspects of Koyukon life. Entries in the 1,212-page volume are illustrated by more than 17,500 sentence examples, 3,200 descriptive comments by Jette and Jones, and 90 of Jette's drawings, diagrams and photos.

"The book is a lavish exploration of Koyukon knowledge, world view, technology, social life, personality, aesthetics, history, traditional stories and spiritual beliefs," writes author and anthropologist Richard Nelson in the book's foreword. "The volume is based on more than 50 years of research, encompassing the span of an entire century, combining the

perspectives of both an insider and an outsider to the culture. Few works in the written literature of any indigenous people have been founded upon such authority and experience."

Copies of the Koyukon Athabaskan Dictionary are available through the ANLC at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, P.O Box 757680, Fairbanks, 99775-7680.

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CONTACT: Tom Alton, Editor – Alaska Native Language Center (907) 474-6577 or by email at: fyanlp@uaf.edu

TGP/11-27-00/01-034