Fleagle receives indigenous scholar award

February 7, 2017

UAF photo by JR Ancheta. Elizabeth Fleagle receives an honorary doctor of education degree at the commencement ceremony May 8, 2016, at the Carlson Center.

Elizabeth Fleagle has been named the 2016 Angayuqaq Oscar Kawagley Indigenous Scholar. The award is given in recognition of exemplary contributions to articulating the significance of indigenous knowledge systems, ways of knowing and worldviews.

Fleagle, an Inupiat educator, received an honorary doctorate at UAF in 2016. She was born in 1935 near the village of Alatna. She has worked as a mentor and teacher of traditional knowledge and skills. For several years, she served as elder-in-residence at UAF, assisting many Native students. She continues to provide a bridge between indigenous and Western-based knowledge for students and teachers. She shares her perspective regularly at conferences throughout the country.

Angayuqaq, better known as Oscar Kawagley, was a Yupik scholar who served 25 years as faculty with the Center for Cross-Cultural Studies and Education programs at UAF. He introduced the construct of "Native ways of knowing" and contributed greatly to the indigenous knowledge field.

The award is sponsored by Alaska Native Knowledge Network and the Center for Cross-Cultural Studies. The Center for Cross-Cultural Studies is housed within the College of Liberal Arts and offers both master’s degrees and doctorates. The collaborative, interdisciplinary program offers the only degree of its kind in Alaska.

ON THE WEB: https://www.uaf.edu/cxcs/