The Tlingit or Lingít ( ) are an Indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. Tlingit people are Alaska Natives and First Nations in Canada. They speak the Tlingit language,"Lingít Yoo X'atángi: The Tlingit Language." Sealaska Heritage Institute. (retrieved 3 December 2009) a Na-Dene language.
The Tlingit have a matrilineal kinship system, with children born into the mother's clan, and property and hereditary roles passing through the mother's line. Their culture and society developed in the temperate rainforest of the southeast Alaskan coast and the Alexander Archipelago. The Tlingit have maintained a complex hunter-gatherer culture based on semi-sedentary management of fisheries.Moss, p. 27 Hereditary slavery was practiced extensively until it was outlawed by the United States Government. The Inland Tlingit live in the far northwestern part of the province of British Columbia and the southern Yukon in Canada. Taku Tlingit live in British Columbia and Alaska.
Name Their autonym Lingít means 'People of the Tides'. The Russian name (, from a Sugpiaq-Alutiiq term for the labret worn by women) or the related German name may be encountered referring to the people in older historical literature, such as Grigory Shelikhov's 1796 map of Russian America.Shelikhov, Gregorii Ivanovich and Richard A. Pierce. A Voyage to America 1783–1786. Kingston: Limestone Press, 1981.
Contemporary nations
Federally recognized tribes of Tlingit people in the United States are in Alaska and include: Angoon Community Association Central Council of the Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes Chilkat Indian Village (Klukwan) Chilkoot Indian Association (Haines) Craig Tribal Association Douglas Indian Association Hoonah Indian Association Ketchikan Indian Community Klawock Cooperative Association Organized Village of Kake Organized Village of Saxman Petersburg Indian Association Sitka Tribe of Alaska Skagway Village Wrangell Cooperative Association Yakutat Tlingit Tribe
Sealaska Corporation is an Alaska Native Regional Corporation that includes Tlingit people. Within Sealaska are smaller regional corporations.
First Nations in Canada of Tlingit people are in British Columbia and Yukon and include: Carcross/Tagish First Nation, Yukon Taku River Tlingit First Nation, British Columbia Teslin Tlingit Council, Yukon
Territory
The greatest territory historically occupied by the Tlingit extended from the Portland Canal along the present border between Alaska and British Columbia, north to the coast just southeast of the Copper River delta in Alaska.de Laguna, 203-28. The Tlingit occupied almost all of the Alexander Archipelago, except the southernmost end of Prince of Wales Island and its surroundings, where the Kaigani Haida moved just before the first encounters with European explorers.
The Coastal Tlingit tribes controlled one of the mountain passes into the Yukon interior; they were divided into three tribes: the Chilkat Tlingit () along the Chilkat River and on Chilkat Peninsula, the Chilkoot Tlingit () and the Taku Tlingit () along the Taku River.
Inland, the Tlingit occupied areas along the major rivers that pierce the Coast Mountains and Saint Elias Mountains and flow into the Pacific, including the Alsek, Tatshenshini, Chilkat, Taku, and Stikine rivers. With regular travel up these rivers, the Tlingit developed extensive trade networks with Athabascan tribes of the interior, and commonly intermarried with them. From this regular travel and trade, a few relatively large populations of Tlingit settled around Atlin, Teslin, and Tagish Lakes, whose headwaters flow from areas near the headwaters of the Taku River.
Delineating the current territory of the Tlingit is complicated because they live in both Canada and the United States, they lack designated reservations, other complex legal and political concerns make the situation confusing, and their population is highly mobile. They also share territory with Athabascan peoples such as the Tahltan, Kaska, and Tagish. In Canada, the Interior Tlingit communities, such as Atlin, British Columbia (Taku River Tlingit),Taku River Tlingit Teslin, Yukon (Teslin Tlingit Council), and Carcross, Yukon (Carcross/Tagish First Nation) have reserves.
Tlingits in Alaska lack Indian reservations because the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) established regional corporations throughout Alaska with complex portfolios of land ownership rather than bounded reservations administered by Tribal Governments. The corporation in the Tlingit region is Sealaska Corporation, which serves the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian in Alaska.
Tlingit people participate in the commercial economy of Alaska, and typically live in privately owned housing and land. Many also possess land allotments from Sealaska or from earlier distributions predating ANCSA. Their current residences are within their historical homelands. Land around Yakutat, south through the Alaskan Panhandle, to the lakes in interior Yukon, as being , the Land of the Tlingit.
The extant Tlingit territory can be roughly divided into four major sections, paralleling ecological, linguistic, and cultural divisions: Southern Tlingit, south of Frederick Sound, who live in the northernmost reaches of the Western Red cedar forest. Northern Tlingit, north of Frederick Sound to Cape Spencer, Glacier Bay, and Lynn Canal; they occupy the warmest and richest of the Sitka Spruce and Western Hemlock forests. Inland Tlingit along large interior lakes, the Taku River drainage, and southern Yukon, whose share a subsistence lifeway similar to Athabascans in the mixed spruce taiga. Gulf Coast Tlingit, who live along a narrow strip of coastline backed by steep mountains and extensive glaciers north of Cape Spencer and along the coast of the Gulf of Alaska to Controller Bay and Kayak Island. Pacific storms hit their territory.
These categories reflect differences in cultures, food harvesting, and dialects. Tlingit groups trade among themselves with neighboring communities. These academic classifications are supported by similar self-identification among the Tlingit.
Tribes or ḵwáans Tlingit tribe IPA Translation Village or Community location Anglicized, archaic variants or adaptations Salmon Stream Tribe Yakataga-Controller Bay area Kaliakh Tribe or People from the Direction of the North Wind Hoonah Hoonah people From ('jade') (around), (land/country/village) because the bay is the color of jade all around Sedum Sumdum Coast Town Tribe northern Prince of Wales Island Tuxekan Inside the Glacier People Yakutat area Yakutat Geese Flood Upriver Tribe Taku Taku Tlingit, Taku people (a.k.a. ) Brown Bear Fort a.k.a. Burnt Wood Tribe Angoon Hootchenoo people, Hoochenoo, Kootznahoo Tribe From Across The Water Klawock Henya, Hanega Among The Athabascans Tribe Dry Bay Gunahoo people, Dry Bay people Big Sinew Tribe Teslin Teslin Tlingit, Teslin people, Inland Tlinkit (also ) Outside Edge of a Branch Tribe Sitka Sitka, Shee Atika Bitter Water Tribe Wrangell Stikine people, Stikine Tlingit People of the Fast Moving Water Petersburg Séet Ká Ḵwáan From ('food cache') ('salmon') ('dwellers'): Salmon Cache Tribe Klukwan Chilkat people Big Lake Tribe Atlin Taku River Tlingit, Inland Tlingit Dawn Tribe Kake Kake people Sea Lion Tribe Fort Tongass (formerly) & Ketchikan (today) Tongass people Chilkoot Tribe Haines Chilkoot people Small Lake Tribe Auke Bay Auke people Stomach Tribe Kuiu Island Kuiu people Southward Tribe Cape Fox Village (formerly) & Saxman (today) Saanya Kwaan, owns Saxman Corporation, which owns Cape Fox Corporation
Culture
The Tlingit culture is multifaceted and complex, a characteristic of Northwest Pacific Coast people with access to easily exploited rich resources. In Tlingit culture a heavy emphasis is placed upon family and kinship, and on a rich oratory tradition. Wealth and economic power are important indicators of rank, but so is generosity and proper behavior, all signs of "good breeding" and ties to aristocracy. Art and spirituality are incorporated in nearly all areas of Tlingit culture, with even everyday objects such as spoons and storage boxes decorated and imbued with spiritual power and historical beliefs of the Tlingits.
Tlingit society is divided into two moieties, the Raven and the Eagle. These in turn are divided into numerous clans, which are subdivided into lineages or house groups. They have a matrilineal kinship system, with descent and inheritance passed through the mother's line. These groups have heraldic crests, which are displayed on totem poles, canoes, feast dishes, house posts, weavings, jewelry, and other art forms. The Tlingits pass down or blankets that represented trust. Only a Tlingit can inherit one but they can also pass it down to someone they trust, who becomes responsible for caring for it but does not rightfully own it.
Like other Northwest Coast native peoples, the Tlingit did practice hereditary slavery.
Philosophy and religion
Tlingit thought and belief, although never formally codified, was historically a fairly well organized philosophical and religious system whose basic axioms shaped the way Tlingit people viewed and interacted with the world around them. Tlingits were traditionally animists, and hunters ritually purified themselves before hunting animals. Shamans, primarily men, cured diseases, influenced weather, aided in hunting, predicted the future, and protected people against witchcraft. A central tenet of the Tlingit belief system is the reincarnation of both humans and animals.
Between 1886 and 1895, in the face of their shamans' inability to treat Old World diseases including smallpox, many Tlingit people converted to Orthodox Christianity.Boyd, 241 Russian Orthodox missionaries had translated their liturgy into the Tlingit language. It has been argued that they saw Eastern Orthodox Christianity as a way of resisting assimilation to the "American way of life", which was associated with Presbyterianism.Kan, Sergei. 1999. Memory eternal: Tlingit culture and Russian Orthodox Christianity through two centuries. P.xix-xxii After the introduction of Christianity, the Tlingit belief system began to erode.
Today, some young Tlingits look back towards their traditional tribal religions and worldview for inspiration, security, and a sense of identity. While many elders converted to Christianity, contemporary Tlingit "reconcile Christianity and the 'traditional culture.'"Sergei, 42
Language
The Tlingit people of Southeast Alaska and Western Canada speak the Tlingit language ( ), which forms an independent branch of the Na-Dené language family. Tlingit has a complex grammar and sound system and also uses several rare phonemes.
Tlingit has an estimated 200 to 400 native speakers in the United States and 100 speakers in Canada. The speakers are all bilingual or near-bilingual in English. Tribes, institutions, and linguists are expending extensive effort into revitalization programs in Southeast Alaska to revive and preserve the Tlingit language and its culture. Sealaska Heritage Institute, Goldbelt Heritage Institute and the University of Alaska Southeast have Tlingit language programs, and community classes are held in Klukwan and Angoon.
Housing
Tlingit tribes historically built plank houses made from cedar and today call them clanhouses; these houses were built with a foundation such that they could store their belongings under the floors. It is said that these plank houses had no adhesive, nails, or any other sort of fastening devices. Clan houses were usually square or rectangular in shape and had front facing designs and totem poles to represent to which clan and moiety the makers belonged.
Economy