Serving the Purpose of Education

Abstract

In this article, Leona Okakok analyzes differences between the Northwest Alaska Inupiat and the Western world views, discusses the history of Western culture's influence on her own culture, and explains why the Native school board has taken full control of the educational system. She includes a discussion of the Inupiat's struggle to preserve their mother tongue and details how the school board has managed to adapt a foreign educational system to contemporary Inupiat culture (which accommodates both Western institutions and a traditional, subsistence-based lifestyle). Okakok's perceptive analyses encompass multiple viewpoints and engage the reader with concrete images and experiences of community-based education.