Students celebrate culture through food

  • By Rashah McChesney
  • Wednesday, November 26, 2014 10:19pm
  • News

With the rich aromas of fry bread, Indian pudding, ham and moose soup permeating the hallways of Kenai Peninsula College, as so often happens when students of Alaska Native culture gather to celebrate, the final event of a November’s Alaska Native and American Indian heritage month brought more than a dozen together to eat, learn the Dena’ina language and watch a documentary.

The month has been peppered with cultural awareness events, including a fry bread social, a presentation on the Dena’ina people to one of the college’s English As a Second Language classes, a beadwork and fish skin basket demonstration, each designed to bring area students of Dena’ina, and others, a knowledge of the Alaska Native culture.

“Each one of the students made something and then they shared the Dena’ina word for it,” said Kenai Peninsula College, Kenai River Campus Rural and native Student Services Coordinator Sondra Shaginoff-Stuart. “Then we all ate, shared our words and then watched a movie.”

Dena’ina elder Helen Dick, of Lime Village, also gave a blessing over the food gathering. Dick is one of the few fluent Dena’ina language speakers left and has visited the Dena’ina language class, which hosted the foods gathering, to help the students learn pronunciation and hear the language spoken.

The documentary focused on the Oklahoma Indians and a type of gospel song that the group has incorporated into their own music and language.

“It became their own music and they were seeing correlations in the music with the Irish people and the African American people,” Shaginoff-Stuart said. “They all had the same songs, but they sang them a little bit different in their communities.”

Last year, the college held one event to commemorate the month, and this year’s events expanded exponentially, Shaginoff-Stuart said.

“It was a busy month, I’m kind of glad it can kind of wind down now,” she said.

The college will be offering several more Alaska Native studies classes during the spring semester including elementary Dena’ina II and Gwich’in I language classes.

Shaginoff-Stuart, who teaches the current semester’s Dena’ina language class, said the campus was trying to move toward offering more classes that could be used in the University of Alaska’s Alaska Native Studies minor.

For now, the small group who gathered on Tuesday evening has been enjoying its cultural explorations, Shaginoff-Stuart said. The foods gathering was organized by one of the students.

“They overwhelmed me,” Shaginoff-Stuart said. “I thought they were just going to bring a few things. They did it all. It really does feel like we’re a little family after this.”

Reach Rashah McChesney at rashah.mcchesney@peninsulaclarion.com.

More in News

Gov. Mike Dunleavy (R-Alaska) speaks to reporters about his decision to veto an education funding bill at the Alaska State Capitol on Thursday, April 17, 2025. (Jasz Garrett / Juneau Empire)
Dunleavy’s veto of education funding bill puts pressure on lawmakers during final month of session

Governor also previews new bill with $560 BSA increase, plus additional funds for policy initiatives.

Brent Johnson speaks during a meeting of the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly in Soldotna, Alaska, on Tuesday, April 1, 2025. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Assembly kills resolution asking for option to cap property assessment increases

Alaska municipalities are required by state statute to assess all properties at their full and true value.

City of Kenai Public Works Director Scott Curtain; City of Kenai Mayor Brian Gabriel; Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor Peter Micciche; Sen. Lisa Murkowski; Col. Jeffrey Palazzini; Elaina Spraker; Adam Trombley; and Kenai City Manager Terry Eubank cut the ribbon to celebrate the start of work on the Kenai River Bluff Stabilization Project in Kenai, Alaska, on Monday, June 10, 2024. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Kenai bluff stabilization info meeting rescheduled for April 30

Originally, the event was scheduled for the same time as the Caring for the Kenai final presentations.

Project stakeholders cut a ribbon at the Nikiski Shelter of Hope on Friday, May 20, 2022, in Nikiski, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)
Peninsula organizations awarded mental health trust grants

Three organizations, in Seldovia, Seward and Soldotna, recently received funding from the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority.

Chickens are seen inside of a chicken house at Diamond M Ranch on Thursday, April 1, 2021, off Kalifornsky Beach Road near Kenai, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)
Soldotna council hears call to lessen chicken restrictions

The Soldotna City Council this month heard from people calling for a… Continue reading

Mount Spurr, raised to Advisory on the Volcano Alert Level, can be seen in yellow northwest of the Kenai Peninsula. (Map courtesy Alaska Volcano Observatory/U.S. Department of the Interior)
Spurr activity ‘declined slightly’

If an eruption were to occur, there would be noticeable indicators that may provide days to weeks of additional warning.

Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor Peter Micciche delivers a borough update to the joint Kenai and Soldotna Chambers of Commerce in Kenai, Alaska, on Wednesday, April 16, 2025. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Micciche pushes mill rate decrease, presses state to boost education funding

Borough Mayor Peter Micciche delivered an update to the joint Kenai and Soldotna Chambers of Commerce on Wednesday.

Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion
SPITwSPOTS employees speak to an attendee of the Kenai Peninsula Job and Career Fair in Kenai on Wednesday.
Job fair gathers together employers, job seekers

“That face-to-face has kind of been missing for a lot of people.”

A poster in the Native and Rural Student Center at the University of Alaska Southeast reads “Alaska is diverse, and so are our educators.” (Jasz Garrett / Juneau Empire)
University of Alaska holds virtual town hall to address fear and stress in changing federal landscape

Students, faculty and staff ask about protecting international students, Alaska Native programs.

Most Read