ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Arctic and Northern Studies Contact Information
Administrators
Brandon Boylan, Ph.D.
Director of Arctic and Northern Studies
Professor and Chair of Political Science Department
GRUE 613B
Courses taught by Dr. Boylan:
- PS F452 / ACNS F652 International Relations of the North
- ACNS F601 Research Methods and Sources in the North
- ACNS F698 Non-thesis Research / Project
- ACNS F699 Thesis
Research interests:
International relations, international security, political violence, separatist movements, Arctic politics and security.
Philip Wight, Ph.D.
Assistant Director of Arctic and Northern Studies
Associate Professor of History
GRUE 613A
*on sabbatical for AY 2025-2026*
Courses taught:
-
ACNS F201 The Circumpolar North: An Introductory Overview
-
HIST F411 / ACNS F611 Environmental History
-
HIST F453 / HONR F453 / ACNS F453 / ACNS F653 Fire, Ice & the Fate of Humanity: A History of Energy & Climate Change
-
HIST F461 / ACNS F661 History of ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ
-
HIST F483 / HIST F683 / ACNS F683 20th Century History of the Circumpolar North
Dr. Wight advises the B.A. and Graduate Certificate programs.
Research interests:
ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñn history, modern circumpolar history, energy systems, political economy, mobility
and infrastructure, and climate change
Affiliated Faculty
Walkie Charles, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Yup’ik and Faculty Fellow
ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Native Language Center
BROOKS 107D
Courses taught:
- YUP F101X Elementary Central Yup'ik I
- YUP F102X Elementary Central Yup'ik II
- YUP F201 Intermediate Central Yup'ik I
- YUP F202 Intermediate Central Yup'ik II
- YUP F301 Advanced Central Yup'ik
- YUP F415 Additional Topics in Advanced Yup'ik
Research specialties and interests:
Dynamic Assessment, Sociocultural Theory, Vygotskian Approaches to Second Language Pedagogy, Second/Foreign Language Assessment (Classroom-based assessment), Theories of Second Language Acquisition, Indigenous Knowledges
Benjamin Christian
Adjunct Faculty
Arctic and Northern Studies
Daryl Farmer, Ph.D.
Professor of English
Department of English
GRUE 862
*on sabbatical for AY 2025-2026*
Courses taught:
- ENGL F270X Introduction to Creative Writing
- ENGL F377 Intermediate Creative Writing: Nonfiction
- ENGL F470 Topics in Creative Writing
- ENGL F661 Mentored Teaching in English
- ENGL F675 Internship in Scholarly Publishing
- ENGL F684 Forms of Nonfiction Prose
Research specialties and interests:
Nonfiction and fiction writing and Literature of the US West.
Carol Gray, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Political Science - Public Law; Coordinator of Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies; Pre-Law Advisor in Political Science; ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Fulbright Liaison
Department of Political Science
GRUE 603A
- ACNS F340 / PS F340 / WGSS F340 Gender and Reproductive Law and Politics
- PSF101X Introduction to American Government and Politics
- PS F435 Constitutional Law I: Federalism
- PS F436 Constitutional Law II: Civil Rights and Civil Liberties
- PS F322 International Law and Organization
- PS F499 - Senior Thesis
Research specialties and interests:
Research interests related to Arctic and Northern Studies include the intersection
of law, human rights, and politics (e.g., abortion rights in ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ and the legal
crisis involving Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women). Other research and teaching
interests include race, gender and class; international human rights law; criminal
law; voting rights; oral history; interdisciplinary studies; decolonization and the
Global South; the Middle East with a focus on Egypt and the Arab- Israeli conflict;
ongoing archival research based on an abolitionist newspaper from the 1800s.
Alexander Hirsch, Ph.D.
Professor of Political Science
Department of Political Science
GRUE 603
Courses taught:
- PS F300X Ethics and Society
- PS F450 Comparative Indigenous Rights
- PS F647 US Environmental Politics
Research specialties and interests:
Zoë Marie Jones, Ph.D.
Associate Professor and Chair of Art Department
Department of Art
FINE ART 409
Courses taught:
- ART F261 History of World Art I
- ART F262X History of World Art II
- ART F363 History of Modern Art
- ART F425 / ART F625 / ACNS F425 / ACNS F625 Visual Images of the North
- ART F463 / ART F663 Seminar in Art History
Research specialties:
20th Century art, immigrant artistic communities, art created in times of conflict
Tyler Kirk, Ph.D.
Associate Professor and Fathauer Chair of History Department
Department of History
GRUE 605B
Courses taught:
- HIST F315 Europe: 1900 - 1945
- HIST F316 Europe Since 1945
- HIST F464/ACNS F664 Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia
- HIST F466 / ACNS F466 / ACNS F666 The Russian Arctic
- ACNS F484/ ACNS F600 / HIST F600 Perspectives on the North
- HIST F497/ACNS F697 Historiography
- HIST F699 Thesis
Russian history, the Soviet Union, the circumpolar North, authoritarianism and memory.
Michael Koskey, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Cross-Cultural Studies
Center for Cross-Cultural Studies
BROOKS 306F
Courses taught:
- CCS F602 Cultural and Intellectual Property Rights
- CCS F603 Field Research Methods
- CCS F604 Documenting Indigenous Knowledge
- CCS F612 Traditional Ecological Knowledge
- CCS F616 Education and Socioeconomic Change
- CCS F656 Sustainable Livelihoods and Community Wellbeing
Research specialties and interests:
Oral history, traditional knowledge, ethnohistory, culture change, decolonization, resource use and allocation, community-based participatory research, cultural and intellectual property rights, and indigenous cosmology/mythology.
Yoko Kugo, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Indigenous Studies
Center for Cross-Cultural Studies
BROOKS 306E
Courses taught:
- ANTH A390 Arctic and Subarctic Ethnography (Central Yup'ik Cultures)
- CCS F612 Traditional Ecological Knowledge
-
CCS F619 Cultural Atlases as a Pedagogical Strategy
Research specialties and interests:
ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Native food lifeways, ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Native language (Central Yup'ik), ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñn history,
Indigenous place names and way of knowing, oral history, community-based participatory
research, cultural anthropology, geography, and Japanese pioneers in ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ.
Amy Lovecraft, Ph.D.
Professor of Political Science, Director of the Center for Arctic Policy Studies
Department of Political Science
GRUE 602B
*on sabbatical for AY 2025-2026*
Courses taught:
- PS F300X Ethics and Society
- PS F303 Politics and the Judicial Process
- PS F403 Public Policy
- PS F462 / PS F662 / ACNS F662 ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Government and Politics
- PS F499 Senior Thesis
Research specialties and interests:
Wildland fire, sea ice, and marine mammals policy; freshwater systems and transnational environmental regimes; environmental political theory addressing rapid change and the far North.
Mary Ludwig, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of History
Department of History
GRUE 606B
- HIST F131 History of the US I
- HIST F132X History of the US II
- HIST F363 History of the US 1877-1945
- HIST F364 History of the US 1945 to Present
- HIST F446 Native American History
Indigenous history, History of the North American West, sovereignty, and carceral studies.
Russell Luke, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Political Science- American Politics
Department of Political Science
GRUE 601B
- PS F101 Introduction to American Government and Politics
- PS F302 Congress and Public Policy
- PS F403/ACNS F603 Public Policy
American politics, public opinion, political psychology, research methods
Leslie McCartney, M.A.
Professor of Library Science, Curator of Oral History
Elmer E. Rasmuson Library
- ANTH F470 / ANTH F670 / ACNS F470 / ACNS F670 Oral Sources: Issues in Documentation
Chanda Meek, Ph.D.
Professor of Political Science
Department of of Political Science
GRUE 603B
Courses taught:
- PS F101X Introduction to American Government and Politics
- PS F447 / PS F647 / ACNS F647 U.S. Environmental Politics
- PS F469 / PS F669 / ACNS F669 Arctic Politics and Governance
- PS F499 Senior Thesis
Research specialties and interests:
Resilience of Northern social-ecological systems, natural resource & environmental policy & politics, human dimensions of wildlife management, indigenous-state power-sharing arrangements, cross-scale policy implementation
Neall Pogue
Assistant Professor of American History
Department of History
GRUE 604C
- HIST F131 US I
- HIST F132X US II
- HIST F275 Perspectives on History
- HIST F411 Environmental History.
- HIST F434 Topics in History: American Pop Culture Since 1945
- HIST F368 Topics in American Film History
Jennifer Schell, Ph.D.
Professor of English
Department of English
GRUE 854
Courses taught:
- ENGL F307 Survey of American Literature: Civil War to the Present
- ENGL F310 Literary Criticism
- ENGL F360 Multiethnic American Literature
- ENGL F612 Studies in American Literature after 1918
- ENGL F620 / ACNS F620 Images of the North
Research specialties and interests:
Circumpolar literature and film, ecogothic and eco-horror, critical animal studies, extinction studies, climate writing, and environmental justice.
Viktor Shmagin
Assistant Professor of History
Department of History
GRUE 606C
Courses taught:
- HIST 333 Foundations of Japanese History
Edo Period Japan, Japan-Russia-Ainu contacts, Northeast Asia, maritime history.
Jeremy Speight, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Political Science
Department of Political Science
GRUE 602A
Courses taught:
- PS F202 Democracy and Global Society
- PS F222 Political Science Research Methods
- PS F458 / PS F658 / ACNS F658 Comparative Environmental Politics
- PS F475 Internship in Public Affairs
- PS F499 Senior Thesis
- ACNS F689 Thesis Writing Workshop
- PS F699 MA Thesis
Research specialties and interests:
Yue Sun
Assistant Professor of Music - Upper Strings
Department of Music
FINE ARTS 209
Courses Taught:
- MUS F223X / ACNS F223X ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ Native Music
Sveta Yamin-Pasternak
Associate Professor of Anthropology
Department of Anthropology
BUNNELL 305A
Courses Taught:
- ANTH F100X Individual, Culture, and Society
- ANTH F336 / EBOT F336 Ethnomycology
- ANTH F402 Anthropology of Art
- ANTH F610 / ACNS F610 Northern Indigenous Peoples and Contemporary Issues
- ANTH F446 / ANTH F646 Economic Anthropology
Food and culture, ethnomycology, anthropology of art, Circumpolar North, post-Soviet studies
Professor Emeriti
Graduate Teaching Assistants
In Memoriam
Former Director, Arctic and Northern Studies (2010-2018)
Former Director, Arctic and Northern Studies (1991-2010)
Professor Emeritus of Political Science
Professor Emeritus of History and Arctic and Northern Studies