Aleuts

The Aleuts, known in their own language as the Unangan (eastern dialect) or Unangas (western dialect), are the Indigenous people of the Aleutian Islands, a volcanic archipelago stretching between the Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea. Their traditional homelands include the Aleutian, Shumagin and Pribilof Islands and the far western Alaska Peninsula. Today the Aleut population is divided politically between the United States (Alaska) and the Russian Federation (Kamchatka Krai). In Alaska, thirteen federally recognised Aleut tribes constitute the core of the Aleut Region, while Aleuts in Russia have been listed since 2000 as one of the Indigenous minorities of the North, Siberia and the Russian Far East.

Etymology

The term Unangan/Unangas means “people” in Unangam Tunuu, the Aleut language. The name Aleut, used by Russian explorers and traders from the eighteenth century onward, became the standard ethnonym in Russian America for both Aleutian peoples and culturally related groups of the Kodiak Archipelago (sometimes called Pacific Eskimos, Sugpiat or Alutiit).

Language

The Aleut language, Unangam Tunuu, belongs to the Eskaleut (Eskimo–Aleut) language family and comprises three main dialects:

• Eastern Aleut: spoken on the Eastern Aleutians, the Fox Islands, Shumagin Islands and the Pribilof Islands
• Atkan (Western Aleut): spoken on Atka and Bering Islands
• Attuan: formerly spoken on Attu Island and now extinct

Today, only about 150 speakers remain in the United States and a handful in Russia, most of them elders on the Pribilof Islands. Aleut was first written using Cyrillic in 1829 and later using the Latin alphabet from the 1870s. A dictionary, grammar and biblical translations have contributed to documentation of the language.

Tribes and Regional Groups

Traditional Unangan society consisted of numerous island-based groups, each associated with specific dialectal or local identities. Major groupings include:

• Attuan / Near Islanders: Attu, Agattu, Semichi Islands
• Kasakam Unangangis (Copper Island Aleuts): Bering and Medny Islands in the Commander Islands
• Qaxun / Rat Islanders: Buldir and the Rat Islands
• Atkan / Aliguutax: Delarof and Andreanof Islands, including Atka and Amlia
• Eastern Aleut groups: Islanders of the Four Mountains, Fox Islanders (Umnak, Unalaska), Krenitzen Islanders, Sanak Islanders and Shumigan Islanders

These identities reflect long-standing linguistic, geographic and cultural distinctions across the archipelago.

Population and Distribution

Before sustained European contact, the Aleut population is estimated at around 25,000. By the early twentieth century, disease, conflict, enslavement and relocation had dramatically reduced their numbers. The 2000 U.S. Census recorded 11,941 Aleut people and more than 17,000 individuals reporting partial Aleut ancestry. In the early twenty-first century, more than 15,000 people worldwide are believed to have Aleut heritage.
Russian colonial policies in the early nineteenth century resulted in forced resettlements, notably to the Commander Islands (Bering and Medny) and the Pribilof Islands, where many Aleuts were employed in fur-seal hunting.

History

Russian Contact and Orthodox Christianity

Russian promyshlenniki (fur traders) reached the Aleutians in the mid-eighteenth century. During this period many Aleuts adopted Russian Orthodoxy, which remains a major religious tradition among Alaska Natives. Saint Peter the Aleut is remembered as one of the earliest Christian martyrs in North America.
However, Russian colonial rule was harsh. Traders routinely took hostages—often women and children—to force Aleut men to hunt sea otters and foxes. Aleut resistance arose periodically; one recorded revolt occurred on Amchitka in 1784, triggered by exploitative trading practices. Accounts from Japanese castaways later described escalating tensions as otter populations declined and Russian compensation dwindled. Violence culminated in the murder of Aleut leaders and the relocation of island communities.

San Nicolas Island Conflict (California)

In 1814 the Russian–American Company dispatched the ship Il’mena with Aleut hunters to San Nicolas Island off the California coast. Conflict with the Indigenous Nicoleño population led to the killing of an Aleut hunter and a retaliatory massacre of Nicoleño people by the Aleuts; precise numbers remain unknown. The Nicoleño were removed from the island in 1835, except for one woman—later called Juana Maria, the “Lone Woman of San Nicolas”—who was found in 1853. She may have been the last surviving member of her people.

World War II and Internment

During the Second World War, Japanese forces invaded the western Aleutians, occupying Attu and Kiska in 1942. Aleut residents of Attu were transported to Hokkaido as prisoners of war, where many died from illness and malnutrition.
Fearing further invasion, the U.S. government forcibly evacuated Aleuts from dozens of communities across the Aleutians and Pribilofs, relocating them to poorly prepared internment camps in southeast Alaska. Overcrowding, inadequate food and limited medical care resulted in high mortality from influenza, measles and other diseases. Approximately 75 Unangan people died in U.S. custody; 22 died in Japanese captivity.
In 1988 the Aleut Restitution Act sought to compensate survivors, and in 2017 the U.S. government issued a formal apology for the internments and their lasting impact.
The U.S. military’s Aleutian Islands Campaign (1942–1943) ultimately recaptured Attu and Kiska but brought profound disruption to Unangan communities.

Culture and Heritage

Aleut culture traditionally centred on maritime hunting—especially seals, sea lions and whales—fishing, and the crafting of elaborate skin-covered kayaks known as iqyax̂. Unangan craftsmanship in basketry, carving and clothing is highly developed, reflecting millennia of adaptation to a cold maritime environment.
Russian influence, particularly through Orthodoxy, intermarriage and language contact, has shaped modern Aleut identity. Today Aleut communities maintain cultural revitalisation programmes, language preservation efforts and heritage events to sustain Unangax̂ traditions.