Joy, remembrance and connection as Alaska Native performers reunite for Quyana at AFN

Alaska Native performers from all across the state celebrated being together through dance at the Alaska Federation of Natives convention for the first time in three years.

Quyana Alaska brought hundreds of people and more than a dozen dance groups to the first two nights of the AFN convention this week. With dancing, drumming and singing, performers shook the stage of the Dena’ina Civic and Convention Center in downtown Anchorage.

“When you are drumming and singing, you’re losing your voice,” Elmer Waller said after he finished performing with Qikiqtagruk Northern Lights Dancers. “But you hear the crowd enjoy it, and you’re gonna keep going and going.”

Quyana performances at AFN haven’t happened in person since 2019, and the energy and joy of an in-person Quyana was contagious and well-missed.

“We celebrate through dance, and we also enjoy watching other dance groups,” said Utqiaġvik resident and Barrow Dancers performer Mary Lum Patkotak. “It’s been a tough few years, not be around to celebrate.”

The first group that took the stage Thursday was Qikiqtagruk Northern Lights Dancers. They shared the dances they learned from their elders from Kotzebue, Kivalina, Point Hope, Point Lay, Wainwright and Utqiaġvik.

With two lines of drummers and singers at the back, dancers would step forward to jump and wave and yell to express their joy. Solo dances were followed by family dances, as well as invitationals where everyone could join the performers on, or in front of, the stage.

The dances represented a number of events, from a celebration of a wedding to a successful hunt, said Judy Huss, who has been performing since she was 12.

“We perform even at people’s funerals to lift up their spirits,” she said.

For Jonathan McIntyre from the Anchorage-based group Qaluyaarmiut Yurartait, performing was “about the remembrance of the ones that passed.” After his grandfather’s recent death, McIntyre said, he tries to follow his steps in everything, from carving to dancing.

“That’s all I think about before we go up on stage,” he said.

The event of Quyana, which means “thank you” in Yup’ik, was introduced at the 1982 convention to thank Alaskans for supporting Alaska Native communities in a pro-subsistence vote, according to AFN. Throughout the years, more than 200 dance groups have performed at Quyana, which now spans two nights.

This year, the celebration also featured international guests, representatives of the Ainu people from Japan. The group took the stage Friday, playing the traditional harp-like instrument called a mukkuri, singing and performing storytelling dances. In one of their acts, the dancers told a story about a hunter who saw a beautiful bird in a forest but didn’t catch it. The performance symbolized acceptance and gratitude celebrated in the Ainu culture, performer Nakamura Yoshio said through a translator.

The Japanese government legally recognized the Ainu as an Indigenous people of Japan for the first time in 2019, and Yoshio said he hopes that in the future, they will be able to celebrate their culture the way Alaska Native people do.

The ability to share and celebrate culture means tireless and consistent practice for Barrow Dancers, said the group’s leader, Fred Elavgak.

“The dance group that we have now, we’re keeping the songs and dances alive as much as we can,” he said, “passing them along to the younger generation.”

The excitement of the crowd is Quyana the performers received.

“You could notice in the front row when somebody’s going, ‘Ah,’ and when they sit up and they say, ‘Again, again again!’” said Martin Woods, who has performed with Northern Lights Dancers at AFN since 1979. “Besides passing on songs and language, tunes and drum beats, drum making and things like that — it’s the audience that just makes the back of your hair stand up.”