Sealaska Heritage Institute - Southeast Alaska
We promote Sealaska's Values in Action Through SHI Programming
Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI), a private nonprofit founded in 1980, mission is to advance Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. SHI’s goal is to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. Sealaska Heritage also conducts scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history, and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee, and a Southeast Regional Language Committee.
We offer numerous programs promoting Southeast Alaskan Native culture, including language and art – we also maintain a substantial archive of Southeast Alaskan Native ethnographic material. We partner with local schools to promote academics and cultural education. Biennially, we produce Celebration, Alaska’s second-largest Native gathering. We own and operate the Sealaska Heritage Store and curate an ongoing cultural exhibit on the first floor of our headquarters in Juneau’s landmark Walter Soboleff Building.
SHI Vision: Indigenous culture, values, and knowledge will be integrated into public policy, institutions, and programming serving Alaska Natives to sustain the cultural vitality of current and future generations.
Site In Development
kindly note that our new website was launched in advance of our planned date, many future updates are scheduled, and some sections will be offline till then.
SHI depts.
Sealaska Heritage Institute's Digital Artist Residency
Sealaska Heritage Institute proudly showcases within our site’s designs, as part of our community endeavors, artworks commissioned by SHI artists and/or artists that sell their works via our online and offline shop. We invite you to visit our Shop in Juneau and/or Visit our online shop to purchase their works. In the future we will have a section within our website dedicated, a virtually gallery, to the promotion of Southeast Alaskan Native Artists that we collaborates with.
LIVE SHI EVENT CONCLUDED
Skíl Jáadei Linda Schrack: "Honoring Our Speakers: Past, Present, and Future"
Article Link: Lecture Series
Click the image below to start the playback of the live stream:
what else is new?
Sealaska Heritage Institute is Born from Great Wisdom
Passing of the "Container of Wisdom"
SHI Tradition & Authenticity
four core values of southeast alaskan natives
- Haa Aaní: Our Land: Honoring & Utilizing our Land (Haida: Íitl’ Tlagáa; Tsimshian: Na Laxyuubm)
2. Haa Shuká: Past, Present, and Future Generations: Honoring our Ancestors and Future Generations (Haida: Íitl’ Kuníisii; Tsimshian: Na Łagigyetgm)
3. Haa Latseení: Our Strength: Strength of Body, Mind, and Spirit (Haida: Íitl’ Dagwiigáay; Tsimshian: Na Gatlleedm)
4. Wooch Yáx: Balance: Social and Spiritual Balance (Haida: Gu dlúu; Tsimshian: Ama Mackshm)
Heritage Forward
SHI is all about “the fresh, the modern, the unexpected – that fosters originality“
Heritage isn’t something old and static… It’s a continuum, stretching back thousands of years—since time immemorial—and stretching forward into the distant future. Heritage encompasses all that has been bestowed from our ancestors: land, art, stories, language, values, community, tradition, culture, and more.