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Richard Dauenhauer (April 10, 1942 – August 19, 2014) was an American poet, linguist, and translator who married into, and subsequently became an expert on, the
Tlingit The Tlingit or Lingít ( ) are Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. , they constitute two of the 231 federally recognized List of Alaska Native tribal entities, Tribes of Alaska. Most Tlingit are Alaska Natives; ...
nation of southeastern
Alaska Alaska ( ) is a non-contiguous U.S. state on the northwest extremity of North America. Part of the Western United States region, it is one of the two non-contiguous U.S. states, alongside Hawaii. Alaska is also considered to be the north ...
. He was married to the Tlingit poet and scholar Nora Marks Dauenhauer. With his wife and Lydia T. Black, he won an American Book Award for ''Russians in Tlingit America: The Battles of Sitka, 1802 And 1804.'' He has translated works into German, Russian, Finnish, and Classical Greek.


Life

Dauenhauer was born in Syracuse, New York. His B.A. was from
Syracuse University Syracuse University (informally 'Cuse or SU) is a Private university, private research university in Syracuse, New York, United States. It was established in 1870 with roots in the Methodist Episcopal Church but has been nonsectarian since 1920 ...
in Russian and Slavic Languages and his M.A. from the
University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public university, public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 stud ...
in German. In 1966 and 1967, he was a student in Finland. He earned his Ph.D. in Comparative Literature in 1975 from the
University of Wisconsin–Madison The University of Wisconsin–Madison (University of Wisconsin, Wisconsin, UW, UW–Madison, or simply Madison) is a public land-grant research university in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. It was founded in 1848 when Wisconsin achieved st ...
, with a dissertation titled ''Text and Context of Tlingit Oral Tradition.'' He became a professor of literature at Alaska Methodist University in
Anchorage Anchorage, officially the Municipality of Anchorage, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Alaska. With a population of 291,247 at the 2020 census, it contains nearly 40 percent of the state's population. The Anchorage metropolita ...
, where he came in contact with the Tlingit people in the late 1960s. In 1973 he married his second wife Nora, and became an honorary member of the Tlingit people.. From 1981 to 1988, he was the poet laureate of Alaska. He worked as a program director at the Sealaska Heritage Foundation from 1983 to 1997, and with his wife edited the foundation's highly regarded ''Classics of Tlingit Oral Literature'' series. He also became a professor at the University of Alaska Southeast until retiring in 2011. Dauenhauer "made recording, transcribing and advocating for the
Tlingit language The Tlingit language ( ; ' ) is an Indigenous language of the northwestern coast of North America, which is spoken by the Tlingit people of Southeast Alaska and Western Canada and is a branch of the Na-Dene language family. Extensive effor ...
his life's work". He and his wife published histories of the Tlingit people and translations of their works, made recordings of spoken works in Tlingit, and helped standardize a written form for the language. They wrote an introductory textbook on the Tlingit language, and he brought what had previously been the oral traditions of the Tlingit into his poetry. As a professor, he also trained many others to teach and translate Tlingit. As a result of his efforts, Tlingit-language teaching is now available to many Alaskans from grade school through the college level. His papers from 1961 to 1985 are held at University of Alaska Anchorage. Dauenhauer died on August 19, 2014, in Juneau's Bartlett Regional Hospital, after having been diagnosed with
pancreatic cancer Pancreatic cancer arises when cell (biology), cells in the pancreas, a glandular organ behind the stomach, begin to multiply out of control and form a Neoplasm, mass. These cancerous cells have the malignant, ability to invade other parts of ...
a month prior.


Works

*(with Philip Binham) (eds.) (1978) ''Snow in May: An Anthology of Finnish Writing 1945–1972''. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. *(1980) ''Glacier Bay Concerto''. Anchorage: Alaska Pacific University Press. * (1982) "Two Missions to Alaska." ''Pacific Historian,'', vol. 26, pp. 29–41. *(1986) ''Phenologies''. Austin: Thorp Springs Press. *(1987) ''Frames of Reference''. Haines, AK: Black Current Press. * (1990) "Education in Russian Alaska." In: ''Russian America: The Forgotten Frontier,'' ed. by Barbara Smith and Redmond J. Barnett, pp. 155–163.
Tacoma Tacoma ( ) is the county seat of Pierce County, Washington, United States. A port city, it is situated along Washington's Puget Sound, southwest of Seattle, southwest of Bellevue, northeast of the state capital, Olympia, northwest of Mount ...
: Washington State Historical Society. * (with Nora Marks Dauenhauer) "Beginning Tlingit", third edition. Juneau, AK: Sealaska Heritage Foundation Press. (1991
976 Year 976 ( CMLXXVI) was a leap year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar. Events By place Byzantine Empire * January 10 – Emperor John I Tzimiskes dies at Constantinople, after returning from a second campaign against ...
* (with Nora Marks Dauenhauer) (eds.) (1981) ''"Because We Cherish You ...": Sealaska Elders Speak to the Future.'' Juneau: Sealaska Heritage Foundation. * (with Nora Marks Dauenhauer) (eds.) (1987) ''Haa Shuká, Our Ancestors: Tlingit Oral Narratives.'' (Classics of Tlingit Oral Literature, vol. 1.) Seattle: University of Washington Press. * (with Nora Marks Dauenhauer) (eds.) (1990) ''Haa Tuwanáagu Yís, for Healing Our Spirit: Tlingit Oratory.'' (Classics of Tlingit Oral Literature, vol. 2.) Seattle: University of Washington Press. * (with Nora Marks Dauenhauer) (eds.) (1994) ''Haa Ḵusteeyí, Our Culture: Tlingit Life Stories.'' (Classics of Tlingit Oral Literature, vol. 3.) Seattle: University of Washington Press. * (with Nora Marks Dauenhauer) (1998) 'Technical, emotional and ideological issues in reversing language shift: examples from Southeast Alaska', in Grenoble, L A. & Whaley, L J. ''Endangered Languages: Language Loss and Community Response.'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press * *(2013) ''Benchmarks: New and Selected Poems 1963–2013''. Fairbanks: University of Alaska Press.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dauenhauer, Richard 1942 births 2014 deaths American male poets Deaths from pancreatic cancer in Alaska People from Juneau, Alaska Writers from Syracuse, New York Poets from Alaska Poets from New York (state) Poets laureate of Alaska Syracuse University alumni University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts alumni University of Wisconsin–Madison alumni Alaska Pacific University faculty University of Alaska Southeast faculty 20th-century American poets 20th-century American translators American Book Award winners 20th-century American male writers