The Conscientious Objector : Art Davidson Decries the World’s Treatment of Indigenous Peoples

Restless curiosity and a zeal for adventure propel a person like little else.

That combination drove Art Davidson to the tops of Alaskan mountains and, for a time, earned his reputation among America’s outstanding alpinists.

It drew him to the front lines of Alaska’s environmental wars, and today he is regarded as one of the state’s eminent conservationists.

But yet another expression of his curiosity and zeal now absorbs him.

From his gaslit log cabin outpost in a steep canyon south of Anchorage, Davidson has spent a good deal of his adult life pondering what most regard as an urban phenomenon: the clash of human cultures. And, more to the point, the ensuing human wreckage.

Spend time in Alaska, even as a tourist, and you are virtually certain to brush the indigenous cultures of Indians, Eskimos and Aleuts.

Spend your life there, and you will come to know enough about those natives and their clash with the dominant culture of modern settlers to madden, sadden and exasperate you, if not envelop you in guilt.

In Davidson’s case, proximity to natives led to friendship, and friendship led to understanding. And, of course, understanding led to alarm.

All of which drove him to travel the world in quest of the stories of struggling indigenous peoples. He returned with poignant portraits otherwise lost in the urgent global competition of ideology, geography and economics; human cries muffled by the powerful voices of governments, corporations and special interests.

His resulting book, “Endangered Peoples,” is half text and half coffee-table photo essay. Published this week by Sierra Club Books--with an introduction by 1993 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchu--the lovingly written but frightful volume details what Davidson calls the “hemorrhaging of humanity.”

“Endangered Peoples” profiles 21 tribes, cultures and cultural regions from North and South America, Europe, Asia, the Pacific and Africa. Dozens more could have been included, for the modern world is fast closing in on the people of old.

Squirming in his chair, Davidson, 49, talks in gentle baritones, wholly disarming from a man so large and imposing, with his wild stand-up hair, sun-creased face, toes long ago nipped off by high-altitude frostbite. Like his voice, Davidson’s thoughts about polyculturalism are disarming for their lack of stridence. He presents himself less as crusader than empathizer.

By example, he encourages others to listen and to think, and to throw away easy generalizations and romanticisms.

Times: How do you define indigenous people ?

Davidson: Usually we think of them as the original inhabitants of a country who are still practicing a way of life similar to their ancestors--people with strong tribal relationships who still have the songs, the dances, the elders, the customs, rites, rituals, their own local dialects. And they are very closely rooted to the land.

Times: Is there more to it?

Davidson: We can think of indigenous as not just what you are by birth, but as being indigenous to a region, indigenous to a place. Whether we realize it or not, our nature as individuals or as a people is shaped and defined by our environment. So I think it’s possible for anyone to become more indigenous and live indigenous to a degree--in other words, we can learn to feel connected with the place where we live, really become part of Northern California or eastern Colorado or the plains of Texas.

Times: Why is that important?

Davidson: Most Americans are largely cut off from their roots. We’re adrift. There is a lot of mobility in our society. A lot of us don’t live where our parents lived, and that can cut us off from having a strong sense of place, which carries a responsibility to that place. It also cuts us off from a sense of the continuation of generations, of having elders, of being part of a community and having a responsibility to our neighbors.

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In 1968, Davidson was part of the first expedition to successfully climb the continent’s highest mountain, Mt. McKinley, in winter. His book “Minus 148 Degrees” recounts the travail, injury and, ultimately, death that marked the epic climb, and remains a classic of the genre.

Mountaineers as a rule are loners and egotists. Davidson has his share of both characteristics, but his interests long ago grew beyond self. He authored the Sierra Club book “In the Wake of the Exxon Valdez,” provided text for lavish photo books of Alaskan scenery and, in 1991, did likewise for “The Circle of Life,” about rites of passage around the world.

But it was friend Harold Napolean, a Yup’ik Eskimo, who personalized for Davidson the life-and-death struggles of indigenous people. Napolean was a tribal leader and fought the good fights. Although he won many, the lot of the Yup’ik seemed only to worsen, a self-destructive spiral of dependency, suicide, glue-sniffing and fetal alcohol syndrome replacing proud traditions of hunting and fishing.

In despair, Napolean turned to liquor. One night he blanked out, and when he awoke, his 4-year-old son was dead, hit with a blunt object. Napolean went to prison for second-degree murder.

For Davidson, the clash of Eskimo and white cultures was cast in the tragic face of a friend. The abstract frictions of group politics forever would be seen for what they are: the simple quests of individual human beings trying to make a life.

Times: By placing such a high regard on cultural differences, aren’t we liable to perpetuate conflict?

Davidson: Sure, cultural diversity can be a source of friction. But it’s a very pessimistic view to say that people cannot maintain their differences and still live in the same country, the same state. My life is enriched when I know it’s not all one homogenized world.

Times: But what about the melting pot? In your own life, you have a new son. His mother is a Yup’ik Eskimo. Isn’t your own family accomplishing what you lament--weakening cultural ties?

Davidson: Not at all. There always has been blending of people and ideas. In my own case, my son is going to have the chance to decide for himself how he is going to combine Yup’ik and Western values. This whole question of what you carry from the past into the future, and what you adapt or bring into your life from this modern world--there are no pat answers.

Times: Why is cross-cultural appreciation so difficult?

Davidson: It is the great arrogance of our Western society that we think that everybody wants to be like us. Some words that have long haunted me came from the elders of a small village, testifying before a group of government officials. One of them said, “Please fathom our great desire to survive in a way somewhat different than yours.”

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In his travels, Davidson has found a great diversity not only in people, but in their wants and hopes. Some, such as the Yanomami in the Amazon basin, want only to be left alone and supplied with medicine to combat the diseases brought by outsiders.

The Maoris of New Zealand seek a bicultural country. Sovereignty is the quest of the Australian Aborigines. The Ainu of Japan, their numbers dwindling to precious few, want recognition and land from a government that acknowledges no minorities.

Some cultures Davidson visited are past the brink. Marie Smith is the Ishi of Alaska’s Eyak Indian nation--the last of her kind.

Times: You write that today’s pressures on native cultures should not be mistaken for cultural evolution as known through history.

Davidson: In the past, these things took place over long periods. As a new culture emerged out of an old, there was a time for people, generation to generation, to decide how they wanted to change and help determine their future. Today, the forces of change are so enormous, they just sweep people away.

Times: If you could share one thing from your work with indigenous people, what would it be?

Davidson: Try not to look at them in stereotype. A young Cree man, a deputy chief, said to me, “Look, I’m sick and tired of the noble savage image. I’m not a savage and I don’t think I’m extra noble. We’re just people. We’re trying to live, we’re trying to raise our kids, we’re trying to find our way in this world.”

Times: It’s a cliche, but there is self-interest for all of us in cultural preservation, right?

Davidson: Yes, it works both ways. I remember a Costa Rican Indian telling me: “Yes, many Indian people are endangered. They need help and they know it. But remember, most people in the Western world are also lost. They have lost their connection with nature, which is essential. How will they be rescued?”

Times: So what do you make of the mainstream United States?

Davidson: I think this is a country of cultural orphans. We’ve abandoned our children to schools that don’t know how to teach meaning, sense of purpose, sense of place. We’ve abandoned our kids to the television and the streets. We’ve lost a great deal of what gives meaning to many indigenous people.

Some of those things are loving the place where you are, not just your house, but the meadow, that rocky ridge over there, knowing it, knowing your father knew it, knowing that you’ll take your children out there, your grandchildren some day; being part of a community, working together, knowing that if you get some good fortune, you have people to share it with, and that people will share with you.