Freeze Frame

Alaska Eskimos in the Movies

Ann Fienup-Riordan

• $27.50 paperback (9780295983370) Add to Cart
• hardcover not available

• Published: 2003
• Subject Listing: Anthropology
  Native American Studies
• Bibliographic information: Orig. pub. 1995. 256 pp., 108 illus., 8 in color, 2 maps, bibliog., filmography, index, 8 x 9
• Territorial rights: world
• Contents

Freeze Frame takes a penetrating, often humorous, look at how Eskimos have been portrayed in nearly a century of film, from the pioneering documentaries of missionaries and Arctic explorers to Eskimo Pie commercials of the 1990s. Some of these works are serious attempts to depict a culture; others are unabashed entertainment, featuring papier-maché igloos and zebra-skin parkas. Even filmmakers who sought authenticity were likely to build igloos in villages that had never seen one and to hire non-Native actors to portray the Eskimo principals.

The groundbreaking film Nanook of the North, released in 1922, solidified the popular impression of Eskimos and set the precedent for dozens of movies to follow. Freeze Frame documents the ideas that motivate and lie behind this abundant generation of images. The first study to look at the popular image of Alaska Eskimos, it makes an important contribution to our understanding of Native American stereotyping.

Anthropologist Ann Fienup-Riordan is the author of numerous books on the peoples of Alaska, including The Living Tradition of Yupik Masks: Agayuliyararput, Our Way of Making Prayer.

Foreword
Preface
Acknowledgments
Primitive Pictures
Eskimos in the Movies: Opening Night
Eskimos in Hollywood
Hollywood After Eskimo: Innocence Lost
Alaska Eskimos in Documentary and Ethnographic Film
Movies by and for Alaska Eskimos
North to the Past, North to the Future
Filmography
References
Index