On most maps, Alaska is an outlier. Separated by land and sea from the “lower 48” and skewed by the distortions of the Mercator-derived projections that most popular maps default to, Alaska doesn’t easily fit within the image of the United States. Cartographers seem to be at a loss as to where to put it. On some maps, the state is packed into its own little box and shipped south to warm up next to Hawai’i. On others, it’s not even present at all. Then, when granted its own map, Alaska receives almost compensatory treatment. It is painted pictorially as larger than life, an Arctic Treasureland or The Far North Frontier, a land of opportunity for those rugged enough to brave its harsh conditions, native and colonial alike.

For our twelfth issue, we want to consider Alaska not as an outlying state or unified mythology, but as an irreducible territory that hosts and is hosted by multiplicities of climates, ecologies, histories, languages, and peoples. A body made of many bodies: akutaq, Alaska Territorial Guard, Alaska Vegetation and Wetland Composite, Alaskeros, Aleut internment, ANCSA Corporations, Awa'uq Massacre, Beringia, Bladder Festival, bowhead whaling, Bureau of Indian Affairs’ boarding school program, central base land use, Charlie Chaplin’s dinner rolls in The Gold Rush (1925), cheechakos & sourdoughs, the Chilkoot Pass, coastal erosion, Cungagnaq / Peter the Aleut, Dalton Highway, damp communities, the dolls of the Red Onion Saloon, Drop City, ecosophy & reciprocity, finelines & formlines, fur trapping & promyshlenniki, The Great Death / Sickness, HAARP, Insomnia (2002), Jewel, Keish / Skookum Jim Mason, Klondicitis, Knik wind, Koh'kluk / Shotridge & Joe Kokaryuk, Kushtaka, Llam Sua, moieties, N1812H, native place name projects, nonsubsistence areas, North to the Future, nuclear testing on Amchitka, Permanent Fund dividends, Peter Kalifornsky, pingos & ice wedge polygons, “Pleasure Boating in Lituya Bay,” potlatches, Porcupine Caribou Herd, Portage, qargi, Qitik / Christmas games, Raven stories, salmon runs, sled dog racing, Seward’s Folly, thermokarst, Tina Fey as Sarah Palin, Trans-Alaska Pipeline, Uksuum Cauyai: The Drums of Winter (1988), USGS Alaska Mapping Initiative, Walter Harper & Denali, White Fang (1991) & White Fang 2 (1994), the Yukon River, Yuuyaraq: The Way of the Human Being.

Issue 12 will be published in May 2020. To learn how to contribute, read our submissions guidelines.