Our People
NANA shareholders are Iñupiat (in-you-PATE), meaning “real people,” who have inhabited Northern and Northwestern Alaska for more than 10,000 years.
The Iñupiat
The ancestors of the Iñupiat are thought to have crossed the land bridge from Siberia, making their home in one of the most severe and unforgiving climates on the globe.
From the start, the Iñupiat were hunters and gatherers, subsisting off of the bounty of the nearby sea and the fresh berries and large game of the tundra.
Today, subsistence still plays a key role in the life of the modern day Iñupiat.
The Iñupiat are part of the Iñuit, or circumpolar indigenous people of the world. The language of the Iñupiat is Iñupiaq (in-you-PACK).
The NANA Logo: The Iñupiat Hunter
The NANA logo is an Iñupiaq hunter moving aggressively toward a successful future through a vast, beautiful, and sometimes harsh world. This is NANA. NANA is all of us working together as one hunter, successful if we are of one mind and purpose, hungry if we are split by doubts and mistrust of each other.
Just as one hunter is small and insignificant when compared to our environment, so is NANA when compared to the corporate and governmental environment in which it must hunt successfully to survive. The same qualities of courage, confidence, humility, respect, integrity, and sharing that have allowed our people to survive as great hunters in a harsh climate are necessary for NANA to be successful.