title: Indigenous Elder Insights About Conventional Care Services in Alaska: Culturally Charged Spaces.
abstract: Indigenous peoples around the world endure health and social disparities. In the United States, such disparities are typically ameliorated through conventional care services and organizations.
  
  
  
  To examine points of tension that characterize culturally pluralistic care services in the United States, specifically Alaska, within context of Indigenous colonial histories.
  
  
  
  The research design is ethnographic and multisited, comprising 12 months of fieldwork across urban, rural and remote village sites in Alaska. A conceptual lens that accounts for culturally diverse social spaces where relations of power are at stake frames research presented here. This work incorporates relational and participatory action research principles with Alaska Native Elders. Ethnographic evidence was collected through multiple methods, including field notes, documents, and interviews, with ethnographic analysis involving atlas.ti.
  
  
  
  Alaska Native Elders describe salient points of tension characterizing Alaska's conventional care services through the following insights: generational curses--a pain, prejudice on both sides-wounded, and value-systems clash-fighting.
  
  
  
  This article concludes with discussion about collective anxieties and implications for care services.
authors.affiliation: a The American Indian/Alaska Native Initiative on Cancer , Spirit of EAGLES , Rochester , Minnesota , USA.
authors.forename: Jean E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Balestrery
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000413:Alaska / Q000208:ethnology; D000072957:Alaska Natives / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology*; D000884:Anthropology, Cultural / Q000379:methods; D054521:Cultural Competency; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010342:Patient Acceptance of Health Care / Q000208:ethnology* / Q000523:psychology; D036301:Qualitative Research; D063505:Racism / Q000523:psychology*; D012424:Rural Population
keywords: American Indian/Alaska Native; Elders; care services; colonialism; health disparities