A Comparison of Plant Use in Three Beringian Societies, Chukotka and Alaska, 2014-2022

This dataset compares the edible and medicinal plant uses of the Chukchi and Naukan Yupik of Chukotka and the Central Alaskan Yup'ik. The purpose is to examine whether there are more similarities in medical beliefs between two societies speaking similar languages and sharing a deep historical root (Naukan Yupik and Central Alaskan Yup'ik), or between two societies speaking unrelated languages, but sharing the more recent influence of the dominant Russian culture (Naukan and Chukchi). Although all three study cultures share many of the same ideas about the edibility of local plants species, the two Russian cultures (Naukan and Chukchi) are much more similar to each other than either are to Central Alaskan Yup'ik in terms of their medical ethnobotany. The greater similarity between Naukan and Chukchi cultures can be explained both by intercultural borrowing and by the fact that both groups have adopted many Russian medicinal plant uses.