The Intersection of Karuk Storytelling and Education

Chapter 4: Early Academic Interest
Four men and six books are of note. A. L. Kroeber, father of U.C. Berkeley’s
Anthropology Department, was markedly more interested in the downriver Yurok. But he
did contribute in no small part to the anthropological literature dealing with the upriver
Káruk people. He treats on classic Káruk culture in juxtaposition with other tribes in his
massive Handbook of the Indians of California (1925) and in collaboration with fellow
anthropologist E. W. Gifford for World Renewal (1949). Their work appeared side by
side again posthumously in 1976 in Karok Myths, envisioned by his widow Theodora
Kroeber as “a companion volume to Yurok Myths”. (xv) Joining them from the field of
linguistics were J. P. Harrington who collaborated with Káruk elder Phoebe Maddux for
their Karuk Indian Myths and more substantial Tobacco among the Karuk Indians of
California (both published in 1932). William Bright, a relative late comer on the scene,
wrote the monumental Karok Language for the University of California in 1957.
Together, these constitute something like a core canon of early academic literature
concerning the Káruk-varâara.
Kroeber writes about “The Karok” in the fifth chapter of his Handbook. The first
four are about the Yurok, arguably his favorite tribe. He makes what he said about them
also apply to us in his opening sentences: “The Karok are the up-river neighbors of the
Yurok. The two peoples are indistinguishable in appearance and customs except for
certain minutiae; but they differ totally in speech.” (98) The rest of the chapter is largely
taken up with discussing the nuts and bolts of our religion. As such, it can be seen as a
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