Dr. Holly Miowak Guise (Iñupiaq) is an Assistant Professor of History at the University of New Mexico. Her forthcoming monograph, “World War II in Alaska: Native Voices and History,” focuses on gender, Unangax̂ (Aleut) relocation and internment camps, Native activism/resistance, and Indigenous military service during the war. Her research methods bridge together archives, tribal archives, community-based research, and oral histories with Alaska Native elders and veterans. She is interested in the colonial/Indigenous relationship during war and social history.
In 2008, she began interviewing Alaska Native elders about experiences with racial segregation that pre-dated and continued after the 1945 Alaska Equal Rights Act. In 2013, she pivoted to interviewing Alaska Native elders about their memories on WWII Alaska as servicemen, civilians, and children. She launched a digital humanities website (ww2alaska.com) that features her YouTube channel (World War II Alaska) with oral history content from Native elders, veterans, and Unangax̂ internment survivors. Since 2022, she has served as an editorial board member for the Alaska History Journal. She has also served as the primary scholar in partnership with the Alaska Humanities Forum for the Indigenous Resistance film series which received $50,000 in funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities (2021).