Nora Marks was born May 8, 1927, the first of 16 children of Emma Marks of Yakutat, Alaska, and Willie Marks, a Tlingit from Hoonah, Alaska. Nora's Tlingit name at birth was Keix̱wnéi. Following her mother in the Tlingit matrilineal system, she was a member of the Raven moiety of the Tlingit nation, of the Yakutat Lukaax̱.ádi clan, and of the Shaka Hít or Canoe Prow House, from Alsek River. In 1986 she was chosen as clan co-leader Yakutat Lukaax̱.ádi clan. and as trustees of the Raven House and other clan property. In November 2010 she was given the title Naa Tláa as the ceremonial leader of the clan. Emma's maternal grandfather had been Frank Italio, an informant to the anthropologist Frederica de Laguna whose knowledge was incorporated into De Laguna's 1972 ethnography of the northern Tlingit, Under Mount St. Elias. She was raised in Juneau, Hoonah, and on seasonal hunting and fishing sites around Icy Straits, Glacier Bay, and Cape Spencer. Her first language is Tlingit. She began to learn English when she entered school at the age of 8. In 1976, she earned a bachelor's degree in Anthropology from Alaska Methodist University. In the early 1970s, she married linguist Richard Dauenhauer, who had done his doctoral work on Tlingit language. She is international recognized for her work preserving and teaching the Tlingit language. She died on September 25, 2017 at the age of 90.
Career
Dauenhauer researched Tlingit language for the Alaska Native Language Center at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks from 1972 to 1973. There she translated and transcribed works of Tlingit culture into books. Her books include Beginning Tlingit, published in 1976. When Dauenhauer received a National Endowment for the Humanities grant, she and her family moved to Juneau, Alaska, in 1983. There she became a principal researcher in language and cultural studies at the Sealaska Heritage Foundation from 1983-1997. From October 10, 2012, to October 2014 she was Alaska States Poet Laureate.
Personal
Dauenhauer lived in Juneau where she wrote, researched, and volunteered at local schools. She had four children, 13 grandchildren, and 15 great-grandchildren.
2005: Community Spirit Award Honoree, First Peoples Fund
2007: Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian tribes of Alaska recognized her with a lifetime achievement award.
2008: Received the Before Columbus Foundation's American Book Award for Anooshi Lingit Aani Ka / Russians in Tlingit America: The Battles of Sitka 1802 and 1804.
November 2011: Selected as Indigenous Leadership award honoree by Ecotrust, Salman Nation, Portland, Oregon.
2012 – 2014 – Alaska State Writer Laureate
Works
"Egg Boat." In: Earth Power Coming: Short Fiction in Native American Literature, ed. by Simon J. Ortiz, pp. 155–161. Tsaile: Navajo Community College Press.
"Context and Display in Northwest Coast Art." New Scholar, vol. 10, pp. 419–432.
The Droning Shaman: Poems by Nora Marks Dauenhauer, Haines: The Black Current Press
"The Battles of Sitka, 1802 and 1804, from the Tlingit, Russian, and Other Points of View." In: Russia in North America, ed. by Richard Pierce, pp. 6–24. Kingston, Ontario: Limestone Press.
"Because We Cherish You...": Sealaska Elders Speak to the Future. Juneau: Sealaska Heritage Foundation.
Haa Tuwanáagu Yís, for Healing Our Spirit: Tlingit Oratory. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
Haa Kusteeyí, Our Culture: Tlingit Life Stories. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
'Technical, emotional and ideological issues in reversing language shift: examples from Southeast Alaska', in Grenoble, L A. & Whaley, L J. Endangered Languages: Language Loss and Community Response. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
