Estelle Thomson
Grants and Tribal Development Officer
Angute’karaq (Estelle Thomson) is an enrolled member of the Native Village of Paimiut, a descendant of one of the original five families of Paimiut. As Paimiut is a displaced tribe, her hometown is the Southwestern Bering Sea Coast community of Hooper Bay (originally Naparyarmiut- “the place of the stake village people”). Estelle has lived in Washington and Alaska communities over her lifetime including Hooper Bay, Bethel, Seattle, Utqiaġvik, Fairbanks, Kingston, Poulsbo, Suquamish, Kenai, Big Lake and Anchorage.
She has previously served the Paimiut people as the Tribal Court Program Director, a Tribal and Government consultant, and continues to serve as a member on her Tribes governing body, the Native Village of Paimiut Traditional Council. Currently, Estelle is a Traditional Council Officer and works as the Grants and Tribal Development Officer for the Native Village of Paimiut. She is also a steering committee member for the Western Alaska Partnership, a commissioner for the Yukon River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, and a working member of the Catalyst Fund for Indigenous communities.
As a Native Village of Paimiut Traditional Council member, Estelle spends a great deal of time educating local, state and federal agencies on her village, her culture and historical and intergenerational trauma; organizations on protocols and procedures in Tribal Courts and Tribal, advocating for her People and is a liaison and does consultation between Alaska tribes in her region, the Department of Justice, the Department of Interior, the Department of Commerce, the White House Council on Indian Affairs and other local, state and federal agencies. She is also consults and works voluntarily with traditional healers and an international indigenous birthworkers network on a variety of projects and programs. She has been published in the First Alaskans Magazine on an article entitled “Preserving Traditional Lifeways” and in the Journal of Environmental Health on “the Impact of Climate Change for Alaska Natives”.
Her mentors and teachers in traditional medicine span every major culture group in Alaska, several tribes in Canada, the Lower 48, Asia, Hawaii, New Zealand and Australia. She loves learning and sharing her knowledge and will continue to do so in various capacities and venues for the rest of her life. She feels her most important job thus far has been a mother to her three intelligent, funny and incredible children.