Amelia Katherine (Barr) Topkok is originally from Kotzebue, Alaska. She is currently a fifth-year PhD graduate student in Indigenous Studies at UAF. Her research looks at how Inupiaq skin-sewing builds cultural identity and impacts community health and well-being. Amy has a long 31+ year staff support career at UAF as well as teaches Alaska Native Studies courses as an adjunct. She earned her Master of Arts in Cross-Cultural Studies in May 2018 and her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Drawing
and minor in Native Art in 1997. As an artist, she draws, beads earrings, necklaces, and bracelets, sews kammak (maqlaqs), fur mitten keychains, and atikluks (qaspeqs/kuspuks), mostly for her Inupiaq dance
group, Pavva Inupiaq Dancers of Fairbanks, a non-profit since 1999. Amy also offers sewing workshops teaching sewing skills or shares Alaska Native dance and culture in collaboration with programs and schools. She is currently sewing a sea otter fur parka utilizing her grandmother’s fancy designs from Shishmaref.