Kuskokwim River in the context of Central Alaskan Yupʼik language

The Yupik (/ˈjuːpɪk/; Russian: Юпикские народы) are a group of Indigenous or Aboriginal peoples of western, southwestern, and southcentral Alaska and the Russian Far East. They are related to the Inuit and Iñupiat. Yupik peoples include the following:

• Alutiiq, or Sugpiaq, of the Alaska Peninsula and coastal and island areas of southcentral Alaska.
• Yupʼik or Central Alaskan Yupʼik of the Yukon–Kuskokwim Delta, the Kuskokwim River, and along the northern coast of Bristol Bay as far east as Nushagak Bay and the northern Alaska Peninsula at Naknek River and Egegik Bay in Alaska.
• Siberian Yupik, including Naukan, Chaplino, and—in a linguistic capacity—the Sirenik of the Russian Far East and St. Lawrence Island in western Alaska.

Bethel (Central Yupik: Mamterilleq) is a city in the U.S. state of Alaska, located on the Kuskokwim River approximately 50 miles (80 km) from where the river flows into Kuskokwim Bay. It is the largest community in western Alaska and in the Unorganized Borough and the eighth-largest in the state. Bethel has a population of 6,325 as of the 2020 census, up from 6,080 in 2010.

Annual events in Bethel include the Kuskokwim 300 dogsled race; Camai, a Yup'ik dance festival held each spring; and the Bethel Fair held in August.

Nunivak Island (Central Alaskan Yup'ik: Nunivaaq; Nunivak Cup'ig: Nuniwar; Russian: Нунивак, romanized: Nunivak) is a permafrost-covered volcanic island lying about 30 miles (48 km) offshore from the delta of the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers in the US state of Alaska, at a latitude of about 60°N. The island is 1,631.97 square miles (4,226.8 km) in area, making it the second-largest island in the Bering Sea and eighth-largest island in the United States. It is 76.2 kilometers (47.3 mi) long and 106 kilometers (66 mi) wide. It has a population of 191 persons as of the 2010 census, down from 210 in 2000. The island's entire population lives in the north coast city of Mekoryuk.

The Yukon–Kuskokwim Delta is a river delta located where the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers empty into the Bering Sea on the west coast of the U.S. state of Alaska. At approximately 129,500 square kilometers (50,000 mi) in size, it is one of the largest deltas in the world. It is larger than the Mississippi River Delta (which varies between 32,400 and 122,000 square kilometers or 12,500 and 47,100 sq mi); it is comparable in size to the entire U.S. state of Louisiana (135,700 square kilometers or 52,400 sq mi). The delta, which consists mainly of tundra, is protected as part of the Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge.

The delta has approximately 25,000 residents. 85% of these are Alaska Natives: Yupik and Athabaskan peoples. The main population center and service hub is the city of Bethel, with an estimated population of around 6,219 (as of 2011). Bethel is surrounded by 49 smaller villages, with the largest villages consisting of over 1000 people. Most residents live a traditional subsistence lifestyle of hunting, fishing, and gathering. More than 30 percent have cash incomes well below the federal poverty threshold.

Mary Sattler Peltola (born August 31, 1973) is an American politician and former tribal judge who served as the U.S. representative from Alaska's at-large congressional district from 2022 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party, she previously served as a judge on the Orutsararmiut Native Council's tribal court, executive director of the Kuskokwim River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, Bethel city councilor, and member of the Alaska House of Representatives. As of 2025, Peltola is the most recent Democrat to have won or held statewide office in Alaska.

Peltola defeated Republican former Governor Sarah Palin and Republican Alaska Policy Forum board member Nick Begich III in an upset in the August 2022 special election to succeed Don Young, who had died that March. It was the first election to take place under the state's new ranked-choice voting system. In winning that election, Peltola became the first Alaska Native member of Congress, the first woman to represent Alaska in the House of Representatives, the first person born in Alaska elected to the House, and the first Democrat to serve as Alaska's representative in the House since Nick Begich Sr. in 1972.