In Tlingit (Native Alaskan) cultural life, every place, from an ocean to the tip of a rock, has a name. This makes it very easy to sort out daily life, and it also gives clues to researchers about how the Tlingit develop their identity as individuals and social groups within their own perceptions of space and time. As he reveals the unique ways in which the Tlingit ally themselves with place and the names they give to place on the basis of experience, Thornton (anthropology, Portland State U.) analyzes the Tlingit sense of being, the influence of geographic knowledge on social organization, the role of names in place and subsequently in cognition, the workings of the everyday on the building of culture and the individual's place in it, the development of rituals that include consideration of space and time, and the implications of Tlingit ways for anthropology. Copublished with Sealaska Heritage Institute. Annotation ©2008 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)