Alaska Demographics

As of 2005, Alaska has an estimated population of 663,661, which is an increase of 5,906, or 0.9%, from the prior year and an increase of 36,730, or 5.9%, since the year 2000. In 2000, Alaska was ranked 48th out of 50 states by population.[9] Alaska is the least densely populated state at 0.2849 people per square kilometer (1.1 per square mile), with the next nearest ranking state, Wyoming, at 1.3208 (5.1 per square mile), and the most densely populated, New Jersey, at 293.792 people per square kilometer (1,134.4 per square mile).

According to the U.S. Census Bureau's 2005 American Community Survey, 66.7% of Alaska residents are non-Hispanic whites.[10] American Indians and Alaska Natives make up 14.2% of the state's population (or 18.3% if those indicating both white and American Indian/Alaska Native races are included),[10] the largest proportion of any state.[citation needed] Multiracial people are the third largest group in the state, totaling 6.9% of the population.[10] Hispanics, Asians, African Americans, and Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islanders make up 4.8%, 4.5%, 3.4%, and 0.5% of the population, respectively.[10]

The largest self-reported ancestry groups in the state are German (19.0%),[11] Alaska Native or American Indian (15.6%),[citation needed] Irish (12.7%),[11] English (11.0%),[11] American (6.0%),[11] and Norwegian (4.4%).[11]

The vast, sparsely populated regions of northern and western Alaska are primarily inhabited by Alaska Natives, who are also numerous in the southeast. Anchorage, Fairbanks, and other parts of south-central and southeast Alaska have many whites of northern and Western European ancestry. The Wrangell-Petersburg area has many residents of Scandinavian ancestry and the Aleutians contain a large Filipino population. Most of the state's black population lives in Anchorage. Fairbanks also has a sizable black population.

According to the 2000 U.S. Census, 85.7% of Alaska residents age 5 and older speak English at home. The next most common languages are Spanish (2.88%), Yupik (2.87%), Tagalog (1.54%), and Iñupiaq (1.06%).[12] A total of 5.2% of Alaskans speak one of the state's 22 indigenous languages, known locally as Native languages.

The largest study of American religious beliefs, the American Religious Identification Survey, did not include Alaska in its coverage.[13] According to an NBC exit poll taken during the 2004 presidential election, 52% of Alaskan voters were "Protestant/other Christian," 17% were Catholic, 1% were Jewish, 11% were "something else," and 19% were not religious.[14] Alaska has a relatively large Russian Orthodox population as a result of early Russian colonization and missionary work among Alaska Natives.[15] (In 2004, church officials estimated that there were up to 50,000 Russian Orthodox individuals in the state, comprising approximately 8% of the state's population.[15]) In 1990, 0.51% of the state's population was Quaker, the largest percentage of any state.[16]

Russian Orthodox church in Sitka, Alaska.