Saving Inuktitut (fwd)

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September 20, 2006

Saving Inuktitut

Nunavut has passed legislation intended to keep the Inuit language from
fading. As southern culture encroaches in the North, it will be a tough
fight

COLIN CAMPBELL
http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/canada/article.jsp?content=20060925_133597_133597#

On the dusty streets of Iqaluit, Nunavut, stop signs read in two
languages: English and the squiggly syllabic characters of Inuktitut.
So do signs at the post office, bank and grocery store. Inuktitut is
the first language for 70 per cent of the territory's 30,000 residents,
and by some measures appears one of the healthiest indigenous languages
in the country. But here in the capital, a town of about 3,600, English
is the language of choice among young Inuit. Children wear SpongeBob
SquarePants T-shirts, and buy the latest CDs by 50 Cent and the Red Hot
Chili Peppers. Internet use is widespread, as is satellite TV. The
result: Inuktitut is a language under siege, and assuring it survives,
even flourishes, has become a priority.

In a controversial move this year, Nunavut Premier Paul Okalik ordered
that senior bureaucrats learn the language or lose their jobs. The
government is also drafting two new language laws designed to help make
Inuktitut Nunavut's working language by 2020, and lift employment
barriers for Inuktitut speakers. "It really does open the ice for
Inuit," says Johnny Kusugak, Nunavut's language commissioner. "Inuit
kids can now look up and see that there are lots of positions in the
government where they can reach their goals."

One war room in the fight to preserve Inuktitut is the Pirurvik Centre
-- the place Nunavut bureaucrats come to learn Inuktitut, at a small
table in a room looking out over Frobisher Bay. On this day, the
lessons are on hold while the centre puts the finishing touches on a
two-year project translating Microsoft's Windows operating system and
Office business software into Inuktitut. "It's a start," says Leena
Evic, one of the centre's founders, about the software, which will be
used primarily by government. "If we do nothing now, Inuktitut could
end up in a very threatened state. But if we take the right steps it
could be an indigenous language for a long time to come."

It's an uphill battle. The big concern these days is the lack of
Inuktitut in the education system. Nunavut's population is the youngest
in Canada (almost half are under 19) and according to one government
survey, only 18 per cent of Inuit say Inuktitut is the language they
speak most often in school. The language is taught up to Grade 3 or 4,
but then tapers off in favour of English instruction. "In Nunavut this
reinforces the colonial message of inferiority. The Inuit student
mentally withdraws, then leaves altogether," said Thomas Berger, a
former B.C. Supreme Court justice, in a report last spring that also
noted a "severe" shortage of Inuktitut-speaking teachers.

Some argue that young people in Iqaluit avoid Inuktitut because of the
difficulty navigating its different dialects. But Louis-Jacques Dorais,
a researcher at Université de Laval who has documented Inuktitut's
decline, says other factors are at play. Because English is the
language of pop culture and business, Inuktitut "risks being
increasingly limited to petty topics, on the one hand, and highly
symbolic domains on the other," he says. Serious social ills are also
undermining education in either language. School dropout rates are
astronomical -- only about a quarter of Inuit children graduate from
high school -- and drug abuse and alcoholism are rampant.

In more isolated communities outside of Iqaluit, Inuktitut appears much
healthier. Many of the elder residents are unilingual Inuktitut
speakers. Still, even in places like Pangnirtung, a tiny hamlet an
hour's flight north, English use is on the rise. "It started when the
government sent people off to schools in places like Churchill," says
Anuga Michael, 26, who worries about the type of education his infant
son, Wayne Wilson, will receive. "My first priority is to teach him
Inuktitut. That's the way I was taught, so that's the way I'll teach
him." Asked about the challenge of protecting Inuit culture, though, he
sighs: "It's complicated."

Not everyone backs Nunavut's plans to prop up Inuktitut. For young
people to succeed as professionals (like doctors or lawyers), they must
have strong English skills, insists Nancy Gillis, a city councillor in
Iqaluit. Basic English skills and a strong education system risk being
lost in the scramble to preserve Inuktitut, she says. "By the time
children hit Grade 4, they're behind already," she says. Others say
forcing bureaucrats to learn Inuktitut is also misguided. Many of the
skilled managers and bureaucrats here are not Inuit, or Inuktitut
speakers. The majority of Inuit today lack the professional training
and post-secondary education to fill top-tier jobs. Only about 45 per
cent of the government jobs are held by Inuit (who make up 85 per cent
of the population), and most of those jobs are lower-level positions.

Kusugak says he's not worried the new language laws will drive away
qualified bureaucrats. To reverse Inuktitut's decline, young Inuit need
to see that they can hold the most important positions in society while
maintaining their culture, he adds. "When we were growing up, our
parents told us that we have to learn English if we want to work in the
changing world. 'There will be jobs and security,' they said." Now that
the Inuit have their own land and their own government, he says, that
view must change.

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