Tusaalanga lets you hear it (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

Nunavut
July 20, 2007

Tusaalanga lets you hear it
Web site uses sound to teach Inuktitut

CHRIS WINDEYER
http://www.nunatsiaq.com/news/nunavut/70720_327.html

Qallunaat who are impressed with their mastery of Inuktitut phrases such as
"nakurmiik" and "illali" are going to have to get to work.

Iqaluit's Piruvik Centre last week officially launched Tusaalanga.ca, a
website that puts online the same curriculum that's used to teach Inuktitut
to Government of Nunavut deputy ministers.

"Sometimes a lack of resources is used as an excuse not to learn," said
Piruvik co-founder Gavin Nesbitt, before Tusaalanga's official launch July
13. "You have to hear Inuktitut to get it."

[photo inset - Piruvik Centre co-founder Gavin Nesbitt shows off the
Tusaalanga website to visitors during its launch July 13. The site features
15 introductory Inuktitut lessons with streaming audio to help teach
pronunciation. (PHOTO BY CHRIS WINDEYER)]

Tusaalanga, Inuktitut for "let me hear it" tackles the single biggest
obstacle to learning Inuktitut: the fact that words are sometimes
pronounced much differently than Roman orthography would indicate to a
southern tongue. Each of the site's 15 lessons come with audio files,
voiced by Nunavut's former languages commissioner Eva Aariak, demonstrating
the proper pronunciation. There are more than 600 audio files on the site.

It's a solution for people who can't afford or don't have access to
classroom lessons, Nesbitt said. Before Tusaalanga came along, "there was
really no way to know if you were getting the pronunciation down pat."

The online material is drawn from the same lesson plans Piruvik that uses to
teach Inuktitut to GN workers, and which they designed to get new Inuktitut
speakers conversant in the language as quickly as possible. It's based on
the pioneering work of Inuktitut educators Mick Mallon and Alexina Kublu,
Nesbitt said.

The early lessons focus on learning how to say where you come from and how
you are doing, then build in complexity to body parts and places of work.

"It was really developed from scratch," Piruvik co-founder Leena Evic said
of the curriculum. "[The GN] told us it should be practical."

While Inuktitut classes may cost thousands of dollars, the folks behind the
Piruvik centre say they've unveiled Tusaalanga as a public resource that
can get people to a basic level of conversational Inuktitut, though they
caution there's no replacing classroom conversation as a way to learn the
language.

Piruvik plans to eventually develop an intermediate online program, with an
introduction to writing in syllabics, for people with basic fluency or, as
Evic put it, "cultural knowledge."

Evic said sites like Tusaalanga show how useful the internet can be for
preserving and spreading Inuit culture.

"It definitely will have a positive impact. Sharing this kind of program
with Inuit from around the globe is a very positive move."