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Kalaallisut
Page created by Professor Lenore Grenoble, University of Chicago.
Data on Kalaallisut
Alternate Names: Greenlandic, West Greenlandic, East Greenlandic, North Greenlandic, Avanersuarmiutut, Tunumiisut.
The term “Kalaallisut” refers both to the official language of Greenland, and to a dialectal variation spoken on the western coast of Greenland which forms the basis for the standard language. Kalaallit Nunaat, the land of the Greenlanders, is the name of the country.
Area: Greenland.
Greenland is officially an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark . It became decolonized in 1953 but clear steps toward more autonomy were made in 1979 with the declaration of Home Rule. A Self Government was instituted 21 June 2009 as the result of a referendum. Denmark is still in charge for the matters of external relations, money and military defense.
Classification: Kalaallisut belongs to the Inuit branch of the Inuit-Yupik-Aleut language family. It is one of the Inuit languages, which include Iñupiak in Alaska.
The Iñupiak-Inuktitut-Kalaallisut is a vast dialect continuum, stretching from northwestern Alaska to the eastern coast of Greenland, comprising between 60 to 100 dialectal varieties, depending on the sources. The different varieties are remarkably close, considering the distance between each community. Their status as either different but closely related languages or somewhat more distinct dialects of a single language, is disputed. In his extensive monograph on the Inuit language, Dorais (2010) treats them as varieties of a single language. The Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC), the international organization which unites Inuit around the Circumpolar Arctic, sees there to be one single Inuit language with multiple dialects. There are strong reasons for this, including the strengthening of Inuit identity. Still, some linguists argue that the differences are more language-like than dialect-like. Much depends on what criteria are used to define language versus dialect.
Historically the Inuit language has sometimes been referred to as Eskimo, but this is a term which the Inuit have repeatedly rejected. In fact, the Executive Council of ICC passed a resolution on 29 September 2010 resolving that all research, scientific and other communties be called open to use the terms Inuit and paleo-Inuit (in lieu of Eskimo and paleo-Eskimo) in all publications, documents, and other research findings. Full text of the resolution is available here.
Main dialects and variants in Greeland: The Kalaallisut itself can be subdivided into several dialectal groups; the exact number depends on how dialect is defined and which features are taken into account.
Schematically there are three main dialectal groups in Greenland:
• Kalaallisut or West Greenlandic, spoken on the west coast
• Tunumiisut or East Greenlandic, spoken on the east coast.
• Avanersuarmiutut or North Greenlandic, spoken in the area of Thule, in the northern part of Greenland ; it is linguistically closer to the dialects of Eastern Canadian Inuktitut than it is to the other varieties spoken in Greenland.
West and East Greenlandic are closely related and together form a single subgroup, often called the Greenlandic subgroup, in distinction to the Polar (or Thule) subgroup which contains North Greenlandic and is more divergent.
Number of speakers: The total population of Greenland is just under 57,000 according to 2010 data according to Statistics Greenland. An estimated 88%, or approximately 50,000 people, speak Kalaallisut. It is the first and primary language for the majority of the citizens of Greenland.
Status: On 21 June 2009, the Greenland Act on Self Government came into effect. As part of this Act, Greenlandic is recognized as the official language of Greenland. The importance of Danish continues to be recognized, but this agreement declares a single official language of Greenland. Dialect variation is naturally maintained in spoken communication, but the standard variety is used for the government and in education.
Media: Greenland has a long-standing tradition of media. The first Greenlandic newspaper, Atuagagdliutit ‘distributed reading matter’, was first established in 1861 by the Dane H.J. Rink under the editorship of Rasmus Bertelsen, a native Greenlander. Bertelsen continued his work as editor until the paper was taken over by another Greenlander, Lars Møller, who served as editor from 1874 to 1921. This speaks to the high levels of media and literacy in Greenland.
Today there is a well-developed Greenlandic media with newspapers, radio and a Greenlandic television station. Greenland’s television station, KNR (Kalaallit Nunaata Radioa) is the public broadcasting corporation of Greenland. It produces a television station and extensive radio programming, primarily in Greenlandic but also in Danish. Their website is available in three languages (Greenlandic, Danish, and English). The newspaper Sermitsiaq is a national newspaper and is also available in digital format, with versions in the same three languages.
Education: The Self Government Act of 21 June 2009 recognized Greenlandic as the official language in Greenland. This means that it is a language of education, not just a home language, and school instruction is in Greenlandic. Higher education, however, is conducted in Danish, due to a set of issues: lack of pedagogical materials, lack of trained teachers with sufficient proficiency in Greenlandic, and so on. (Approximately 75% of all teachers are Greenlanders.) The University of Greenland (Ilisimatusarfik) conducts classes in Danish, although it should be noted that some of the faculty and the rector are fluent speakers of Greenlandic. The question of education instruction in Danish is not addressed in the Self-Government Act but its importance is widely recognized. It is assumed that the Self-Government will provide education in Danish and other languages, not just Greenlandic, as a necessary prerequisite for young Greenlanders to pursue education in Denmark and elsewhere abroad. Still, Greenlandic
Literacy: Greenland has long had high literacy rates thanks to a robust history of writing. Initially writing in Greenlandic was primarily religious documents, but the first newspaper was published in the language in 1851. This means, among other things, a long-standing written tradition and relatively early and extensive written records of the language. Samuel Kleinschmidt created a writing system for Greenlandic in 1851; this system was used until 1973 when orthographic reforms were introduced in an attempt to make the writing system closer to the spoken norm. This change in orthography was part of a large movement to revitalize Greenlandic; the modern orthography is used in all publications, the schools and official documents today.
Vitality and transmission: Kalaallisut is the only Arctic indigenous language which has seen an increase in the number of speakers over the last decades. It is the primary language of a large percentage of the population of Greenland and is used across all generations and in all domains and in all socioeconomic classes. In many regions knowledge of Danish is limited to that of a second language at best. In Nuuk, the capital of the country, there are high levels of multilingualism but elsewhere less so. Greenlandic is clearly identified as the language of the country; knowledge of it is a central part of identity and is key to fully participating in Inuit society in Greenland.
Linguistic details
Kalaallisut is a polysynthetic, noun-incorporating language with a very extensive derivational and inflectional morphology. As is typical for other polysynthetic languages, words are long and often translated into sentences in Indo-European language. Moreover, words can be built out of words by adding various suffixes, making the possibilities for “word forms” infinite, similar, again, to sentences in other languages. For example, the word qimmeq ‘dog’ can take the suffix -qar- ‘have’ and then add verbal endings of person, tense, and mood to create a new verb: Uanga qimmeqarpunga. ‘I have a dog’. Similarly we can take the root miki ‘little’ and add a verbal ending to get mikivoq ‘it’s little’. Or we can add another suffix to get mikisoq ‘one who is little’. Or we can add more suffixes to get mikisuarnannguuvoq ‘it’s a little one who’s very little’. And so on.
Kalaallisut is sufficiently different from Indo-European languages like Danish and English that it is quite difficult for adult learners to master. One of the challenges facing language planners in Greenland is thus helping native speakers of Danish (or other languages) living in Greenland to achieve proficiency in this language.
Essential Bibliography
Collins, D.R.F., ed. 1990. Arctic Languages: An Awakening. Paris: UNESCO.
Dorais, Louis-Jacques. 2010. The Language of the Inuit: Syntax, Semantics, and Society in the Arctic. McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Fortescue, Michael. 1984. West Greenlandic. London: Croom Helm.
Krupnik, Igor, Claudio Aporta, Shari Gearheard, Gita J. Laidler, & Lene Kielsen Holm, eds. 2010. SIKU: Knowing Our Ice: Documenting Inuit Sea-Ice Knowledge and Use. London : Springer.
Sadock, Jerrold. A Grammar of Kalaallisut. Munich: Lincom.
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