The
languages of the Inuit peoples constitute a subfamily
of the Eskimo-Aleut language family.
A major linguistic division occurs in Alaska, according
to whether the speakers call themselves Inuit (singular,
Inuk) or Yuit (singular, Yuk).
The
eastern branch of the subfamily-generally called Inupiaq
in Alaska but also Inuktitut in Canada and Kalaallisut
(Kalâdtlisut) in Greenland-stretches from eastern Alaska
across Canada and through northern into southern Greenland.
It forms a dialect chain-that is, it consists of many
dialects, each understandable to speakers of neighboring
dialects, although not to speakers of geographically distant
dialects.
The western branch, called Yupik, includes three distinct
languages: Central Alaskan Yupik and Pacific Gulf Yupik
in Alaska and Siberian Yupik in Alaska and Canada, each
with several dialects (see Native
American Languages).
The Inupiaq dialects have more than 40,000 speakers in
Greenland and more than 20,000 in Alaska and Canada. Yupik
languages are spoken by about 17,000 people, including
some 1000 in the former Soviet Union.
These
various languages are used for the first year of school
in some parts of Siberia, for religious instruction and
education in schools under Inuit control in Alaska, and
in schools and communications media in Canada and Greenland.
The Inupiaq and Yupik languages have an immense number
of suffixes that are added to a smaller number of root
words; these suffixes function similarly to verb endings,
case endings, prepositional phrases, and even whole clauses
in the English language. A root word can thus give rise
to many derivative words, often many syllables long and
highly specialized in meaning, and sometimes complex enough
to serve as an entire sentence.
Inuit
font Inuktitut-Sri
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Because
these languages are among the most complex and difficult
in the world, few explorers or traders learned them; instead,
they relied on a jargon composed of Danish, Spanish, Hawaiian,
and Inupiaq and Yupik words. The Inupiaq and Yupik languages
themselves have a rich oral literature, and a number of
Greenland authors have written in Greenland Inupiaq. The
first book in Inupiaq was published in 1742.
