Inuit

Inuit (Canada) A word used to designate the aboriginal people living in the Arctic regions of Canada. The Inuit speak six dialects of a common language, Inuktitut, and are divided into eight main tribal groups. Never exposed to the same degree of contact with Europeans experienced by more southern native peoples, the Inuit were more or less officially ignored until 1939, when a federal court ruled that they were a federal responsibility. Never subject to the Indian Act, they receive funding from the federal government for housing, education, and other basic programmes. Most of the Inuit converted to Christianity in the twentieth century.

After World War II, when the Canadian north was opened up to development and mineral exploitation, contact with non-aboriginal Canadians increased, and the traditional nomadic way of life became less common. Partly as a result of this increased contact some Inuit began to develop an artistic industry in soapstone carving and printmaking, which has brought greater economic self-sufficiency to many communities.

In the early 1970s a national organization, the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, was founded to protect Inuit cultural and individual rights. The organization also includes in its mandate the negotiation of land claims (including the Nunavut agreement) and the protection of the Arctic environment. Although most Inuit now live in permanent communities rather than following a more traditional, seasonally nomadic lifestyle, their distinctive culture persists in their language, family and cultural laws, attitudes, and art.

Inuit Collective name for the Eskimo people of Nunavut, Greenland, and the Northwest Territories, Arctic Québec, and n Labrador areas of Canada. Many Inuit still live by the traditional skills of fishing, trapping and hunting.

Inuit the members of an indigenous people of northern Canada and parts of Greenland and Alaska.

The peoples inhabiting the regions from NW Canada to western Greenland prefer to be called Inuit rather than Eskimo, and this term now has official status in Canada. By analogy, the term Inuit is also used, usually in an attempt to be politically correct, as a synonym for Eskimo in general. However, this latter use, in including people from Siberia who are not Inupiaq-speakers, is, strictly speaking, not accurate.