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why is basically nobody learning Greenlandic, it’s so beautiful. look at it. look at those words. imagine how completely BOMB you would sound speaking that.

tulunnguaq

I couldn’t agree more.

tulunnguaq

I saw this post come up again and I thought I’d try and translate it. My guess is that the passage is from “Herod and Mariamne” by Literature Nobel-prize winner Pär Lagerkvist, presumably translated from its original Swedish into Greenlandic, but I don’t have a hard copy to confirm this. Want to hear it spoken out loud? Well the Greenlandic Language Secretariat (Oqaaseriliffik) has a groovy text-to-speech tool for that - click here and listen!

Ullut ilaanni aperaa uitaarerusunneraani. Asanninnermik sumik taasaqanngilaq. Aammami tamanna qangasuarli paasereersimajunnarsivaa, oqaatsillu taamaattut, taamak pingaartigisut, aninnissaat nangaanartorujussuuvoq. Siornatigut taamaattunik oqaaseqarsimanngisaannarami aninngitsoorluaannarpai. Aammami imminut oqaasissaqqiginngilluinnaramigit.

Aperisaa sumik akinngilaq, aammami akeqqullugu piumaffiginngilaa. Taamaallaat ajukkuppalungajattutut pissuseqarluni oqarfigaa oqaatsini eqqarsaatigitsiaqqullugit.

One day he asked her if she would marry him. There had been no declaration of love. And indeed she had understood this for a long time; and such words, being of such importance, their utterance was extremely troublesome. Because he had never spoken of such things before, he cannot have said these words lightly. And also because he definitely did not consider them worth saying again.

She did not answer his question, and she also did not want him to ask her to answer. So coming across as somewhat shy, she asked if she could think a little about what he had said.

Vocabulary

ullut ilaanni one day

aperaa he asked her

uitaarerusunneraani whether she would marry him (lit. whether she would want to have him as a new husband)

asanninnermik sumik taasaqanngilaq there had been no declaration of love (lit. no love had been talked about/mentioned)

aammami and (indeed)

tamanna she (lit. this one)

qangasuarli for a long time

paasereersimajunnarsivaa she had already understood this for sure

oqaatsillu taamaattut and such words

taamak pingaartigisut of such importance (considered to be important in this way)

aninnissaat their utterance

nangaanartorujussuuvoq was extremely troublesome

siornatigut before, earlier

taamaattunik oqaaseqarsimanngisaannarami because he had never spoken about such things

aninngitsoorluaannarpai he had not (as would otherwise be expected) just easily uttered them (or: he cannot have said these words lightly)

ammami and also

imminut (for) himself

oqaasissaqqiginngilluinnaramigit because he absolutely did not consider them worth saying again.

aperisaa his question

sumik akinngilaq she did not answer

aammami and also

akeqqullugu piumaffiginngilaa she did not want to be asked to answer him

taamaallaat so

ajukkuppalungajattutut pissuseqarluni (in the position of) almost making out to be shy

oqarfigaa oqaatsini eqqarsaatigitsiaqqullugit she asked if she could think a little about what he had said

I haven’t broken down the words into their consistent parts as in previous posts, but I’d be happy to do so if anyone has any specific questions. As ever, corrections welcome. In particular if anyone has a copy of the original Lagerkvist text to confirm (in Swedish or any other language) to confirm if it is in fact an extract from that book, I’d be grateful, also to compare the translation.

tulunnguaq

So I was right about the book - finally got hold of an English version:

And here’s the English translation of the text above:

So I was mostly right; I got the subject wrong in the last sentence (she for he), but then there’s no grammatical gender in Greenlandic so there was probably some other subtle cue I missed. Now I just need to sit down and read the rest of the book!

tulunnguaq

Greenlandic Text Lesson 6 – Aasami Atuanngiffik

The next text lesson is taken from the opening paragraph of Aasami Atuanngiffik (The Summer Holidays) by Vivi Heilmann, which is the first in a collection of short stories by young Greenlandic authors, and also the titular story of that collection: Aasami Atuanngiffik – inuusuttut oqaluttualiaat (The Summer Holidays – young people’s stories).

Sila alianaappoq; niviarsiaq inuusuttunnguaq aqqusinikkut ilummut pisorusaarpoq. Ullaassaammat aqqusineq inoqanngilaq, silageqimmalli avataani angallatit aallartalereersimapput. Iluuna qasugaluarluni pisummini qungujullattaavoq unnuaammat pisimasut eqqarsaatigigamigit. Kammalaatini meeqqat atuarfianni atuaqatigisimasani naapisimaarsimavai.

Vocabulary

aasami - in the summer from aasaq summer + -mi in, locative case

atuanngiffik - school holiday from atuar study + -nngi- not + ffik time or place where [verb] happens

sila – weather

alianaappoq – is wonderful (note: alianaak : What lovely weather! and Lovely to see you again!)

niviarsiaq – girl

inuusuttunnguaq – a sweet, little young person from inuusuttoq young person + -nnguaq a sweet, little person or thing. As in my own handle tulunnguaq!

aqqusinikkut – along the path/road, from aqqusineq path/road + -kkut along, via, prolative or vialis case

ilummut – inwards, landwards, away from the sea from ilu(a) (its) inside + -mut to, allative case

pisorusaarpoq – wanders slowly from pisuppoq go for a walk + -rusaar- do slowly + -poq 3s indicative mood

ullaassaammat – because it was early from ullaassaaq early in the morning + -mmat because it was, 3s causative mood, intransitive

inoqanngilaq – there was no one about from inuk person + -qar- exist, have + -nngilaq 3s negative indicate mood

silageqimmalli – but because the weather was so good from silagi*- to be good weather + -qi- very much, intensifier + -mmat 3s causative mood + -li but

avataani – out off the coast, in the sea from avataa that which is out off the coast + -ni in, locative case

angallatit – the boats (more generically, vehicles). Singular form angallat. Related form angallappaa he/she transports it

aallartalereersimapput – they had already started setting off from aallar- to set off + -tar- do regularly + -ler- to begin to + -reer- already + -sima- perfective aspect + -pput 3p indicative mood

Iluuna – girl’s name

qasugaluarluni – although [she was] tired from qasu- be tired + -galuar- but, although, otherwise + -luni while she… 4s contemporative mood (the 4th person is the term used where the 3rd person in the subordinate clause is the same person as the 3rd person in the main clause in the sentence)

pisummini – while walking (literally in her walking) from (I think) pisu*- to walk or pisuk a walk + -mi- 4s possessive ending (“her”) + -ni in, locative case

qungujullattaavoq – she smiled now and again from qunguju- to smile + -llattaar- now and again + -voq 3s indicative mood

unnuaammat – when it was yesterday evening from unnuaq – night, evening + -u- to be (-au- becomes –aa- in Greenlandic) + -mmat when it was (3s causative mood).

pisimasut – the events from pi- dummy verb (discussed in previous lessons) + -sima- perfective aspect + -sut things which (3p nominal mood). So “events” are literally “things which have happened”.

eqqarsaatigigamigit – as she remembered them from eqqarsaat(i) thought + -gi- to have something as one’s [noun] + -gamigit when she…them 3s causative mood (because, when) with 3p object.

kammalaatini - her classmates from kammalaat friend, comrade, classmate (a loan word from Danish kammerat) + epenthetic -i- + -ni 4th person singular possessor, with singular or plural possessed object (but here with plural meaning)

meeqqat – the children’s (note: meeqqat also means the children. in Greenlandic the plural form is the same in the absolutive case as well as the relative case. In this example the word is in relative case, acting as the possessor of atuarfik in the next word)

atuarfianni – in their school from atuar- study + -vik/-ffik place where [verb] happens + -at- their (3p possessor, 3s object) + -ni in, locative case

atuaqatigisimasani – who had been her fellow students (literally something like: those who had been had as fellow students by her) from atuar- study + -qati- fellow + -gi- to have as one’s [noun] + -sima- perfective aspect + -saq passive participle + -ni 4th person singular possessor, with plural possessed object as above

naapisimaarsimavai – she had had a good time meeting up with them from naapi*- meet + -simaar- feel good after doing [verb] + -sima- perfective aspect + -vai she… them; 3s subject, 3p object, nominative mood ending.

Translation:

So a natural translation could be as follows:

Sila alianaappoq;

It was beautiful weather;

niviarsiaq inuusuttunnguaq aqqusinikkut ilummut pisorusaarpoq.

a cute young girl walked slowly up the road leading inland.

Ullaassaammat aqqusineq inoqanngilaq,

Because it was so early in the meaning, there was no-one else on the road,

silageqimmalli avataani angallatit aallartalereersimapput.

but as the weather was so good the boats had already all set off into the sea.

Iluuna qasugaluarluni pisummini qungujullattaavoq

Although Iluuna was tired, she smiled to herself as she walked

unnuaammat pisimasut eqqarsaatigigamigit.

and as she remembered last night’s events.

Kammalaatini meeqqat atuarfianni atuaqatigisimasani naapisimaarsimavai.

She’d had a great time meeting up with her friends - her old classmates from their time at public school.

—

As ever, if you have any questions, please ask!

tulunnguaq

This question was recently posted on the Inuit-Yupik-Unangan Discord group, and user zanewallach gave this fantastic answer, which I’m sharing with you all below (the above map from Wikipedia by Noahedits may be helpful):

ehhh… it’s a complicated question to answer, but Inuit languages work on a spectrum. Pick a spot on the map, and the further west or east you go, the less you’ll understand. Generally, all the Inuit dialects in Nunavut, including North Baffin, South Baffin, Aivilik, Kivalliq, Nunavik, and Nunatsiavut, are mutually intelligible for native speakers without much effort. These dialects share the vast majority of their basic vocabulary (although some surprisingly basic things such as greetings and the words for ‘yes’ and 'no’ are different from dialect to dialect) and the main way that they vary is in terms of gemination (generally, the more west you go, the less gemination occurs). That being said, it makes sense to classify the aforementioned group of dialects under a single name: Eastern Canadian Inuktitut. So, there are basically four main dialect groups which, for the sake of simplicity, can kind of each be considered their own language. Another way to look at it, is that Inuit is one huge macrolanguage, but I think the former approach is more practical.

The four major dialect groups (or languages) are these: Inupiatun dialect group = North Slope, Malimiutun, Qawariaq, Bering Strait Western Canadian Inuktun dialect group = Siglitun, Inuinnaqtun, Natsilingmiutut Eastern Canadian Inuktitut dialect group = North Baffin, South Baffin, Kivalliq, Aivilik, Nunavik, Nunatsiavut Greenlandic dialect group = West Greenlandic, East Greenlandic, Polar Greenlandic

Keep in mind, most all these dialects have subdialects, but at that level, it’s most just quibbling If we start with North Baffin, Inuinnaqtun is where it starts to become a legitimately different language, but still, I think a native speaker from Iglulik would be able to understand 80% at the very least of what a native speaker from Ulukhaktok was saying. North Baffin compared to Greenlandic is where the differences start to become pretty insuperable, but I still think someone from Nuuk could understand 70ish% of what someone from Iglulik was saying if they were trying their hardest. (But probably less so, the other way around) Theoretically, the two furthest Inuit dialects apart from each other are Bering Strait Inupiaq and East Greenlandic. I don’t think that speakers of these two dialects would understand more than 20% of what each other were saying Here is a list of basic North Baffin Verb Roots next to their Inuinnaqtun equivalents for comparison:

isuma- = think / ihuma- pisuk- = walk / pihuk- titiraq- = write / titiraq- niri- = eat / niri- katak- = fall / katak- sinik- sleep / sinik- tikit- arrive / tikit- taku- see / taku- ikajuq- help / ikajuq- malik- follow / malik- tautuk- watch / tautuk- pilak(si)- = carve / pilak(hi)- kapi(si)- stab / kapi(hi)- ingit- (iksivaaq-) = sit (be seated) / ingit- (ikhiva-) aullaq- = depart / aullaq- angirrau- (angirraq-) = go home (be at home) / angilrau- (angilraq-) tusaq- (tusaa-) = hear / tuhaq- (tuhaa-) tuqu- (tuqunga-) = die (be dead) tuqu- (tuqunga-) iqqaq- (iqqauma-) = remember / itqaq(gi)- qauji- (qaujima-) = discover (know) / ilihima- tukisi- = understand / kangiqhi- qukiq(si)- shoot / hiqquq- naulik(si)- harpoon / naulik(hi)- kunik(si)- = kiss / kunik(hi)- ilira(suk/gi)- = intimidate / ilara(huk/gi)- quvia(suk/gi)- = be happy / quvia(huk/gi)- kangu(suk/gi)- = be shy / kan'ngu(huk/gi)- naglik(gusuk/gi)- = love / piqpa(gi)- piu(ksak/gi)- = like / nakuu(gi)- unga- = miss / kinnguq- As you can see, with basic vocabulary, the differences between East Canadian Inuktitut and Western Canadian Inuktun are very minimal. That’s why sometimes, both dialect groups are labeled under the name “Inuktut” But Greenlandic shares a lot less vocabulary with these dialects The good thing though is that all Inuit languages have essentially the same grammar as each other (they are all equally polysynthetic as one another), but some dialects are more vague about tense than others, North Baffin has one extra mood than the other dialects, aspect works a bit differently in Western Canadian Inuktun than it does in Eastern Canadian Inuktitut; stuff like that. It’s really in the phonology that dialects vary the most.

tulunnguaq

Language Puzzle No. 2

For this puzzle, first see my recent post on a piece of Inuit artwork here.

You now see another piece of art, in a similar style but by a different artist and of a different subject, marked:

ᓴᔪᐃᓕ on the artwork

and underneath:

[print number] ᑯᓕᓴᔭᒧ ᓴᓇᓯᒪᔪ ᑲᒍ ᐃᓱᒥᑐ ᓴᔪᐃᓕᐊᐅᐳ ᐳᕕᓂᑐ ᑯᐃᐱ ᑲᓇᑕ [year]

Just using the information in the first post and the additional clue below, can you tell me:

- what does the artwork depict? For this, you will need to decipher the relevant descriptive part and Google the roman text. You also need to know that -a and -u forms are mirror images, while -i and -u forms show rotational symmetry with each other (either one or two quarter turns, depending on the symbol)

- who made it?

- where did they live?

tulunnguaq

I saw this query on Reddit recently. Another Redditor aiviik came in with most of the answer, and I chipped in with part of it. It’s quite interesting from both a language and indigenous art perspective, so I thought I’d share it here.

The syllabics on the image:

ᔪᓯ ᐸᐱ

ᑯᓕᓴᔭᒧ ᓴᓇᓯᒪᔪ ᐊᒍᑎ ᐃᓗᓕᐅᑐ ᔪᓯ ᐸᐱ ᐳᕕᓂᑐ ᑯᐃᐱ ᑲᓇᑕ 1975

Transliterated literally into roman characters it would be:

Jusi Papi

kulisajamu sanasimaju aguti iluliutu jusi papi puvinitu kuipi kanata 1975

However, this is a somewhat abbreviated form of syllabics, and from what I can see this approach is used on other similar artworks of the period. In order to interpret this properly, we have to imply in a number of additional (implied) letters, essentially those which would appear as superscript syllabics in the usual script, which have the effect of adding a vowelless consonant (since all normal-sized syllabics have an embedded vowel), or in some cases have the effect of changing a ‘k’ to ‘q’. Long vowels would also have a superscript dot, but I don’t see these being relevant here.

So if we add these in we would get the following:

ᔪᓯ ᐸᐱᖅ

ᖁᓪᓕᓴᔭᕐᒧᑦ ᓴᓇᓯᒪᔪᖅ ᐊᖑᑎ ᐃᓪᓗᓕᐅᕐᑐᖅ ᔪᓯ ᐸᐱᖅ ᐳᕕᕐᓂᑐᖅ ᑯᐃᐱᒃ ᑲᓇᑕ 1975

which can then be transliterated as follows:

Jusi Papiq

qullisajarmut sanasimajuq - anguti illuliurtuq - jusi papiq - puvirnituq, kuipik, kanata 1975

Glossary:

qullisajarmut - onto soapstone. qulliq is a stone lamp (for burning seal or whale oil), and qullisajaq is soapstone (possibly formed with suffixes -(k)saq [take] material for making X, and -jaq passive form, a thing which has been). -mut is the allative case.

sanasimajuq - it has been made

anguti - a man (also angut)

illuliurtuq - he builds an igloo

jusi papiq - Josie Paperk

puvirnituq - Puvirnituq

kuipik - Quebec

kanata - Canada

Translation:

[Print] 20/45. Carving on soapstone. A man builds an igloo. Josie Paperk, Puvirnituq, Quebec, Canada; 1975

Background:

Josie Paperk is also known as Josie Papialuk.

Some more detail on the artist is available here and here. An extract below:

Josie Pamiutu Papialuk, known also as “Josie Paperk” or simply “Puppy,” was born in 1918 near Issuksiuvit Lake, just inland from Povungnituk. After the death of his wife Martha in 1975, he continued to live there with his only surviving son. Josie is a very jovial man, regarded in the community as an eccentric joker. His art is indicative of a special kind of genius: it reveals both his profound sense of observation and a keen insight.

Josie produces both carvings and prints. He was one of the first Povungnituk artists to become involved in printmaking in the early 1960s. Initially, he produced small, whimsical soapstone carvings of birds, fish and human heads. Many elements of Josie’s unique style are already apparent in some of his early carvings: scratched footprints to indicate past or future directions, and captions to explain the action.

In both his carvings and prints, Josie employs undulating lines to depict such invisible phenomena as wind, voices or bird chatter. In the introduction to the 1983 catalogue JOSIE PAPERK, Marion Scott remarked that “[Josie] has been to capture in a gentle, philosophical and sometimes humorous way, the very essence of existence.” George Swinton described his work as “naïve realism,” a style which to this day remains puzzling to most Inuit artists.

Unlike many artists who might attempt to disguise a flaw in the stone, Josie often directs attention to it by carving a circle around it. This attitude towards maintaining and, to a certain extent, exploiting the integrity of the materials used is shared by many contemporary southern artists.

Josie’s inclination towards whimsy does not cloud his artistic judgement. When asked why he sometimes puts only one leg on his birds, Josie answered “I put the second leg on when I need the extra money.”

tulunnguaq

Language Puzzle

After my previous post on the Language Lover’s Puzzle Book (please do buy this if you haven’t already), I’ve decided to create a short puzzle based on some Greenlandic sentences. No prior knowledge of Greenlandic required!

Task: translate the title.

Clues:

angut - man -ffigi- - to have [object] as a place of doing [suffixed verb] (transitive verb) -fik - place of doing [suffixed verb] -gaa - short form of -gi- plus -vaa -gi- - to have [object] as one’s [suffixed noun] (transitive verb) iser- - to enter -miu - inhabitant of a place nakorsaq - doctor nappar- - to become sick nassuiaa- - to explain something -ni - his/her own (thing) -nni*- - half-transitiviser (removes the express object from a transitive verb) nuliaq - wife oqalu*- - to speak to -qat - a fellow doer of [suffixed verb] saa- - to turn toward (someone/something) -sima- - perfective aspect for [suffixed verb] -soq - 3rd person singular, participial mood, intransitive taku- - to see -tar- - [do suffixed verb] regularly -u- - to be -vaa - 3rd person singular subject, 3rd person singular object, indicative mood transitive. -voq / -poq - 3rd person singular, indicative mood, intransitive (-va in the interrogative mood)

Note there are some sound changes (deletions, assimilations) when affixes combine (* marks a geminating affix), and some orthographical conventions that hide certain sounds (e.g. loss of -v- between -u- and -a-, such that -uva- is spelled -ua-).

If you are struggling, message me for a clue!

tulunnguaq

Hi! Sorry this is a really random question, but have you seen any of the Terror, and if so do you know what language Silna is speaking ? Nive Nielsen the actress playing Silna/lady silence is Greenlandic but in the programme one of the other characters say she’s speaking Inuktitut. Feel free to ignore this I’m just really curious and I haven’t got anywhere googling this lol

Hi there. I haven’t actually come across The Terror but it looks pretty interesting.

I had a quick look at a couple of clips online, eg this one from episode 5:

As far as I can tell she is saying Huuqmi tuqujumavit? which would be Inuktitut.

The (standard, ie West) Greenlandic equivalent would be Soormi toqujumavit?

So as you can see the two are very close which is why Inuit is sometimes described as a single language existing in a dialect continuum from Alaska to Greenland, rather than multiple languages.

So it would not be difficult for a native Greenlander like Nive Nielsen to play someone speaking Inuktitut. I note she is described as a Netsilik inuk, but I don’t know enough of the dialect there to know how accurate the dialogue is generally. The following chart from Fortescue* shows that Netsilik (Net) is one of the West Canadian Inuit (WCI) dialects. One notable point is the appearance of “h” for standard Inuit “s” which Fortescue confirms is a standard reflex for Netsilik Inuit (along with the neighbouring Copper (Cop) and Caribou (Car) dialects, as well as the North Greenland (NG) dialect, which was populated by a relatively recent migration from Canada). So it may well be accurate.

*Comparative Eskimo Dictionary (Fortescue et al, 1994)

Breakdown:

huuq/sooq - why

-mi - emphatic particle (and/then...)

tuqu/toqu - die

-juma- - want

-vit - you (2s interrogative mood, intransitive)

From Iqaluit2002 -- RE: Memrise Greenlandic Classic Review: Greenlandic "Atuareerput." does not translate into English as "They finished eating." The correct verb stem for this English translation should be "Neri-". "Atuareerput" would translate as "They finished reading." Am I correct?

Thanks again. :) It was indeed wrong and I corrected it now. Nice to see so actively reading learners in the lessons. Keep on and don’t feel discouraged to point out mistakes! Qujanaq.

First, I want to thank you for creating your course in Greenlandic for English-speakers. It's an extraordinary accomplishment. Second, I have a question regarding the Memrise Greenlandic Classic Review: Given the DAKA definitions "pukkippoq ts o er lav, ligger lavt på vandet (om et fartøj)" and "angivoq o er stor", I think the question "Can you guys be big?" should translate to "Angissinnaavisi?" rather than "Pukkissinnaavisi?". Am I right?

Aluu, thanks for your comment. You are completely right, “pukkippoq” means “to be low” and the translation is wrong. It would be “Angisinnaavisi?” with only one <-s-> because it is a vowel stem. I changed it in the lesson. Qujanarujussuaq :)

tulunnguaq

Essential movie quotes in Greenlandic, #3

tulunnguaq

inu.it

person.(pl)

toqu.nga.su.nik

death.appear-like.one-which.(instrumental case, pl)

taku.sar.pakka

see.(habitual).indicative mood-1s(subj)-3pl(obj)

tulunnguaq

Essential movie quotes in Greenlandic, #1-9 collected.

tulunnguaq

And just like that you can all understand Greenlandic.

Hello, I was wondering how to pronounce Kalaallisut? Another thing I want to ask you. Do you know any websites or online dictionaries that are trustworthy?

Hello, sorry for the late response. The general pronunciation of “Kalaallisut” is [kaˈlaːɬːisut]. That means the stress is on the second syllable, the “a”s are roughly pronounced like the “a” in “cat”, the stressed syllable has a long vowel. The [ɬː] is not a sound in English, but you can hear it in Welsh, it is similar to a voiceless /l/ - try making a long /l/ and then leave away the voice in your glottis and pushing more air on the sides of your tongue, that should come close. A dictionary I use often is this one, where you also hear the word pronounced by Martha, the laguage synthesiser for Greenland that makes text to speech: https://oqaasileriffik.gl/dict/?lex=162704 On the same site of the Language Secreteriat of Greenland, you can find a list of good dictionaries: https://oqaasileriffik.gl/links-to-other-homepages/links-to-dictionaries-etc/

What's pikkoripputit?

pikkoripputit means “y'all are capable/practical/good with doing stuff”.

how to say plane

Airplane is timmisartuusaarneq. The breakdown is “timmi-tar-tuq-usaar-niq” and I’d translate it loosely along “the thing that is usually flown”.

I am interested in learning the Thule Dialect of northern Greenland, which is specifically spoken on Qaanaaq. Do your lessons teach this dialect? There are so many resources online for learning Greenlandic but I cant find any that specialize in any certain dialect. Thank you :)

Aluu, the Thule dialect (Avanersuaq) is only as much of a dialect of Greenlandic as the whole Inuit spectrum would be considered dialects of each other. (I use the term languages or varieties for them.) It’s typologically closer to North Baffin Inuktitut than it is to West Greenlandic. Thus, the lessons wouldn’t cover it. You could, if you are interested in learning it, learn North Baffin Inuktitut on this site: https://tusaalanga.ca/ (It’s called Northern Qikiqtaaluk there). It’s probably the variety that would come closest to the Thule dialect. Or you can take a look at this ebook, which covers the Thule dialect in Qaanaaq, and learn it by that: https://1drv.ms/b/s!AtG5cratUaJhhJdeyvhzMJWNbKfJ5g?e=95O1fu

tulunnguaq

how do you say 'northwest' in greenlandic

Okay, well this is actually a really interesting question.

Before we go further, I need you all to commit to memory the following diagram*:

*All diagrams from Fortescue’s Eskimo Orientation Systems (1988)

Got that? Oh there’s also this one.

Let’s focus on point “c” in the first diagram, which represents Nuuk or standard West Greenlandic.

The compass points here are (in extended form, with standard third person singular ending):

N - avannaa

E - kangia

S - kujataa

W - kitaa

But if we look at point “a”, Ammassalik in East Greenland, (sorry about image quality):

We see that “av-” no longer points north but closer to south. And all the other alternative designations from point “c” have become directionally reversed! (i.e. allowing for sound changes, each of pav-/pu-, sam-/sav-, qav-/qav- now points in the opposite direction)

So what is going on here? As Map 1 suggests, which compares the directional systems across the entire Inuit language continuum (and wider Eskimo-Aleut domain), there is a lot of individual variation, and the relationships between neighbouring areas can even be a “mirror” one, whereas the relationship between West Greenland and East Greenland is a rotational one.

The answer is based in the fact that the concepts of “true north”, “true east”, etc are not native to Inuit dialects but rather the terms used locally are reflective of the environment in which each community has lived. Each term has an underlying meaning that relates to that environment in some way, so:

avannaa is from Proto-Eskimo (PE) avan (from a demonstrative av- “over (there)”) meaning “area around”/”surroundings”, which over time in West Greenlandic has semantically moved to mean “off from land”, and in turn with -naq (something resembling) giving avannaq with specific meaning “north wind”, and from there with 3s possessive giving avannaa, now meaning generically “north”. But in East Greenlandic, which was derived from West Greenlandic as a wave of Greenlanders steadily moved south and then round the southern tip of Greenland back up the east coast, the term has retained a similar directional meaning from the perspective of being “to the right, when looking toward the sea”. And in East Greenlandic qav- therefore effectively now means the opposite “to the left, when looking toward the sea”. You can see from the diagram that Fortescue notes that av- and qav- type stems also act as similar opposite pairs (left/right or upriver/downriver) in other western Inuit dialects.

kitaa is from PE kətə- “area in front or towards the water” which has a more transparent meaning in the context of West Greenland settlements. A similar term used to exist in East Greenlandic with meaning “outwards” as shown here:

but as seen in the diagram another term kana- has taken over the meaning of east in that dialect. I also understand that more recently the West Greenlandic standard terms have been incorporated into East Greenlandic, no doubt due to some natural cultural pressure (national media presumably being almost entirely in West Greenlandic) and the fact that some of the West Greenlandic terms like kitaa (for west) no longer has a native East Greenlandic term to compete with. But it does create the unusual position that if an East Greenlander uses kitaa for west the term would literally be pointing in the opposite direction of the original meaning (i.e. now inwards, away from the sea). [NB this is perhaps no different in a sense from someone in the Southern hemisphere using the term “south”, since the etymology of this is derived from the direction of the “sun”, which for them would actually be in the north.]

So to come back to your question, “north west” in West Greenlandic is “avannaa-kitaa”, but I didn’t want to answer so quickly without giving a hint of the interesting background.

best-friend-quads

Really great post!

I love that the answer to “how do you say northwest?” is basically “directions are a social construct”

tulunnguaq

Greenlandic Text Lesson 14 - Harry Potter!

I was excited today to finally see inside the Greenlandic translation of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Harry Potter Ujarallu Inuunartoq) which I previously touched on briefly here. (NB not my picture below)

Here is the first page!

Well, there’s no need for me to provide a translation this time(!), but if anyone has any queries on any specific words or phrases, then I’ll be happy to try and answer.

The title of the chapter is as follows:

nukappi.araq - boy [young-bachelor.small]

toqun.neqar.sinnaa.nngi.tsoq - who could not be killed [kill.PASSIVE.can.not.(NOMINAL MOOD, INTRANSITIVE)-3s]

tulunnguaq

If anyone has any requests to see how a favourite extract of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone was translated into Greenlandic, just let me know! I may pick out a few myself!

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