RATIONALE

This research sought to find out how people 'feel' about their heritage language--whether they speak it or not.

Today there exist different opinions about the role and importance of Aboriginal languages in the Northwest Territories. This research did not seek to establish the extent to which Inuvialuktun is spoken. Rather, it attempted to find out what young people think about Inuvialuktun today. Knowing about how people relate to their heritage language is very important if one wishes to strengthen or revive a language.

In the Northwest Territories there exists a shared desire to protect and revitalize Aboriginal languages.

This desire is paralleled by a nationwide statistically observed trend in indigenous individuals acquiring an Aboriginal language as second language, rather than as mother tongue. Honorable Jackson Lafferty, Minister Responsible for Official Languages in the Northwest Territories, stresses the importance of protecting heritage languages within the territory because they are “the foundation of northern cultures” (ECE 2010). The language plan emphasizes that many scholars of language, identity, and cultural heritage from around the world echo the minister’s concern in their research findings. It reiterates that many of these scholars see the loss of heritage languages as leading to the loss of ‘worlds of knowledge,’ because indigenous ways of knowing are embedded in Aboriginal languages.

Research shows that language planners benefit from a detailed knowledge of how potential learners view their own heritage language.

The Official Languages Act of 2008-2009 of the NWT recognizes Inuvialuktun as an official language in need of revitalization. Strategic language planning, as engaged by the Inuvialuit Cultural Resource Centre in Inuvik, represents a practical response to the voiced concern over language and heritage loss in the territory. However, reviving a heritage language is a grand task calling for a network of language specialists. Research in New Zealand and North America has shown that successful language planning and “effective promotion strategies to encourage [Aboriginal] language use” are dependent on an in-depth knowledge of local language attitudes. It is precisely here that the rational of this study was anchored.

MEET THE RESEARCHER

Alex Oehler was born in Germany but grew up across several European countries. In 2007 Alex came to Canada with his family to obtain an anthropology degree, focusing on the Canadian North. In 2009 he moved his family to Inuvik. Since then his interest in contemporary Inuit culture throughout the north has grown. In 2010 he entered an Interdisciplinary Masters program at the University of Northern British Columbia focusing on the connections between language and identity.

THE SUPERVISOR

Dr. Michel Bouchard is Associate Professor and current chair of the Anthropology Program at the University of Northern British Columbia, Prince George. Dr. Bouchard’s research has focused on issues surrounding language and ethnicity, particularly within the context of nations and nationalism in the Baltic States, Russia, and francophone Canada.

ADVISING LINGUIST

Dr. Louis-Jacques Dorais is a leading specialist of Inuktitut and has worked extensively on sociolinguistic issues surrounding bilingualism and multilingualism among Inuit and other ethnicities internationally. Since 1965, he has been studying the relationship between language, culture and society among the Inuit of Nunavik (Québec's Arctic), Nunavut and Greenland with a focus on community organizing, semantics, dialectology and the sociolinguists of the Arctic. He played an integral role in the first academic analysis of Inuvialuktun, which resulted in a series of dictionaries and grammars for this language.

NATIVE STUDIES ADVISOR

Dr. Ross Hoffman has worked with Wet'suwet'en, Gitxsan, and Cree communities on a variety of community based research projects in the areas of education, language, and culture, and health and wellness. This interdisciplinary research has included extensive work in the oral tradition with Elders and other knowledge holders. His broad research interests include studying the relationship between cultural renewal, identity, and health and wellness. Ross is a continuing source of guidance in this study thanks to the wealth of experience he has with community based research in Canada.

INUVIALUIT CO-INVESTIGATOR

Catherine Cockney manages the Inuvialuit Cultural Resource Centre (ICRC) where she and her collegues are involved in researching, designing, curating, and publishing educational, cultural, and language resources. With a background in anthropology and an intimate knowledge of her own people, Cathy is an important partner in questionnaire design and overall study guidance. Her engagement has brought about much of the applied direction to this study. The ICRC functions as part of the Inuvialuit Social Development Program under the Inuvialuit Final Agreement (IFA, section 17).

EDUCATION CO-INVESTIGATOR

Suzanne Robinson is senior instructor of the Community Education Preparation Program (ALCIP II) at Aurora College in Inuvik. With the needs of her own students in mind, Susanne seeks to constantly improve Aboriginal language teaching materials for Aurora College. Suzanne is currently a doctoral student in sociology at the University of Essex where she focuses on visual sociology in the Western Arctic.

RESEARCH ASSISTANT

Dwayne Drescher is research assistant thanks to the generous support of Nasivvik (Laval University). Dwayne is also a student of the Aboriginal Culture and Language Instructor Program at Aurora College. He is training to become a public school teacher at the University of Saskatchewan. Dwayne is an Inuvialuk with a passion for his ancestral language and culture.