West Greenlandic

An Essential Grammar

Lily Kahn, Riitta-Liisa Valijärvi

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• eBook ISBN: 9781351663687
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Languages
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

This grammar provides a clear and comprehensive overview of contemporary West Greenlandic. It follows a systematic order of topics beginning with the alphabet and phonology, continuing with nominal and verbal morphology and syntax, and concluding with more advanced topics such as complex sentences and word formation. Grammatical points are illustrated with authentic examples reflecting current life in Greenland. Grammatical terminology is explained fully for the benefit of readers without a background in linguistics.

Features include:

• Full grammatical breakdowns of all examples for ease of identifying individual components of complex words.
• A detailed contents list and index for easy access to information.
• An alphabetical list of the most commonly used West Greenlandic suffixes.
• A glossary of grammatical abbreviations used in the volume.

The book is suitable for a wide range of users, including independent and classroom-based learners of West Greenlandic, as well as linguists and anyone with an interest in Greenland's official language.

Chapter 1
Introduction

DOI: 10.4324/9781315160863-1

1.1 Greenlandic within the Eskimo-Aleut language family

The Eskimo-Aleut languages are spoken in the Arctic regions of Alaska and Canada, in Greenland, and in the Chukchi Peninsula in Eastern Siberia, as illustrated in Map 1.1.

Map 1.1 Eskimo-Aleut languages

Eskimo-Aleut languages are not related to the other Indigenous languages of the Americas. They are believed to be relatively late arrivals from Siberia, sharing a similar grammatical structure and vocabulary. The Eskimo-Aleut family is divided into two branches, Eskimo and Aleut, which diverged around 2000 BCE. The Aleut branch has a single representative, Aleut, which is spoken only by around 100 people on the Aleut islands in Alaska and Russia. The Eskimo languages are divided into two branches, Yupik and Inuit, which are thought have diverged around 1,000 years ago. Central Alaskan Yupik has the second largest number of speakers of any Native American language in the United States (after Diné/Navajo): Yupik has around 14,000 speakers and Diné/Navajo around 150,000 speakers. There are a few hundred speakers of Yupik varieties in Russia. These include Central Siberian Yupik (which also has speakers in Alaska) and Naukan Yupik. Sirenik, another Siberian variety, is now extinct.

Inuit languages are spoken in Greenland, Canada, and Alaska, with the majority in Greenland and Canada. The Inuit languages are closely related to each other and generally mutually intelligible. The resemblance between them is similar to the one between the Romance languages or the Scandinavian languages. There are three main Inuit languages: Iñupiaq (2,000 speakers in Alaska), Inuktut (an umbrella term for related Inuit dialects spoken the territory of Nunavut in Canada, of which the biggest is Inuktitut, with around 35,000 speakers), and West Greenlandic (around 50,000 speakers). Another Canadian Inuit variety is Inuvialuktun (Western Canadian Inuit or Western Canadian Inuktitut), which is highly endangered, hasa number of different dialects, and is spoken by around 600–1,000 people. Inuktut is written with a syllabic script that was first invented by Protestant missionaries in the mid-1800s to write the Cree language and was adapted for Inuktitut shortly thereafter. The others are written using forms of the Latin alphabet. For a comparative dictionary of Eskimo-Aleut vocabulary, see Fortescue, Jacobson, and Kaplan (2010), listed in the ‘Suggested Resources’ section at the end of this book.

1.2 Greenlandic language varieties

Table 1.1 Words from the different varieties of Greenlandic

North greenlandic		West greenlandic		East greenlandic		English
nivirhiaq		niviarsiaraq		niiarsiaq		girl, unmarried woman
ataata		ataata		alaala		father
irniq		erneq		irniq		son
inuk		inuk		iik		person
uanga		uanga		uara		I
ihhit		illit		ittit		you (sg)
humi		sumi		sumi		where
auk		aak		aak		blood
ihi		isi		ili		eye
aghak		assak		attak		hand
arvik		arfeq		arpiq		whale
tuktu		tuttu		tuttu		reindeer
qughuk		qussuk		qutsuk		swan
hiqiniq		seqineq		siirliq		sun
ulluriaq		ulloriaq		utturiaq		star
atauhiq		ataaseq		alaasiq		one

There are three varieties of Greenlandic: North Greenlandic (also known as Inuktun, Thule Inuit, or Polar Eskimo), which has around 800 speakers, West Greenlandic (also known as Kalaallisut), which has around 50,000 speakers and is the official variety of the language, and East Greenlandic (also known as Tunumiisut), which has around 3,000 speakers. There are differences in pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary between the threevarieties, to such an extent that speakers of one can struggle to understand speakers of another. Table 1.1 illustrates some of the differences between the different varieties of Greenlandic.

1.3 Historical and sociolinguistic introduction to West Greenlandic

1.3.1 Early history of Greenlandic

There is evidence of human settlement in Greenland dating back as far as 2500 BCE. The Saqqaq people migrated to Greenland from Canada around this time and lived there until 800 BCE. The next wave of migration was the Dorset people, a pre-Inuit Eskimo culture, who settled on the island around 1000 BCE. The Thule population, the ancestors of the modern Inuit, arrived in Greenland by the 13th century CE. They first settled in the north of Greenland and then migrated along the coast to the south and east. Their language was the ancestor of the modern Greenlandic varieties. In addition, in the late 10th century CE Viking colonies were established in southwestern Greenland, led by Eric the Red, who came from Iceland around 985. Eric the Red is believed to have given Greenland its name, and the Vikings introduced Christianity to the country. The Vikings spoke a variety of Old Norse (closely related to present-day Icelandic). The Viking settlements in Greenland are estimated to have comprised around 5,000 people at their largest but dwindled and disappeared around the 14th century. There was most likely interaction between the Inuit and Viking populations in southern Greenland, though the extent of this, and of any linguistic contact between the two groups, is unclear. In addition to the Vikings, whale hunters from all over Europe had contact with the Inuit population of Greenland.

1.3.2 History of written West Greenlandic

In the early 1700s, Greenland came under Danish control; the first written records of Greenlandic date to this period, when Danish and Norwegian missionaries and colonisers arrived in the country and began to document the language. Poul Hansen Egede (1708–1789) played a key role in the early development of written Greenlandic. He moved to Greenland from Denmark in 1721 at the age of 12 with his father, the Norwegian missionary Hans Egede, who dreamed of converting the Norsemen of Greenland from Catholicism to Lutheranism. Upon arrival, Hans Egede discovered that there were no longer any Norsemen on the island, but the family stayed and founded a Christian mission among the local Inuit population in the area of the modern-day capital city of Nuuk. Hans Egede later returned to Denmark, and Poul took over the mission, where he taught theology. Poul later became the Bishop of Greenland. Poul Egede’s contribution to the development of written Greenlandic consists of a Greenlandic–Danish–Latin dictionary (1750), a Greenlandic catechism (1756), and a Greenlandic grammar (1760). He also co-produced the first Greenlandic translation of the New Testament (1766) together with Arnarsaq (ca. 1716–1778), a female missionary, interpreter, and translator from northern Greenland, and Hans Punngujooq, one of Egede’s students.

Another central figure in the development of written Greenlandic was Samuel Kleinschmidt (1814–1886). Kleinschmidt was the son of Moravian missionaries but was born and bred in Greenland. His father was German and his mother was Danish, and he grew up trilingual in Greenlandic, German, and Danish. He studied Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, Dutch, and English and worked as a pharmacist’s apprentice in Holland. He wrote a grammar of West Greenlandic called Grammatik der grönländischen Sprache (1851) and a West Greenlandic-Danish dictionary called Den...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• Chapter 1 Introduction
• Chapter 2 Phonology and orthography
• Chapter 3 Nouns
• Chapter 4 Pronouns
• Chapter 5 Numerals
• Chapter 6 Noun modification (= adjectives)
• Chapter 7 Verbs
• Chapter 8 Participles
• Chapter 9 Adverbs
• Chapter 10 Postpositions
• Chapter 11 Conjunctions
• Chapter 12 Particles
• Chapter 13 Suffixes
• Chapter 14 Phrases, clauses, and sentences
• List of essential suffixes
• Suggested resources
• Index