Indigenous languages · in preparation

ᐃᓄᒃᑎᑐᑦ — The Inuit Languages

The languages of Inuit Nunangat — the Inuit homeland across the Canadian North — honoured here in their own names, in their own scripts, and under their own authorities.

In preparation — in partnership with the Inuit people's own speakers across Nunavut, Nunavik, Nunatsiavut and the Inuvialuit Settlement Region. The goal is the whole collection in the Inuit languages — Inuktitut, Inuinnaqtun, Inuvialuktun and Labrador Inuttitut: every book to read and to hear, here and in the school. Nothing is published until their speakers have guided and reviewed it.

The language

“Inuit” is not one language but a family, spoken across four regions: Nunavut, Nunavik in northern Quebec, Nunatsiavut in northern Labrador, and the Inuvialuit Settlement Region in the western Arctic. Inuktitut (ᐃᓄᒃᑎᑐᑦ), the principal language of Nunavut and Nunavik, counts roughly 41,675 speakers, with a strikingly young average mother-tongue age of 28. Beside it stand Inuinnaqtun of the western Kitikmeot — about 1,310 native speakers, classified definitely endangered — Inuvialuktun of the Inuvialuit, with about 355 speakers, and Labrador Inuttitut, the most severely eroded of them, whose fluent speakers today are few and mostly elders.

These languages are written in two official systems: the syllabics called qaniujaaqpait (ᖃᓂᖅ), brought to the Inuit in the late nineteenth century and still the script of Nunavut and of the Inuktitut Bible, and the Roman orthography called qaliujaaqpait. Inuktitut is an official language of Nunavut, protected by the Inuit Language Protection Act as a language of instruction, of government work, and of daily public service — a language with law behind it, and children still learning it first.

Their own teachers

The teaching is the Inuit's own. Nunavut Arctic College trains interpreters, translators, and teachers in Inuktitut; the Pirurvik Institute in Iqaluit grants an Inuktut Instructor Diploma; Nunavik's school board, Kativik Ilisarniliriniq, teaches in Inuktitut from kindergarten, and with McGill University opened a full-time teacher certificate in Kuujjuaq in 2025; Nunatsiavut's government carries its own language strategy; and the Inuvialuit Cultural Centre keeps Inuvialuktun teaching alive in the western Arctic.

Learn the Inuit languages in writing

This room opens first for learning to read and write. Nothing here is ours: the chart is taught by Pirurvik, the Inuit language institute in Iqaluit, through its Tusaalanga school; the lessons are the Inuit's own; and the practice sheet holds only the chart's characters, for copying by hand.

The writing

Inuktitut syllabics (qaniujaaqpait) — the full chart

The syllabic writing system as taught by the Pirurvik Institute's Tusaalanga (tusaalanga.ca), Iqaluit. Each row is one consonant family; the columns are the vowel sounds i, u, a — short, then long (the dotted characters) — and the small final character that closes a syllable.

	i	ii	u	uu	a	aa	final
vowels alone	ᐃ i	ᐄ ii	ᐅ u	ᐆ uu	ᐊ a	ᐋ aa
p	ᐱ pi	ᐲ pii	ᐳ pu	ᐴ puu	ᐸ pa	ᐹ paa	ᑉ p
t	ᑎ ti	ᑏ tii	ᑐ tu	ᑑ tuu	ᑕ ta	ᑖ taa	ᑦ t
k	ᑭ ki	ᑮ kii	ᑯ ku	ᑰ kuu	ᑲ ka	ᑳ kaa	ᒃ k
g	ᒋ gi	ᒌ gii	ᒍ gu	ᒎ guu	ᒐ ga	ᒑ gaa	ᒡ g
m	ᒥ mi	ᒦ mii	ᒧ mu	ᒨ muu	ᒪ ma	ᒫ maa	ᒻ m
n	ᓂ ni	ᓃ nii	ᓄ nu	ᓅ nuu	ᓇ na	ᓈ naa	ᓐ n
s	ᓯ si	ᓰ sii	ᓱ su	ᓲ suu	ᓴ sa	ᓵ saa	ᔅ s
l	ᓕ li	ᓖ lii	ᓗ lu	ᓘ luu	ᓚ la	ᓛ laa	ᓪ l
j	ᔨ ji	ᔩ jii	ᔪ ju	ᔫ juu	ᔭ ja	ᔮ jaa	ᔾ j
v	ᕕ vi	ᕖ vii	ᕗ vu	ᕘ vuu	ᕙ va	ᕚ vaa	ᕝ v
r	ᕆ ri	ᕇ rii	ᕈ ru	ᕉ ruu	ᕋ ra	ᕌ raa	ᕐ r
q	ᕿ qi	ᖀ qii	ᖁ qu	ᖂ quu	ᖃ qa	ᖄ qaa	ᖅ q
ng	ᖏ ngi	ᖐ ngii	ᖑ ngu	ᖒ nguu	ᖓ nga	ᖔ ngaa	ᖕ ng
ł	ᖠ łi	ᖡ łii	ᖢ łu	ᖣ łuu	ᖤ ła	ᖥ łaa	ᖦ ł

Dialect note: this is the Nunavut (Qikiqtaaluk) standard chart. Nunavik retains additional characters for the sound ai (ᐁ, ᐯ, ᑌ …) which Nunavut writes with two characters together.

In western dialects the ᓯ-row is pronounced with an h sound; the writing stays the same.

Inuinnaqtun, Inuvialuktun, and Labrador Inuttitut are written in Roman letters (qaliujaaqpait), not syllabics; their spelling is their own regions' to teach.

The ł-row belongs to the dialects west of Hudson Bay and stands in the full chart.

Practice the characters

Print the practice sheet and copy the characters by hand. The sheet holds only the characters of the chart above — no words, nothing added. Printable practice sheet — the Inuktitut syllabics

Learn from their own teachers

Tusaalanga — How to read syllabics — Pirurvik Institute, Iqaluit — the Inuit's own online school of Inuktitut, with the syllabic chart and lessons
Inuktitut syllabics chart (PDF) — Inuuqatigiit Centre for Inuit Children, Youth and Families, Ottawa — a printable syllabics and pronunciation sheet

The writing is the people's own gift to their learners. The words of the books wait for the partnership.

Hear the Inuit languages today

These voices are the Inuit people's own, published by their own teachers and stations. The link takes you to their house; nothing of their voice is copied here.

Inuktut Tusaalanga — Pirurvik Centre, Iqaluit — the Inuit-owned language centre's own lessons: thousands of soundfiles for mastering pronunciation, in seven dialects
Uvagut TV — IsumaTV — the Nunavut Independent Television Network, Inuit-owned: the 24/7 Inuktut television channel — films, documentaries, elder interviews
CBC North, Iqaluit — daily radio — Qulliq, Nipivut and Tusaajaksat broadcast in Inuktitut every day (CBC is a public broadcaster, not Inuit-governed)

An open invitation

This door stands open by invitation. If you are a speaker, teacher, or language keeper of the Inuit languages, or you carry its authority, this programme asks to work with you — to be guided, corrected, and reviewed by the people whose language this is. In this collection the holy names are never invented: what the Creator is called in a language is for its own speakers to give, and the spelling of every text is theirs to settle. Write to the publisher at [email protected].

The doors this programme will knock on are the Inuit language authorities — Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami and the language bodies of the four regions — and no other.

To hear it

When the Inuit languages open here, they will be heard as well as read — in their own voices, spoken and recorded by their own speakers. Until then these doors are silent in those languages on purpose: the first voice heard in them should be the people's own.

The other doors

This doorway carries no advertising.