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    <title>Chillin' Polar - Inuit Environment</title>
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            <h1>Inuit Environment</h1>
        
            <h3>Settlements</h3>

            <ul>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Canadian Inuit live primarily in
                        <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nunavut">Nunavut</a>,
                        a territory in Canada.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        There have been Inuit settlements in
                        <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yukon">Yukon</a>, especially
                        at <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herschel_Island">Herschel
                        Island</a>, but there are none at present.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Crossed the Bering Land Bridge during the Ice Age 35,000 to 22,000 BCE.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Inuit also lived in temporary shelters made from show in winter (the
                        famous <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igloo">Igloo</a>), and
                        during the few months of the year when temperatures were above freezing,
                        they lived in tents made of animal skins and bones.
                    </p>
                </li>
            </ul>

            <h3>Language Terms of the Region</h3>

            <ul>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        In <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inuktitut">Inuktitut</a>,
                        the language of the Inuit people, "Inuit" means "the people".
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Language">English</a>
                        word "Eskimo" is a Native American word which is widely believed to
                        mean "eater of raw meat," although this meaning is disputed.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Many Inuit consider the word <em>Eskimo</em> offensive, but it is
                        still in general usage to refer to all Eskimo peoples.
                    </p>
                </li>
            </ul>

            <h3>Travel</h3>

            <ul>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Sea animals were hunted from single-passenger, covered seal-skin
                        boats called <em>qajait</em> which were extraordinarily buoyant,
                        and could easily be righted by a seated person, even if completely
                        overturned. Because of this property, the Inuit design was copied
                        - along with the Inuit word - by Europeans who still make and use
                        them under the name kayak. Inuit also made umiaq - larger, open
                        boats made out of skins and bones for transporting people, goods and
                        dogs.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        On land, the Inuit used <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_sled">
                        dog sleds</a> (in Inuktitut, <em>qamutiit</em>, singular <em>qamutiq</em>
                        ) for transportation. The
                        <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sled_dog">husky</a> dog breed
                        comes from Inuit breeding of dogs for transportation.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        They used landmarks to navigate, and possessed a comprehensive
                        native system of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toponymy">
                        toponymy</a>. Where natural landmarks were insufficient, the Inuit
                        would erect an <em>inukshuk</em> (a stone landmark used as a
                        milestone or directional marker, sometimes created in the appearance
                        of a man) to compensate.
                    </p>
                </li>
            </ul>

            <p class="centeredImg">
                <img src="images/general/rjc_olympics.png" alt="Vancouver 2010 Logo" />
                <br />
                Inukshuk
            </p>

            <h3>Clothing</h3>

            <ul>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        The hoods of Inuit women's parkas - <em>amautiit</em> (singular
                        <em>amauti</em>, <em>amaut</em> or <em>amautik</em>) in Inuktitut -
                        were traditionally made extra large; to protect the baby from the
                        harsh wind when snuggled against the mother's back.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Boots (Inuktitut: <em>kamik</em> or <em>
                        <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mukluk">mukluk</a></em>)
                        could be made of caribou or sealskin, and designs varied for men
                        and women.
                    </p>
                </li>
            </ul>

            <h3>Oral Tradition Facts and Myths</h3>

            <ul>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Nearly all Inuit cultures have oral traditions of raids by Indians
                        and fellow Inuit, and of taking vengeance on them in return.
                        Although these tales are generally regarded not as accurate
                        historical accounts but as self-serving myths - violence against
                        outsiders as justified revenge - it does make clear that there was a
                        history of hostile contact between Inuit and other cultures.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Even within an Inuit band, breaching traditional justice and wronging
                        another Inuit was routinely punished by murderous vengeance, as the
                        story of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atanarjuat">Atanarjuat</a>
                        shows. Within a community, punishments were meted out by community
                        decision, or by the elders, and a breach meant that the victim and his
                        or her relatives could seek out restitution or revenge.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Martin Frobisher, attempted to find the Northwest Passage. He
                        encountered Inuit on Resolution Island. Five sailors jumped ship and
                        became part of Inuit mythology. The homesick sailors tired of their
                        adventure attempted to leave in a small vessel and vanished.
                        Frobisher brought an unwilling Inuk to England, doubtless the first
                        Inuk ever to visit Europe. The Inuit oral tradition, in contrast,
                        recounts the natives helping Frobisher's crewmen, who believed they
                        had been abandoned.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        The Moravian missionaries could easily provide the Inuit with the iron
                        and basic materials they had been stealing from whaling outposts -
                        materials whose real cost to Europeans was almost nothing, but whose
                        value to the Inuit was enormous - and from then on contacts in
                        Labrador were far more peaceful.
                    </p>
                </li>
            </ul>

            <h3>Inuit Throat Singing</h3>

            <ul>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        This cultural form of artistic expressive came along with the Inuit
                        across the Bering Ice Bridge. Originally decreed illegal by priests,
                        throat singing has came back into the mainstream.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Inuit throat-singing is done the following way: two women
                        face each other; they may be standing or crouching down; one
                        is leading, while the other responds; the leader produces a
                        short rhythmic motif, that she repeats with a short silent gap
                        in-between, while the other is rhythmically filling in the
                        gaps.  The game is such that both singers try to show their
                        vocal abilities in competition, by exchanging these vocal
                        motives.  The first to run out of breath or be unable to
                        maintain the pace of the other singer will start to laugh or
                        simply stop and will thus loose the game.  It generally last
                        between one and three minutes.  The winner is the singer who
                        beats the largest number of people.
                    </p>
                </li>
                <li>
                    <p>
                        Words and meaningless syllables are used in the songs.  When
                        words are used, no particular poetical meaning or regular
                        meaning are assigned to them.  These words can simply be
                        names of ancestors, a word or name meaningful at the time the
                        games are taking place, or other common words.  The meaningless
                        syllables generally portray sounds of nature or cries of
                        animals or birds, or sounds of everyday life. 
                    </p>
                </li>
            </ul>

            <p class="centeredImg">
                <img src="images/general/rjc_map.png" alt="Map of Inuit Cities" />
                <br />
                Map of Inuit Settlements
            </p>

            <p>
                The information on these communities courtesy of the NWT Data Book 1990, compiled by
                the Government of the Northwest Territories (published by Outcrop Ltd. Yellowknife,
                &copy; April 1991).
            </p>
            <p>
                <a href="http://collections.ic.gc.ca/arctic/inuit/communit.htm">
                    http://collections.ic.gc.ca/arctic/inuit/communit.htm
                </a>
            </p>

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