LOUIS-JACQUES DORAIS

Universite Laval, Quebec, Canada

Discourse And Identity In The Baffin Region: Conclusions And Reflexions

Since 1994, a team of researchers from Universite Laval and Nunavut Arctic College have been involved in a long term research on language usage and language attitudes in Iqaluit, Igloolik and Kimmirut, three communities in the Baffin region of Nunavut. This paper will summarize the principal conclusions of the research: the Baffin region has now become a bilingual area where both Inuktitut and English are essential to communicating among Inuit, and between Inuit and non-Inuit. Inuktitut has more to do with one’s identity (it is deemed important to transmit it to children), while English has both a practical and social value (it is the language of modernity). Some reflexions will also be made on the type of cooperation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers this research has entailed.