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From the course description:
- Survey of the Eskimo-Aleut languages of Alaska, Canada, Siberia and Greenland and their dialects, comparative phonology and grammar, reconstructing proto-Eskimo, literacy traditions, and prospects for language survival. How many Inuit-Unangan languages are there? How are they similar to each other and how are they different? How can linguists reconstruct features of the Proto-Eskimo language from thousands of years ago? How do the structures and vocabulary of Inuit-Unangan languages shape how the world is classified? How many people speak Unangas, Yupik and Inuit languages today? Why are some Inuit-Unangan languages endangered – or are they all endangered? How are people trying to reverse language shift and what works successfully to encourage language survival? What’s the history of different literacy traditions and writing systems?
The required reading list includes the following books:
Berge, Anna and Moses Dirks. 2009. Niiĝuĝis Mataliin Tunuxtazangis: How the Atkans Talk: A Conversational Grammar. Fairbanks: Alaska Native Language Center, University of Alaska. $30 retail.
Dorais, Louis-Jacques. 1988. Tukilik: An Inuktitut Grammar for All. Inuit Studies, Occasional Papers, No. 2. Québec: Association Inuksiutiit Katimajiit, Université Laval. Out of print; PDF on Blackboard (BB).
Dorais, Louis-Jacques. 2010. The Language of the Inuit: Syntax, Semantics, and Society in the Arctic. McGill-Queen’s Native and Northern Series 58. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press. $45 retail.
Jacobson, Steven A. and Anna Jacobson. 1995. A Practical Grammar of the Central Yup’ik Eskimo Language. Fairbanks: Alaska Native Language Center, University of Alaska. $42 retail.
Krauss, Michael E. 1995. Inuit Nunait/Nunangit Yuget (Map of the Inuit-Yupik-Aleut World). Fairbanks: Alaska Native Language Center, University of Alaska. $16 retail.
For more information about the course contact Roy Mitchel (afdrm [at] uaa.alaska.edu)
