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Make Inuktitut the language of instruction, Iqaluit residents say

Leaders, parents, students tell MLAs Inuit language must be the dominant language

Law student Madeline Redfern: "In law we could make Inuktitut the first language of instruction."

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(PHOTO BY PATRICIA D’SOUZA)

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PATRICIA D’SOUZA

The Nunavut government has the power, supported by Canadian legislation, to make Inuktitut the language of instruction in Nunavut schools, an Akitsiraq law school student told a panel of MLAs reviewing Bill 1, the proposed Education Act this week.

"In law we could make Inuktitut the first language of instruction," Madeline Redfern said before the legislative assembly’s standing committee on Tuesday. "The way the bill is written now, it makes English the language of instruction. Nothing requires English or French to be the default."

Redfern recalled the day in August that she made this discovery. "I started to wonder if the Inuit politicians would have the balls, the guts, to fulfill this possibility," she said.

"What amazed me is that the fact in law is that you can do it."

However, she added, it would not be good enough to translate the Alberta curriculum, which schools in Nunavut use for all English-language instruction.

Nunavut has an original Inuktitut curriculum in place only from Kindergarten to Grade 3. In addition, while Inuit make up 40 per cent of the teaching profession in the territory, there are none who teach high school.

"If this government can make education a priority, it can attract Inuit to the profession," Redfern said. "We desperately need more Inuit teachers. They make wonderful role models."

Iqaluit resident Mary Wilman pleaded with the MLAs to take the interests of the majority Inuit population into account. "You, as elected leaders, are the only ones who can help us now in protecting our language," she said.

Presenters at the meeting, which took place at the Anglican Parish Hall in Iqaluit, emphasized this "last chance" message. If the bill is passed as it is, it will set in law the inferiority of the Inuktitut language in the territory’s education system. This, they said, cannot be allowed to happen.

"The bill is not very strong because it does not recognize anything that comes from the Inuktitut culture," Wilman said.

"We don’t want to be passed over any more."

Though many adult Inuit in Nunavut have not received a formal English-language education, they are not "uneducated," said Cathy Towtongie, president of Nunavut Tungavik Inc.

An Inuktitut education can encompass the breadth of cultural ways, including how to use the stars for navigation and how to know if ice is thick enough to support weight, as well as required academic courses, she said.

"The draft act as it stands now says Inuktitut, Innuinaqtun, English and French may be the language of instruction depending on the availability of teachers. It is an option with a very limited Inuktitut curriculum and available teachers," she said.

"We want the Education Act to say that the language of instruction must be Inuktitut or Innuinaqtun."

Navarana Beveridge, a policy analyst with NTI’s social and cultural department, estimated that within five years, all schools in Nunavut could teach all subjects from Kindergarten to Grade 12 in Inuktitut.

A K-6 curriculum has already been developed by the Arviat curriculum division of the department of education, she said. The only obstacle is finding Inuktitut teachers to implement it.

Nunavut could borrow materials from Greenland to cover the remaining grades, while continuing the work of creating original materials, she said.

Without original materials, Inuit risk being indoctrinated into a qallunaat system, Towtongie warned.

"I think we have to be aware of the racism in Nunavut where students are not benefitting from teachers of a different race," she said. "All of the textbooks written have eliminated the Inuit perspective of history."

Immediate government action is the only way to stop this, she said. And if it doesn’t happen now, it may not happen for another 20 years.

"If the government does not require this, it will not come about," Towtongie said.

"The language of government will never be Inuktitut by 2020 if the language of instruction is not Inuktitut."

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