Preserving Languages

Ronald Brower speaks at the Arctic Indigenous Languages Symposium in Tromso Norway on October 20th, 2008. Ronald H Brower Sr. was born in 1949 in Barrow and was raised in a traditional sod home at Eviksook about 30 miles south of Barrow until the Family moved to Barrow.… Uqalimakkanirit

Jose Amaujaq Kusugak speaks at the Arctic Indigenous Languages Symposium in Tromso, Norway on October 20th, 2008. Jose Amaujaq Kusugak was born in Naujaat, Nunavut in 1950. He is the second born of 8 brothers and 4 sisters. His passion for language started when he was taking Latin in high school and he realized that unlike Latin, Inuktitut was a working and living language.… Uqalimakkanirit

Footage from the Arctic Indigenous Languages Symposium in Tromso, Norway October 19-21st, 2008. Inuit Circumpolar Conference.

Filmmaker: isuma.tv

Filmmaker Contact:

isuma@isuma.ca

Year of Production: 2008

Country: Canada

Region: Arctic

Zacharias Kunuk and Peter Irniq speak about Technology and Media as Tools for Change at the Arctic Indigenous Languages Symposium in Tromso, Norway on October 20th, 2008. Zacharias was born in 1957in Kapuivik near Igloolik. He is president and co-founder in 1990 of Igloolik Isuma Productions, Canada's first Inuit-owned independent production company.… Uqalimakkanirit

From Cherry English is a surrealist Mi'gMac allegory about the loss of language and identity to the anonymity of urban wasteland. Traylor, a Mi'gMac man being pulled between two worlds meets a non-native woman who sends him on a hallucinogenic journey of masochism, and self discovery. The film explores the relationship that Traylor has with his language, culture, and past.

First Isuma recreated fiction. A late-winter Inuit camp in the 1930's. Four families build a qaggiq, a large communal igloo, to celebrate the coming of spring with games, singing and drum dancing. A young man seeks a wife. The girl's father says no, but her mother says yes...