Kalaallisut language

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Information for Authority record
Name (Hebrew)
שפת גרינלנדית
Name (Latin)
Kalaallisut language
Other forms of name
Greenland Eskimo language
Greenland Inuit language
Greenlandic Eskimo language
Greenlandic Inuit language
Greenlandic Inuktitut language
Greenlandic language
nne Kalâtdlisut dialect
Kalâtdlisut language
See Also From tracing topical name
Inuit language
See Also From tracing place name
Denmark
Greenland
MARC
MARC
Other Identifiers
Wikidata: Q15665351
Library of congress: sh 87005970
DLC: sh 87005970
LIBRARY_OF_CONGRESS: 98169349270000041
Sources of Information
  • Work cat.: Lesser-known language collection:v. 73 (language Kalâtdlisut, country Kalâtdlit-nunãne)
  • Curr. trends ling.:v. 10, p. 842ff. (East, West, Polar Greenlandic)
  • Ethnologue:p. 7 (Greenland Eskimo: Polar Eskimo, East, West Greenlandic)
  • Kloss, H. Written lang. of the world, 1978:v. 1, p. 302 (Kalatdlisut, Greenland Inupiaq, East, West, Polar Greenlandic)
  • Web. 3(Greenlandic)
  • Voegelin lang.:p. 133 (Inuit: Three dialects of Greenlandic - Labrador are East Greenlandic; West Greenlandic; and Polar)
  • Newak, E. Transforming the images, 1996(Kalaallisut dialect, from Klienschmidt's work on Inuit languages)
  • Mennecier, P. Le Tunumiisut, 1994:p. 6 (Kalaallisut is major Inuit dialect of Greenland, Tunumiisut is considered as further subdialect)
  • Email from Dan Mandeville, Nordic Studies and Linguistics Librarian University of Washington Libraries, May 11, 2023("The term for the Greenlandic language in LCSH is Kalâtdlisut, following the orthography developed by Samuel Kleinschmidt in the mid-19th century and used until the current orthography was offically adopted in 1973. The current standard uses Kalaallisut. ... Kalaallisut has been the sole official language of Greenland since 2009, following 40 years of increasing status following the establishment of home rule in 1979")
  • Ethnologue, May 15, 2023(Greenlandic; a language of Greenland; alternate names: Greenlandic Inuktitut, Grønlandsk; autonym: Kalaallisut; official national language of Greenland; belongs to the Eskimo-Aleut language family; classification: Eskimo-Aleut, Eskimo, Inuit-Inupiaq; ISO 639-3: kal; dialects: West Greenlandic (Kalaallisut), East Greenlandic (Tunumiit oraasiat), North Greenlandic (Avanersuarmiutut, Inuktun, "Polar Eskimo" (pej.), Polar Inuit, Thule Inuit). Dialects border on being different languages; also spoken in: Denmark)
  • Omniglot : the online encyclopedia of writing systems & languages, May 15, 2023(Greenlandic (Kalaallisut); Greenlandic is a member of the Inuit branch of the Eskimo-Aleut language family. Unlike most Inuit languages, it has a lot of influence and loanwords from languages such as Danish, Icelandic, Norwegian, Faroese, Finnish and English. It is spoken by about 57,000 people in Greenland (Kalaallit Nunaat) and Denmark (Danmark / Qallunaat Nunaat). There are three main dialects: West Greenlandic (Kalaallisut), East Greenlandic (Tunumiisut / Tunumiit oraasiat) and North Greenlandic (Avanersuarmiutut))
  • Glottolog, via WWW, May 15, 2023(Spoken L1 Language: Kalaallisut and Spoken L1 Language: Tunumiisiut, [which are part of] Family: Greenlandic Inuit, [which is part of] Family: Inuit, [which is part of] Family: Eskimo)
  • Endangered Languages Project, via WWW, May 15, 2023(Kalaallisut. Also known as: Inuit, Eskimo, Greenlandic, Greenlandic Eskimo. Classification: Eskimo-Aleut, Eskimo, Inuit. Variants & dialects: West Greenlandic; East Greenlandic; Polar Eskimo. Greenlandic is the English name for the Inuit (Eastern Eskimo) dialects of Greenland (the Inuit term is Kalaallisut). There is a significant dialect difference between the west coast settlements and those on the east coast, leading to a distinction between West Greenlandic and East Greenlandic. The five Thule communities in the far northwest of the island constitute a third dialect cluster, sometimes called Polar Eskimo. This dialect is closer to the speech of Baffin Island than to West or East Greenlandic, and is usually considered to be a variety of Eastern Canadian Inuktitut that has been influenced by standard Greenlandic)
  • The world atlas of language structures online, May 15, 2023(under Family Eskimo-Aleut, Genus Eskimo: 16 languages, including Greenlandic (East), Greenlandic (South), Greenlandic (West))
  • Britannica online, May 15, 2023(under Greenland: The official languages of the island are Kalaallisut (West Greenlandic) and Danish (a Scandinavian, or North Germanic, language). Greenlandic is an umbrella term for the dialects of the Inuit language spoken on the island; Inuit belongs to the Eskimo-Aleut (Eskaleut) language family. The Kalaallisut dialect is spoken by the great majority of the people of Greenland. The Tunumiit (East Greenlandic) and Inuktun, or Avanersuarmiutut (Polar, or Northern, Greenlandic), dialects are spoken by smaller groups of people)
  • Wikipedia, May 15, 2023(Greenlandic (Greenlandic: kalaallisut; Danish: grønlandsk) is an Eskimo--Aleut language with about 57,000 speakers, mostly Greenlandic Inuit in Greenland. It is closely related to the Inuit languages in Canada such as Inuktitut. It is the most widely spoken Eskimo-Aleut language; Greenlandic has been the sole official language of the Greenlandic autonomous territory since June 2009; The main variety is Kalaallisut, or West Greenlandic. The second variety is Tunumiit oraasiat, or East Greenlandic. The language of the Inughuit (Thule Inuit) of Greenland, Inuktun or Polar Eskimo, is a recent arrival and a dialect of Inuktitut)
  • The Language Secretariat of Greenland website, May 15, 2023:About Greenlandic > About Kalaallisut > About dialects (The language that is common to all Greenlanders is the Greenlandic standard language. The language in its current form does not belong to any single dialect, although it originally originated in central West Greenland. It is the language that all Greenlanders, regardless of their dialect, use in writing. In contrast, the spoken language is unregulated.) ( (Greenlandic-English dictionary, 2018, via WWW, May 15, 2023.) )
  • Email from Oqaasileriffik (the Language Secretariat of Greenland), received July 21, 2023:(Our preference here at Oqaasileriffik is that we write English in English texts and Danish in Danish texts and Greenlandic in Greenlandic texts, even we call Greenlandic language as kalaallisut here in Greenland. For that reason, we would recommend that you use Greenlandic.)
Wikipedia description:

Kalaallisut (lit. 'language of the Kalaallit'), also known as West Greenlandic (Danish: vestgrønlandsk), is the primary language of Greenland and constitutes the Greenlandic language, spoken by the vast majority of the inhabitants of Greenland, as well as by thousands of Greenlandic Inuit in Denmark proper (in total, approximately 50,000 people). It was historically spoken in the southwestern part of Greenland, i.e. the region around Nuuk. Tunumiisut and Inuktun are the two other native languages of Greenland, spoken by a small minority of the population. Danish remains an important lingua franca in Greenland and used in many parts of public life, as well as being the main language spoken by Danes in Greenland. An extinct mixed trade language known as West Greenlandic Pidgin was based on West Greenlandic.

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