Language


 * For the vast majority, the Inuit people speak a traditional Inuit language or dialect. This is often referred to by the general term Inuktitut. However, many Inuit groups are known to speak the predominant language of the country in which they live.
 * The written system of language, Qaliujaaqpait, was developed in the 1760s as Moavian missionaries arrived in Greenland. Influences were derived from the Latin alphabet.
 * The specific Inuktitut mode of speaking that is used throughout Canada is based off of that which was derived by the missionary James Evans and later developed by Edmund Peck.
 * The Copper Inuit were not among those to develop a system of hieroglyphics, as this was known to exist among the people of Alaska. Among those that were the last to adopt the written word were the Eastern Canadian Inuit.



Eskimo-Aleut Language:
The Eskimo-Aleut is a language-family that is native to the areas that include the residence of the Copper Inuit people. This language family is divided into two branches, the Eskimo languages and the Aleut language. Of the Eskimo languages are two branches, the Yupik languages (Alaska and Siberia) and the Inuit language (Canada, Greenland, northern Alaska). Furthermore, the Inuit language is divided into several dialects. It is postulated that the common ancestral language of both the Eskimo and Aleut languages divided into the two branches around 2000 BCE. The Eskimo language family is known to have divided into the Yupik and Inuit branches around 1000 CE.

Within this set of languages, every word must have only one root, always at the beginning. These languages have a small number of roots. Following the root, come postbases, bound morphemes that add to the meaning of the root. Following these are non-lexical suffixes that indicate case on nouns and person and mood on verbs. The number of particular cases varies, with the Eskimo-based systems having a greater number. Also, at the end of a word, there can be a small number of clitics. These have meanings such as "but". Phonologically, these languages are similar to other languages of northern North America and far eastern Siberia. Generally, only three vowels (a, i, u) are used.

