Dialogue: Welcome
Vocabulary
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atelihai
Welcome! (addressing 1 person)
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inuttitut uKâlasonguven?
Inuktitut (Do you speak... ?)
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â
yes
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ketakuluk
little bit (a...)
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kina?
who?
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kinauven?
What's your name?
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kinaunâ?
What is his / her name?
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nane?
where?
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nanimiunguven?
Where are you from?
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IKalummiunguvunga
I'm from Iqaluit.
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Âttavâ
Ottawa
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Âttavâmiunguvunga
I'm from Ottawa.
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nigivunga
eating, I am...
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nigivutit
eating, you (1) are...
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nigijuk
eating, she/he is...
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nigivuguk
eating, we (2) are...
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nigivugut
eating, we (3+) are...
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nigivutik
eating, you (2) are...
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nigivusi
eating, you (3+) are...
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nigijok
eating, they (2) are...
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nigijut
eating, they are (3+)...
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tukisivunga
understand (I...)
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sinittuk
sleeps (he/she...)
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aullajuk
departs (he/she...)
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Grammar
1 » The Basic Structure of Inuktut
In Inuktut, the basic units of meaning are roots, affixes and grammatical endings.
| nigi- | to eat |
| aullak- | to depart; leave town |
| tupik | tent |
Roots that describe nouns (people, places, animals or objects) sometimes appear on their own:
| nuna | land |
| inuk | an Inuk; a person |
| natsik | ringed seal |
Generally, though, words are built in Inuktut by attaching affixes and endings to a root.
Here are three simple noun endings:
| -mi | in / at a place |
| -mut | to a place |
| -mit | from a place |
We can add these endings to a noun root to create a word:
| sitjami | at the shoreline |
| sitjamut | to the shoreline |
| sitjamit | from the shoreline |
Verb endings are attached to verb roots that describe actions. Here are three simple verb endings:
| -tunga | I |
| -tutit | you |
| -tuk | she / he / it |
If we add different endings to the same root, we get different meanings:
| aullavunga | I depart. |
| aullavutit | You depart. |
| aullajuk | He / she departs. |
Affixes are pieces of words that appear between the root and the ending. They can never begin a word. Affixes add more information about the noun or verb that is described by the root.
For example -lauk- is a verb affix that indicates that an action happened in the past:
| aullalaukKunga | I departed. |
| aullalaukKutit | You departed. |
| aullalauttuk | He / she departed. |
In Inuktut, it is possible to build up very long words by adding a series of affixes between the root and the ending. We can end up with single words that would take an entire sentence to say in English:
mipvik + liak + giaKak + lâk + tunga = mipviliagiaKalâttunga I’ll have to go to the airport.
2 » I am...
To introduce yourself, you can add the affix -u- to the end of your name followed by the verb ending -vunga:
| Peta | Peter |
| Peta + u + vunga = Piitauvunga | I am Peter; My name is Peter. |
The affix -u- means to be. When it is added to a root that ends in a -k or a -q, it deletes the final consonant. We can use a different verb ending -juk to talk about he / she or it:
| tupik | |
| tupik + u + juk = tupiujuk | It is a tent. |
If the last vowel sound before the consonant is a u, the verb –u– merges with thtat sound to become a long u . In Nunatsiavummiutitut long u is written as o.
| inuk | |
| inuk + u + vunga = inovunga | I am Inuk. |
Adding –u– to names coming from other languages like English, can sound quite awkward in Inuktut. If such a name ends in a vowel, it usually isn’t a problem:
| Susi | Susie. |
| Susi + u + vunga = Susiuvunga | My name is Susie. |
But if the name ends in a consonant, Nunatsiavummiutitut speakers will often add an -i- sound before -u- to make pronunciation easier:
| Job | |
| Jobiuvunga. | My name is Job. |
To ask someone their name, you start with the root kina, meaning who? You then add the affix -u- to the end of kina, followed by the question ending -ven?:
| kina + u + ven? | Susie. |
| kinauven? | Who are you? |
3 » Where are you from?
The affix -miuk- means, someone who comes from the place described by the root of the word:
| Nunaingumiuk | someone from Nain |
| KipukKamiuk | someone from Postville |
| kikiammiuk | someone from Rigolet |
| Apvitommiuk | someone from Hopedale |
| Maggovimmiuk | someone from Makkovik |
As we see in the above examples, -miuk can appear at the end of a word. But we can also build onto it to talk about different people. We do this by adding the verb -ngu- to the the end of -miuk- and follow it with a verb ending:
| kikiammiunguvunga | I am from Rigolet. |
| Maggovimmiunguvunga | I am from Makkovik. |
We can easily change the verb ending to talk about different people:
| kikiammiunguvuguk | We (2) are from Rigolet. |
| Maggovimmiunguvusi | You (3+) are from Makkovik. |
We can also add -miuk- to the question root nani- (meaning where?) to create a question:
| nani + miuk + ngu + ven? = | nanimiunguven? |
| Where are you from? |
4 » Simple Verb Endings
Verb roots in Inuktut describe actions or states of being. The verb ending tells us who is performing the action.
| takuvunga |
| I see. |
In the above word, taku- describes the action of seeing and the verb ending –vunga describes who is seeing.
By using different verb endings we can talk about different people doing the same action:
| nigivunga | I am eating. |
| nigivutit | You are eating. |
| nigivuk / nigijuk | He / she is eating. |
| nigivuguk | The two of us are eating. |
| nigivugut | We (3+) are eating. |
| nigivutik | The two of you are eating. |
| nigivusi | You (3+) are eating. |
| nigivok / nigijok | The two of them are eating. |
| nigivut / nigijut | They (3+) are eating. |