Nunavut

Nunavut (in the Inuktitut syllabary, ᓄᓇᕗᑦ, “our land”) is one of the three territories that, together with the ten provinces, make up the thirteen federal entities of Canada. Its capital is Iqaluit. It is located in the north of the country, bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the northeast by Baffin Bay that separates it from Greenland, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean and Hudson Bay, to the south by Manitoba, to the southwest by Saskatchewan and to the west with the Northwest Territories. With 31,152 inhabitants in 2008, it is the least populated entity, with 2,093,190 km², the largest, and with 0.01 inhab/km², the least densely populated.

Nunavut separated from the Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999, according to borders established in advance in 1993. These borders recognized Nunavut's jurisdiction over nearly all of Canada's Arctic Islands (Ellesmere, Baffin, Devon, Southampton and the eastern half of Victoria and Melville), as well as the central Canadian coastal area over the Arctic Ocean and all the islands in Hudson Bay.

Since 1976, a desire of the Inuit people to achieve greater autonomy for the territory began to be noticed. Following the recommendation made by a report by the Royal Commission of Canada on the advisability of granting greater autonomy to the aboriginal peoples of Canada, this came into effect in mid-1999.

Its inhabitants —called Nunavutensians (Nunavummiut, singular Nunavummiuq)— are spread over nearly thirty villages or smaller towns. One of these is Iqaluit, the capital, located on Baffin Island, formerly called Frobisher Bay.

Geography

Northeast coast of the island of Baffin

The territory covers about 1.9 million km² of land and 161,000 km² of water in northern Canada, including part of the continent, the most of the Arctic Archipelago, and of all the islands in Hudson Bay, James Bay, and Ungava Bay (including the Belcher Islands) that belonged to the Northwest Territories. This makes it the fourth largest subnational entity in the world. If Nunavut were a country, it would be number 15 in territory. Nunavut has land borders with the Northwest Territories on several islands, as well as the mainland, a border with Manitoba, south of the Nunavut peninsula, and a small border terrestrial with Newfoundland and Labrador on Killiniq Island. Likewise, it shares water borders with the provinces of Quebec, Ontario and Manitoba and with Greenland. More than 90% of the territory is covered by the Canadian Shield.

History

The region now known as Nunavut has been continuously populated for approximately 4,000 years. Most historians identify the coast of Baffin Island with the Helluland described in the Norse sagas, so it is possible that the inhabitants of the region had occasional contact with Scandinavian sailors.

The modern history of Nunavut began in 1576. Martin Frobisher, while leading an expedition to find the Northwest Passage, believed he had discovered deposits of gold in the body of water now known as Frobisher Bay off the coast of Nunavut. Baffin. It turned out that the mineral was actually pyrite, which was worthless, but Frobisher established the first contact between Europeans and the Inuit people. The contact was hostile, with both sides taking prisoners who later died.

Other explorers such as Henry Hudson, William Baffin, and Robert Bylot traversed the territory in search of the Northwest Passage during the 17th century.

The indigenous population of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, who found themselves less influenced by colonialism as they inhabited an area where contact with the white population was not permanent until the 1920s, received the negative effects of some Western cultural segments since then. However, the Inuit have learned to adapt to new circumstances and have in recent decades the support of a large part of the Canadian population, and seem to be moving towards their autonomy. Late contact also seems to have played a role in the survival of these arctic minorities. Together, the socioeconomic model of exploitation of raw materials applied to the north since 1945 now seems to count more on the small producer and not only on the interests of large corporations, a model (that of 1945) that also generated the Eskimo dependence on the federal resources and not on their own.

In 1976 as part of the negotiations of land claims between the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (indigenous organization) and the federal government, the division of the Northwest Territories was discussed. On April 14, 1982, a plebiscite on division was held in the Northwest Territories. A majority of residents voted in favor, and the federal government gave a conditional agreement seven months later. The land claims settlement was decided in September 1992 and ratified by nearly 85% of Nunavut voters. On July 9, 1993, the Nunavut Land Claims Settlement Act and the Nunavut Act were introduced into the Canadian Parliament, and the transition was completed on April 1, 1999.

Territorial organization

Demographics

Nunavut has the smallest and least dense population in Canada: 35,944 (2016) scattered over an area similar to that of Western Europe. If Nunavut were an independent country, it would be the least densely populated in the world, with about the same size and half the population of Greenland.

At the 2011 census, 27,435 inhabitants (86.54%) of the total (31 700) indicated that they were Native American, with 27,075 (98.68%) identifying as Inuit, 170 (0.6%) as Métis, and 465 (1.69%) as Native American. First Nations.

Languages

The official languages of Nunavut are Inuktitut, Inuinnaqtun, English, and French. Inuktitut is an Inuit language and the most widely spoken in Nunavut, but the majority of the population cannot speak English or French, because it is an Inuit territory, although Inuinnaqtun is not widely spoken either.

Ian Martin of York University proposed a language plan over a twenty-year period to create "a fully functional bilingual society, Inuktitut and English" by 2020. The plan provides several blueprints, including:^{[citation required]}

• Qulliq model, for most communities in Nunavut, with Inuktitut as the main language of instruction.
• Inuinnaqtun immersion model, for the recovery and revitalization of this language as a living language.
• Mixed population model, mainly for Iqaluit (possibly for Rankin Inlet), since its 40% Qallunaat (non-inuit population), may have various requirements.

To the census question about mother tongue, these were the answers:

Economy

The economy is based on mineral resources, especially gold, lead and zinc. There are also many diamonds. Hunting and fishing are other important activities. Tourism is constantly growing.