Igloolik Iqualuit Ugakjualik   PhotographyArctic TripLinksHome
 
photos
camping photos
emails
maps & links

This, one of Igloolik's busy intersections, shows the true bilingualism of the town.
When written in roman orthography, the Inuktitut syllabics shown here look something like this:
NU-Q-KA-Q-LU-TI-T (letter-by-letter), but I could be completely wrong, as I'm just going by the notes scribbled in my journal.
There are basically 15 different syllabics, and depending on the direction that they face, it tells you what sound or sound combination the symbol makes. So the same syllabic, for example "t"(the upside down "U" and the sideways "U" - or small "c" in the photo), can be "ti", "tu", "ta" or the final "t".
As Inuktitut is an oral tradition, and the syllabics were created by white missionaries and are relatively new to the language.

Previous Photo | Next Photo