Tribes of the Arctic region

The Inuit are a Native American people of northernmost North America, Europe and Asia which are still commonly known in the United States as Eskimos. Their traditional range of inhabitation spans around the Arctic Circle from eastern Siberia across Alaska in the United States, the Northwest Territory, Yukon Territory, Nunavut, Quebec and Newfoundland in Canada, all the way to Greenland and the Faroe Islands. Anthropologically, they were a much studied people for their physical and social adaptations to severe cold.

Name

In their own language, Inuit means the people. The traditional name for them, Eskimo, is now not politically correct since only foreigners had used it. Furthermore, in Inuit it means eaters of raw meat, neglecting their large diet of raw fish.

Language

Inuit also refers to the language of the Inuit people. It has numerous consonants in tight clusters. Similar to Hawaiian, it has very short words, in part due to the expediation necessary to prevent the heat loss from opening their mouths. Also to prevent heat loss, Inuits would greet each other and perform other common exchanges only by rubbing their noses together ("Eskimo kiss"), since the nose was usually the only strip of skin exposed to the elements. The Inuit language is remarkable for having over 100 words to describe "snow".

Diet

Since the Inuit live in a region of permafrost, they do not consume many plants. Their diet primarily consists of fish caught through iceholes and seals, walruses, or auks caught by spearhunting. Occasionally they would kill a polar bear to eat, but as with any bear, the meat is often not worth the danger of the hunt. In the whale spawning season, the Inuit would venture onto the thawed waters and hunt the great animals for their meat and blubber, a natural insulator for their homes and a wax substitute for candles.

The Inuit developed a specialized metabolism for protein, fat, and carbohydrates in a virtually fiber-free diet. However, they often suffered from conditions resulting in a lack of Vitamin C, riboflavin and thiamine. Their different metabolism has led to serious health issues as they try to convert to a modern diet.

Society

The Inuit developed heat-efficient housing made of thick blocks of ice, called igloos. They would live in small villages through the long winter and then switch to a nomadic lifestyle in the short summer.

Their clothing was also heat-efficient: polar bear fur and sealskin would be used for the highly insulated parkas, anoraks, papooses and mukluks that comprised the Inuit wardrobe.

Inuits primarily bartered blubber and seal oil for special goods, though wampum currency was a possible alternative payment for commerce.

The Intuit traditionally practiced polyandry, the polygamous endowment of several husbands to one wife. In the harsh climate it was difficult for one man to feed a pregnant woman, thus several men would put aside their natural competitive instincts to care for one woman and continue the preservation of the race.

The funerary ceremony of the Inuit involved the family and close friends of the deceased placing the corpse on a small ice flow or canoe and casting it out to sea.

Religion

Christianity was brought to these pagan people by missionaries in the early 19th century and while pagan cultural rites have persisted, Christianity is the sole theistic religion practiced.

History

Until the great northern explorations of Henry Hudson, the Inuit were unknown to Europeans other than the Vikings, who had already conquered the coastline of Greenland from them. Arctic explorers such as Admiral Byrd and Commodore Perry wrote about encounters with the Inuit in their journals, which were later popularized in the fiction novels of authors such as Jack London.

The first Inuit recorded on film was Nanook of the North, whose eponymous documentary by Robert J. Flaherty from 1922, showed all the modern world the curious arctic life of the Esquimoux (as they were then called). Some initial reactions to the film claimed it to be a hoax, but these objections quickly subsided.