Editing Eskimo (section)

== Languages ==
{{Main|Eskaleut languages}}

=== Language family ===
[[File:Welcome to Barrow, Alaska.jpg|thumb|left|English ("Welcome to Barrow") and [[Inupiaq language|Iñupiaq]] (''Paġlagivsigiñ Utqiaġvigmun''), [[Utqiaġvik, Alaska]], framed by whale jawbones]]
The [[Eskaleut languages|Eskimo–Aleut]] (also known as Eskaleut or Inuit–Yupik–Unangan) family of languages includes two cognate branches: the [[Aleut language|Aleut]] (Unangan) branch and the Inuit–Yupik branch.<ref name="Lyovin Kessler Leben 2017 p. 327">{{cite book |last1=Lyovin |first1=A. |last2=Kessler |first2=B. |last3=Leben |first3=W.R. |title=An Introduction to the Languages of the World |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2017 |isbn=978-0-19-514988-3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hjxuDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA327 |access-date=November 7, 2021 |page=327 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref>

The number of [[Grammatical case|cases]] varies, with Aleut languages having a greatly reduced case system compared to those of the Inuit–Yupik subfamily. Inuit–Yupik–Unangan languages possess voiceless plosives at the [[bilabial consonant|bilabial]], [[coronal consonant|coronal]], [[Velar consonant|velar]] and [[Uvular consonant|uvular]] positions in all languages except Aleut, which has lost the bilabial stops but retained the [[Nasal consonant|nasal]]. In the Inuit–Yupik subfamily a voiceless [[Alveolar consonant|alveolar]] [[Lateral consonant|lateral]] [[Fricative consonant|fricative]] is also present.

The Inuit–Yupik sub-family consists of the [[Inuit languages|Inuit]] and [[Yupik languages|Yupik]] language sub-groups.<ref name="FortecueM">{{Cite book |url=https://www.alaska.edu/uapress/browse/detail/comparative-eskimo-dictionary-with-aleut-cognates.php |title=Comparative Eskimo Dictionary with Aleut Cognates |first1=Michael |last1=Fortescue |author1-link=Michael Fortescue |first2=Steven |last2=Jacobson |first3=Lawrence |last3=Kaplan |publisher=Alaska Native Language Center, [[University of Alaska Fairbanks]]}}</ref> The [[Sirenik language]], which is virtually extinct, is sometimes regarded as a third branch of the Inuit–Yupik language family. Other sources regard it as a group belonging to the Yupik branch.<ref name="FortecueM"/><ref name="kaplanB">{{cite web |last=Kaplan |first=Lawrence |url=https://www.uaf.edu/anlc/resources/comparative_yupik_and_inuit.php |title=Comparative Yupik and Inuit |date=July 1, 2011 |access-date=April 3, 2021 |publisher=Alaska Native Language Center, [[University of Alaska Fairbanks]]}}</ref>

Inuit languages comprise a [[dialect continuum]], or dialect chain, that stretches from [[Unalakleet, Alaska|Unalakleet]] and [[Norton Sound]] in Alaska, across northern Alaska and Canada, and east to Greenland. Changes from western (Iñupiaq) to eastern dialects are marked by the dropping of vestigial Yupik-related features, increasing consonant assimilation (e.g., ''kumlu'', meaning "thumb", changes to ''kuvlu'', changes to ''kublu'', changes to ''kulluk'', changes to ''kulluq'',<ref name=livingdict>{{cite web |url=http://www.livingdictionary.com/search/viewResults.jsp?language=en&searchString=thumb&languageSet=all |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220807154151/https://www.livingdictionary.com/search/viewResults.jsp?language=en&searchString=thumb&languageSet=all |url-status=dead |archive-date=August 7, 2022 |title=thumb |work=Asuilaak Living Dictionary |access-date=November 25, 2007}} </ref>) and increased consonant lengthening, and lexical change. Thus, speakers of two adjacent Inuit dialects would usually be able to understand one another, but speakers from dialects distant from each other on the dialect continuum would have difficulty understanding one another.<ref name="kaplanB"/> [[Seward Peninsula]] dialects in western Alaska, where much of the [[Iñupiat]] culture has been in place for perhaps less than 500 years, are greatly affected by phonological influence from the Yupik languages. [[Tunumiit dialect|Eastern Greenlandic]], at the opposite end of Inuit range, has had significant word replacement due to a unique form of ritual name avoidance.<ref name="FortecueM"/><ref name="kaplanB"/>

Ethnographically, [[Greenlandic Inuit]] belong to three groups: the [[Kalaallit]] of west Greenland, who speak [[West Greenlandic|Kalaallisut]];<ref name="ethno"/> the [[Tunumiit]] of [[Tunu]] (east Greenland), who speak [[Tunumiit language|Tunumiit oraasiat]] ("East Greenlandic"), and the [[Inughuit]] of north Greenland, who speak [[Inuktun]].

The four [[Yupik languages]], by contrast, including [[Alutiiq language|Alutiiq]] (Sugpiaq), [[Yup'ik language|Central Alaskan Yup'ik]], [[Naukan Yupik language|Naukan]] (Naukanski), and [[Central Siberian Yupik language|Siberian Yupik]], are distinct languages with phonological, morphological, and lexical differences. They demonstrate limited mutual intelligibility.<ref name="FortecueM"/> Additionally, both Alutiiq and Central Yup'ik have considerable dialect diversity. The northernmost Yupik languages – Siberian Yupik and Naukan Yupik – are linguistically only slightly closer to Inuit than is Alutiiq, which is the southernmost of the Yupik languages. Although the grammatical structures of Yupik and Inuit languages are similar, they have pronounced differences phonologically. Differences of vocabulary between Inuit and any one of the Yupik languages are greater than between any two Yupik languages.<ref name="kaplanB"/> Even the dialectal differences within Alutiiq and Central Alaskan Yup'ik sometimes are relatively great for locations that are relatively close geographically.<ref name="kaplanB"/>

Despite the relatively small population of Naukan speakers, documentation of the language dates back to 1732. While Naukan is only spoken in Siberia, the language acts as an intermediate between two Alaskan languages: Siberian Yupik and Central Yup'ik.<ref name="erudit.org">{{cite journal |last1=Jacobson |first1=Steven A. |title=History of the Naukan Yupik Eskimo dictionary with implications for a future Siberian Yupik dictionary |journal=Études/Inuit/Studies |date=13 November 2006 |volume=29 |issue=1–2 |pages=149–161 |doi=10.7202/013937ar |s2cid=128785932 |doi-access=}}</ref>
[[Image:Inuktitut dialect map.svg|thumb|upright=1.4|Distribution of language variants across the Arctic]]

An overview of the Inuit–Yupik–Unangan languages family is given below:

{{tree list}}
* '''Inuit–Yupik–Unangan'''
**[[Aleut language|Aleut]] or Unangan
****Western-Central dialects: Atkan, Attuan, Unangan, Bering (60–80 speakers)
****Eastern dialect: Unalaskan, Pribilof (400 speakers)
**Inuit–Yupik or Eskimo (Yup'ik, Yuit, and Inuit)
***[[Yupik languages|Yupik]]
****[[Yup'ik language|Central Alaskan Yup'ik]] (10,000 speakers)
****[[Alutiiq language|Alutiiq]] or Pacific Gulf Yup'ik (400 speakers)
****[[Central Siberian Yupik language|Central Siberian Yupik]] or Yuit (Chaplinon and St Lawrence Island, 1,400 speakers)
****[[Naukan Yupik language|Naukan]] (700 speakers)
***[[Inuit languages|Inuit]] or Inupik (75,000 speakers)
****[[Greenlandic language|Greenlandic]] (Greenland, 47,000 speakers)
*****[[West Greenlandic|Kalaallisut]] (West Greenlandic, 44,000-52,000 speakers)
*****[[Tunumiisut]] (East Greenlandic, 3,500 speakers)
****[[Inupiaq language|Iñupiaq]] (northern Alaska, 3,500 speakers)
****[[Inuvialuktun]] (western Canada; together with [[Siglitun]], [[Netsilik dialect|Natsilingmiutut]], [[Inuinnaqtun]] and [[Uummarmiutun]] 765 speakers)
****[[Inuktitut]] (eastern Canada; together with [[Inuktun]] and [[Inuinnaqtun]], 30,000 speakers)
****[[Inuktun]] (Avanersuarmiutut, Thule dialect or Polar Eskimo, approximately 1,000 speakers)
***[[Sirenik language|Sirenik]] (Sirenikskiy) {{extinct}}
{{tree list/end}}

American linguist [[Lenore Grenoble]] has explicitly deferred to the ICC resolution and used ''Inuit–Yupik'' instead of ''Eskimo'' with regards to the language branch.<ref name="Grenoble, 2016"/>

=== Words for ''snow'' ===
{{Main|Eskimo words for snow}}
There has been a long-running linguistic debate about whether or not the speakers of the Inuit–Yupik–Unangan language group have an unusually large number of words for snow. The general modern consensus is that, in multiple Inuit–Yupik languages, there are, or have been in simultaneous usage, indeed fifty plus words for snow.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.treehugger.com/are-there-really-eskimo-words-for-snow-4862000|title = Are There Really 50 Eskimo Words for Snow?}}</ref>