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Programme: accepted abstracts

Abstract ID: 534

Part of Session 142: Deconstructing the urban-rural dichotomy (Other abstracts in this session)

Urban-rural’ dynamics and Indigenous urbanization: The case of Inuit language use in Ottawa

Authors: Patrick, Donna (1); Budach, Gabriele (2)
Submitted by: Patrick, Donna R. (Carleton University, Canada)

In Canada, the establishment of cities by European settlers has figured conspicuously in the displacement, dispossession, and marginalisation of Indigenous peoples. Despite this, more than half of the Indigenous population now resides in cities, and urbanisation continues to increase. Associated with this migration has been the enactment of complex, interconnected practices that cross a divide conventionally described as ‘urban-rural’. These practices include those associated with movement between cities and reserves and other communities and the mobility of cultural objects and language. The ways in which urban Indigeneity is being enacted, however, contest conventional ‘urban-rural’ dichotomies. This is largely because Indigenous homelands do not readily fit into the category of traditional ‘rural’ spaces — a category that itself need to be reconceptualised, given that ‘rural’ spaces have undergone a significant transformation and can no longer be seen either as occupied solely by those with economic ties to the land or as culturally or economically ‘backward’ (cf. Williams 1973).

In this social-geographical context, our paper examines Inuit mobility and migration and the dynamics of Inuit language use in Ottawa. While urbanisation might be assumed to increase the demand among Inuit to access the dominant linguistic resources of southern urban centres, our work with a group of Inuit educators from across the Arctic suggests otherwise. Surprisingly to us, the focus of this group was not access to valued English-language resources driving educational and economic mobility, but rather maintaining and promoting Inuit linguistic and cultural resources. These semiotic resources are used by urban Inuit in the construction of narratives, intertwining past and present, and the maintenance of meaningful social relations and connections to Inuit homelands.

By analysing linguistic interaction in urban Inuit family literacy activities, we show how ‘non-urban’ Inuktitut language forms and the social values attached to them are reproduced and reinforced in urban contexts. As our findings show, what is important in this context is not that this is an ‘urban’ environment creating new forms of language use. It is  that continuity and linkages across ‘non-urban’ Arctic regions, and the sociolinguistic practices associated with these, construct Inuitness and connect Inuit across (so-called) ‘rural-urban’ divides.