How a novel saved the Inuktitut language from disappearing

When Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk wrote Sanaaq in 1984, it was the first novel written in Inuktitut in Canada. She wanted to prevent the language from no longer existing. Nappaaluk who died in 2007, helped develop the Inuktitut language curriculum in Nunavik and wrote more than 20 books — most of them designed to teach Inuktitut to children. She was also a teacher, an artist and a thinker with profound ideas about justice and community. *This is the third episode in our four-part series called Another Country: Change and Resilience in Nunavik. It originally aired on June 28, 2023.