Canada - Northwest Territories - Yellowknife

Aurora Paradise, Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, Canada.

Sent by NFVC from Yellowknife, Canada.

Yellowknife /ˈjɛloʊnaɪf/ (2011 population: 19,234) is the capital city and largest community of the Northwest Territories (NT or NWT), Canada. It is located on the northern shore of Great Slave Lake, approximately 400 km (250 mi) south of the Arctic Circle, on the west side of Yellowknife Bay near the outlet of the Yellowknife River. Yellowknife and its surrounding water bodies were named after a local Dene tribe once known as the 'Copper Indians' or 'Yellowknife Indians' (now referred to locally as the Yellowknives Dene (First Nation)) who traded tools made from copper deposits near the Arctic Coast. The current population is ethnically mixed. Of the eleven official languages of the Northwest Territories, five are spoken in significant numbers in Yellowknife: Dene Suline, Dogrib, South and North Slavey, English, and French. In the Dogrib language, the city is known as Somba K’e (Som-ba Kay) ("where the money is"). (read further)

Canada - Inuit Girl in Tuktoyaktuk

Fresh faced and smiling in Tuktoyaktuk. She is of Inuit people.

Sent by Shelley, a postcrosser from Toronto, Canada.

This is from Wikipedia : The Inuit are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic regions of Canada (Northwest Territories, Nunatsiavut, Nunavik, Nunavut, Nunatukavut), Denmark (Greenland), Russia (Siberia) and the United States (Alaska). Inuit means “the people” in the Inuktitut language. An Inuk is an Inuit person. The Inuit language is grouped under Eskimo-Aleut languages.

The Inuit live throughout most of the Canadian Arctic and subarctic: in the territory of Nunavut ("our land"); the northern third of Quebec, in an area called Nunavik ("place to live"); the coastal region of Labrador, in areas called Nunatsiavut ("our beautiful land") and Nunatukavut ("Our Ancient Land"); in various parts of the Northwest Territories, mainly on the coast of the Arctic Ocean and formerly in the Yukon. Collectively these areas are known as Inuit Nunangat.

In the US, Alaskan Inupiat live on the North Slope of Alaska and Siberian Coast, Little Diomede Island and Big Diomede Island. Greenland's Kalaallit are citizens of Denmark.

In Alaska, the term Eskimo is commonly used, because it includes both Yupik and Inupiat, while Inuit is not accepted as a collective term or even specifically used for Inupiat (who technically are Inuit). No universal replacement term for Eskimo, inclusive of all Inuit and Yupik people, is accepted across the geographical area inhabited by the Inuit and Yupik peoples.

In Canada and Greenland, the Natives prefer the word Inuit. As they consider "Eskimo" pejorative, it has fallen out of favour. In Canada, the Constitution Act of 1982, sections 25 and 35 recognised the Inuit as a distinctive group of Canadian aboriginals, who are neither First Nations nor Métis.