The Inuit are an Indigenous people of the Arctic, living across a vast stretch of northern territory that spans Alaska, Canada, Greenland, and a small part of Russia. Roughly 180,000 Inuit live in these regions today. The word “Inuit” means “people” in their language, with “inuk” meaning “person.” They share deep cultural, linguistic, and genetic ties rooted in thousands of years of life in one of the harshest climates on Earth.
Names and Terminology
For decades, outsiders used the word “Eskimo” to refer to Inuit and related Arctic peoples. That term, which linguists trace to a Montagnais (Innu) word meaning “netter of snowshoes,” is now widely considered a colonial label. Most Alaska Natives, Canadians, and Greenlanders reject it. The Inuit Circumpolar Council, the major international body representing Inuit from all four countries, uses “Inuit” as the preferred term.
That said, the Arctic is home to more than one group. The Yupik people of western Alaska and Russia’s Chukotka region are culturally and linguistically distinct from the Inuit, and they use their own name. “Yupik” is a singular word meaning “real person.” In practice, many Alaska Natives prefer to be identified by their specific group name, whether Iñupiaq, Yupik, or another. In Greenland, the Inuit often call themselves Kalaallit, and their language Kalaallisut.
Where Inuit Live
Inuit communities are spread across four countries, though the vast majority live in Canada and Greenland. In Canada, the territory of Nunavut was created in 1999 through the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement, establishing a public government that serves both Inuit and non-Inuit residents across a territory larger than Western Europe. Inuit also live in northern Quebec (Nunavik), Labrador (Nunatsiavut), and the Northwest Territories. In Greenland, which the Inuit call Kalaallit Nunaat, Inuit make up the majority of the population and have extensive self-governance. In Alaska, Iñupiaq communities dot the North Slope and Seward Peninsula. A smaller population lives in Chukotka, on the Russian side of the Bering Strait.
Ancestry and Migration
Modern Inuit descend from the Thule culture, a maritime people who developed along coastal Alaska and began expanding eastward around 1,000 years ago. The Thule were remarkably mobile. Their use of dogsleds and large skin-covered boats called umiaks allowed them to travel in groups across enormous distances. Within a few centuries, they had spread from the Bering Strait region through the Canadian High Arctic and into Greenland, covering practically the entire North American Arctic.
As the Thule moved east, they replaced an earlier Arctic people known as the Dorset culture and even interacted with Norse Vikings in Greenland. The Thule tradition, which archaeologists date from roughly 1 CE to 1500 CE, gave rise to the diverse modern Inuit and Yupik groups found today across the Arctic.
Language
Inuit languages form a dialect chain that stretches from Alaska to Greenland. While the languages differ enough that speakers at opposite ends cannot easily understand each other, neighboring communities generally can. In Alaska, the language is called Iñupiaq, with two major dialect groups: North Alaskan Iñupiaq along the Arctic coast and Seward Peninsula Iñupiaq further south. The differences can be significant. The word for “dog” is qimmiq in the North Slope dialect but qipmiq in the Malimiut dialect, and each region sometimes uses entirely different verb stems for the same action.
In eastern Canada, the language is most commonly called Inuktitut, though local names vary by region. In Greenland, it is Kalaallisut. All of these are part of the Inuit branch of the broader Inuit-Yupik-Unangan language family, which also includes the Yupik languages of western Alaska and Siberia and the Unangan (Aleut) language of the Aleutian Islands.
Traditional Diet and Way of Life
The Arctic offers almost no conditions for agriculture. Inuit survival has historically depended on hunting marine mammals, fishing, and foraging. Seal, whale, walrus, caribou (reindeer), musk ox, wild birds, Arctic char, and other fish make up what Inuit call “country food.” This traditional diet is extraordinarily rich in protein and fat, and it provides nutrients that would otherwise be nearly impossible to get at high latitudes. Seal and whale, for example, are major natural sources of vitamin D, a nutrient most people at lower latitudes get primarily from sunlight. Research in Greenland has confirmed that the traditional marine diet contributes significantly to vitamin D levels in Inuit populations.
Country food is not just nutrition. Hunting, sharing, and preparing food are central to Inuit identity, family life, and community bonds. The act of providing food for family carries deep cultural meaning that extends well beyond calories.
Knowledge Systems and Governance
Inuit culture is guided by a knowledge system called Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit, often translated as “traditional knowledge.” It is rooted in the daily life of Inuit people and encompasses ecological knowledge, ethical principles, and decision-making practices passed down through generations. The Government of Nunavut formally recognizes several guiding principles of this system, including Inuuqatigiitsiarniq (respecting others and caring for people), Aajiiqatigiinniq (decision making through discussion and consensus), Pilimmaksarniq (developing skills through observation and practice), and Avatittinnik Kamatsiarniq (respect and care for the land, animals, and environment).
These principles are not symbolic. Nunavut’s regulatory bodies require that project developers incorporate traditional knowledge into environmental impact assessments, management strategies, and monitoring plans. This reflects a growing recognition that Inuit ecological knowledge, built over millennia of Arctic observation, contributes meaningfully to biodiversity conservation and sustainable resource management.
Political Representation
The Inuit Circumpolar Council, founded in 1977, represents Inuit across all four countries. It holds Permanent Participant status at the Arctic Council, the main intergovernmental forum for Arctic issues, giving Inuit a direct voice in international discussions about the region they have inhabited for millennia. The ICC has national branches in Alaska, Canada, Greenland, and Chukotka.
Within Canada, the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement was one of the largest Indigenous land claims settlements in history. It established Inuit rights over a vast territory and created the framework for Nunavut’s government. Similar agreements exist in other Inuit regions of Canada, each securing varying degrees of land ownership, resource rights, and self-governance.
Health Disparities
Despite cultural resilience and political progress, Inuit face stark health inequalities. Life expectancy for Inuit in northern Canada is around 70 years, compared to 84 years for Canadians overall. Education index scores in Inuit regions are roughly 35 out of 100, compared to 56 nationally. Housing scores sit at 65 versus 95. Daily smoking rates among Inuit in northern communities reach 63%, nearly four times the Canadian average of 16%. Only about 40% of Inuit in the north rate their health as very good or excellent, compared to 63% of all Canadians.
These numbers reflect generations of colonial disruption, forced relocations, residential schools, and chronic underfunding of northern infrastructure. The gap between Inuit and non-Indigenous outcomes remains one of the widest in any developed country.
Climate Change and the Arctic
The Arctic is warming two to three times faster than the global average, and Inuit communities are experiencing the consequences firsthand. Thinning and unstable sea ice makes travel between communities dangerous and unpredictable. Hunters face rapidly changing conditions that are increasingly difficult to read, raising the risk of accidental injury or death. When ice conditions prevent hunting, the effects ripple outward: families lose access to country food, the cost of hunting and foraging rises, and the transmission of traditional knowledge from elders to younger generations is disrupted.
The mental health toll is significant. Researchers have documented increasing stress and psychological harm among Inuit hunters who can no longer reliably practice the skills that define their cultural identity and their role in their families. The inability to hunt is not just a logistical problem. It represents a loss of livelihood, purpose, and connection to the land that has sustained Inuit life for thousands of years.