Terminology on the tundra

Language is first and foremost utilitarian, its primary function being to convey conceptual information. It is no surprise, then, that specialized language develops in a niche milieu to suit the fundamental needs of speakers, as shaped by their environment. Take Inuktitut for example; while it is a common myth that the Inuit have over 50 different words for snow or ice — Inuktitut has roughly the same number of root words for ice and snow as English — the statement is based in some truth.

Inuktitut is an agglutinative language, which means that a great deal of information can be packed into a new term with the addition of affixes to a root word. Because of this linguistic property, Inuktitut has a great capacity for lexically distinguishing between different kinds of snow or ice. So, Inuktitut has words like “qautsaulittuq, ice that breaks after its strength has been tested with a harpoon, and sitilluqaaq “a recent solid mass”, which applies to a drift of hard snow that formed after a storm“ — no doubt useful distinctions for life in the arctic circle. The myth takes on even more truth when considering the general Inuktitut words that assume a specifically frosty meaning when used in a wintery context. The Canadian Encyclopedia states that, “it is possible to call maujaq the snow in which one sinks. This is a general term that refers to any type of soft ground (mud, wetland, quicksand) but which, in winter, can only apply to a soft snow cover where the foot sinks. In the same way, the word illusaq (“what can become a house”) refers to any construction material (wood, stone, brick, etc.), but when an igloo is built, it applies precisely to snow that is rigid and maneuverable enough for erecting a semi-spherical house made of snow blocks.”

Keep in mind that the development of these specialized lexical units, or “terms”, is not restricted to unique physical environments; almost every conceivable domain (professions, religions, hobbies and pastimes, etc.) also develops its own terminology. In linguistic circles, the study, development, and standardization of this language is known as (big T) Terminology and it is the purview of the terminologist. Terminologists study the denomination of objects or concepts used by a particular discipline or field of expertise from the perspective of their origin, meaning, structure and function within the language. That is to say that they look at how and why a given term develops, how it is used and why some terms are adopted almost globally over others. In the professional sphere, terminologists standardize the language used throughout an organization’s internal and external communications for consistency, and are even tasked with inventing new terms should the need arise. Bilingual terminology is an especially important field in Canada, where translation between French and English is commonplace and the preservation of official minority languages is so important.  As a result, legislated language authorities are in part mandated with cataloguing existing terms and developing new “official” equivalents for objects or concepts previously unknown to our various official languages.

This kind of endeavour is often fraught with uncertainty, however. Just because a term is deemed “official” does not mean it will be agreed upon by all nor necessarily adopted into common use. And Inuktitut may be facing terminological troubles with the recent legalization of recreational cannabis; Inuit Uqausinginnik Taiguusiliuqtiit (Nunavut’s language authority) declared an official term for the substance this summer, for use in the territorial legislation regulating its sale. That term is surrarnaqtuq and it means “to have an effect”. While the word is already used by many Inuktitut dialects, it is not a universal term for cannabis across the language as a whole, and it represents an excellent example of some hurdles faced by terminologists in their work; they must consider all facets of a term, probably the most important of which is its utility to the context in question. Although surrarnaqtuq is not necessarily the most commonly used word for cannabis in Inuktitut, its meaning is general enough that it covers the wide variety of forms and usages of the substance, which underlies its selection as the approved term. Other terms were deemed too restrictive — such as miluksi, derived from the Inuktitut verb “to inhale” — or too closely associated to alcohol consumption to be useful for this specific context.

Ultimately, speakers of a language will naturally create or, more typically, borrow foreign terms for newly introduced concepts and objects. After all, what’s in a name? That which we call weed by any other name would smell as skunky. While some borrowing of terms is unavoidable, terminologists can help preserve and enrich a language by assessing the adequacy and utility of a foreign term that may be settling in, and by giving direction to the term formation process. In this way, they guide the creation of indigenous terms for all spheres of life. Nunavut’s first language commissioner, Eva Aariak, expressed the crux of term creation in her remark to the Toronto Star, “Inuktitut was so succinct and perfect for everything that was around us in our environment before European introduction … They already had words for every little thing. With the introduction of the outside world, we now have to worry about coming up with proper terms that are new to us.”