Polysynthesis in the Acquisition of Inuit Languages

Abstract

In this chapter, I begin by briefly outlining the structure of Inuit (Eskimo) languages and the challenges they present for child language development. In the bulk of the chapter, I review the existing literature on the first language, impaired, and bilingual acquisition of Inuit languages (i.e. Inuktitut and West Greenlandic) from ages 1 through 16 years. Structures covered include nursery vocabulary, word-internal derivational morphology, verbal and nominal inflectional morphology, other complex morphology, noun incorporation, passive, causative, valency alternations, argument realization, and tense and aspect. I also briefly cover aspects of language socialization, narrative acquisition, and the effects on Inuit language acquisition of increasing use of majority languages. I conclude with a summary of our knowledge so far and directions for further research.

Calculating mean length of utterance for eastern Canadian Inuktitut

“…Virtually all Inuit children in eastern Canada learn Inuktitut as their native language. We have a reasonable understanding of the trajectory of many aspects of language acquisition in typically-developing Inuktitut-speaking children as a result of research conducted over the past three decades (e.g., Allen, 1996, 1998, 2000, 2013, in press; Allen & Crago, 1996; Allen, Crago, & Pesco, 2006; Crago, 1988; Crago & Allen, 1997, 1998, 2001; Crago, Annahatak, Doehring, & Allen, 1991; Dorais & Sammons, 2002; Fortescue & Lennert Olsen, 1992; Parkinson, 1999; Swift, 2004; Wilman, 1988; Wright, Taylor, & Macarthur, 2000). However, as noted in a 2010 report published by Speech-Language and Audiology Canada (SAC, 2010), there is a critical lack of tools that can be used by speech-language pathologists to assess language ability and language difficulties in children who speak Inuktitut or other indigenous languages.…”

“…In addition, virtually all children learn Inuktitut at home as their native language. Numerous studies attest to the fluent acquisition of Inuktitut by preschool Inuit children in Nunavik (e.g., Allen, 1996, in press; Crago & Allen, 1998; Swift, 2004), as well as to the strong Inuktitut abilities of school-aged Inuit children in the early grades (e.g., Allen et al, 2006; Crago et al, 1991; Wright et al, 2000).…”

Polysynthesis: A review

“…structural features allow for the possibility of different degrees of consistency of the polysynthetic type. 17 The study of acquisition of polysynthetic structures is its infancy; see Allen (2017), Forshaw et al (2017), and Stoll, Mazara, and Bickel (2017) for three recent case studies and the references therein. Although much more work needs to be done here, the results suggest that children acquire richer and more complex morphologies differently from how they acquire, say, English morphology.…”

The development of possession in the L1 acquisition of Northern East Cree

“…For example, children acquiring Inuit languages productively use grammatical marking for possession around two years of age, earlier than English-acquiring children (Allen, 2017;Fortescue & Olsen, 1992). This early emergence of inflection is likely a function of inflection-heavy language-specific characteristics as well as adult input (Allen, 2017). However, data from other polysynthetic languages more closely resemble cross-linguistic trends in the acquisition of possessive marking.…”