Sanikiluaq (Oct 25/04) - Students and staff at Nuiyak school in Sanikiluaq want to bring an old dialect of Inuktitut out into the public domain with the aid of video-conferencing.

Nuiyak school staff want to see the connection happen before Christmas.

If it does, it will be the first video-conferencing with elders in Nunavut history.

Sanikiluaq Community TV started its new season last month with elders going on TV every Thursday to talk about topics of their choice.

Teacher Tim Hoyt wants to see this kind of activity extended much further with video-conferencing technology, so that elders around Nunavut can see and talk to each other, hopefully in Inuktitut.

The school has about 12 students between the ages of 15 and 18 actively involved in this media/entrepreneurial course right now.

These students have shown off their Inuit culture to people around the world using the tele-health video-conferencing system, loaned to them by the health centre in Sanikiluaq.

They have never used video-conferencing to link elders in Nunavut.

"We want to get elders speaking to other elders," said Hoyt.

He wants the video-conference to happen for many reasons.

"Often dialects make it difficult for people around Nunavut to speak to each other, but there is an old Inuktitut the elders use and they can understand each other," he said.

The cultural exchange will be exciting for students at Nuiyak school and elders who may not have seen or heard from each other in many years. But Hoyt is most especially keen to record sessions of elders speaking to each other in the old Inuktitut.

"With video-conferencing we can tape it. Then from there we want to transcribe the tape and eventually have a common Inuktitut vocabulary."

High-tech day care

The video-conferencing technology runs out of the school's day care centre, located across the street from Nuiyak school.The funding for this came from the Department of Culture, Language, Elders and Youth.

Communities that are interested in participating in a video-conference with Sanikiluaq can contact John Jamieson at Nuiyak school directly to learn more about how they might link up with elders via video-conferencing.