''Sallirmiutun'' (formerly Siglitun) is the dialect of Inuvialuktun spoken by the

Siglit The Sallirmiut (formerly Siglit) are an Inuit group residing in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region. Sallirmiut are considered Inuvialuit, who are the western Canadian Inuit. Inuvialuit is a modern political identity that brings together Sallirmiut ...

, an

Inuit Inuit (; iu, ᐃᓄᐃᑦ 'the people', singular: Inuk, , dual: Inuuk, ) are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwest Territories, ...

group of the

Northwest Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du Nord-Ouest, formerly ''North-Western Territory'' and ''North-West Territories'' and namely shortened as ''Northwest Territory'') is a federal provinces and territo ...

, Canada. It is mainly used in the

Inuvialuit The Inuvialuit (sing. Inuvialuk; ''the real people'') or Western Canadian Inuit are Inuit who live in the western Canadian Arctic region. They, like all other Inuit, are descendants of the Thule who migrated eastward from Alaska. Their homelan ...

communities of Paulatuk,

Sachs Harbour Sachs Harbour (, ) is a hamlet located in the Inuvik Region of the Northwest Territories, Canada. Situated on the southwestern coast of Banks Island in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region, the population according to the 2021 census count was 103 p ...

and

Tuktoyaktuk Tuktoyaktuk , or ''Tuktuyaaqtuuq'' ( Inuvialuktun: ''it looks like a caribou''), is an Inuvialuit hamlet located in the Inuvik Region of the Northwest Territories, Canada, at the northern terminus of the Inuvik–Tuktoyaktuk Highway.Montgome ...

. Sallirmiutun was once the principal dialect of the Mackenzie River delta, nearby parts of the coast and

Arctic Ocean The Arctic Ocean is the smallest and shallowest of the world's five major oceans. It spans an area of approximately and is known as the coldest of all the oceans. The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) recognizes it as an ocean, ...

islands, but the number of speakers fell dramatically following outbreaks of new diseases in the 19th century and for many years Sallirmiutun was believed to be completely extinct. It was only in the 1980s that outsiders realised that it was still spoken. Sallirmiutun means "the language of the people of the coast" referring to the

Beaufort Sea The Beaufort Sea (; french: Mer de Beaufort, Iñupiaq: ''Taġiuq'') is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean, located north of the Northwest Territories, the Yukon, and Alaska, and west of Canada's Arctic islands. The sea is named after Sir Fran ...

. It is the original dialect of the people from

Kitigaaryuit Kitigaaryuit (also spelled Kittigazuit) is a historic Inuvialuit settlement in Canada's Northwest Territories. It was the traditional territory of the Kitigaaryungmiut band of Inuvialuit. The site, which is situated near the junction of the Ma ...

. It is one of the three dialects, along with Kangiryuarmiutun and

Uummarmiutun Uummarmiutun (), Uummaġmiutun or Canadian Iñupiaq is the variant of Iñupiaq (or Inuvialuktun) spoken by the Uummarmiut, part of the Inuvialuit, who live mainly in the communities of Inuvik and Aklavik in the Northwest Territories of Canada ...

, of

Inuit language The Inuit languages are a closely related group of indigenous American languages traditionally spoken across the North American Arctic and adjacent subarctic, reaching farthest south in Labrador. The related Yupik languages (spoken in wester ...

grouped together under the label ''Inuvialuktun''. In fact, the word Inuvialuktun, meaning "the language of the real people" is a Sallirmiutun dialect word.

Phonology

The following is the phonology of the Siglitun dialect:

Vowels

* Vowel sounds /i u/ can have allophones heard as

Consonants

Vocabulary comparison

The comparison of some animal names in the Siglitun dialect of Inuvialuktun language and Uummarmiutun dialect of the Iñupiatun language:Inuvialuit Settlement Region – TK Study, August 2006
/ref>

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Siglitun Agglutinative languages Inuvialuit languages Indigenous languages of the North American Arctic Inuktitut words and phrases