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see EskimoEskimo
, a general term used to refer to a number of groups inhabiting the coastline from the Bering Sea to Greenland and the Chukchi Peninsula in NE Siberia. A number of distinct groups, based on differences in patterns of resource exploitation, are commonly identified,
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Inuit (Eskimo)


In 1976, Joseph Bloom and Richard Gelardin conducted a study of the dreams of the Eskimo (Inuit) people in which a ghost or a spirit appeared. They noted this occurred most often when the dreamer was just falling asleep or just waking up. They were unaware of the widespread occurrence of hallucinating while in a state of semi-arousal and sleep paralysis. They recognized the Inuit experiences as nightmares and linked their sleep paralysis to Arctic hysteria, labeling both as “non-empirical.”

Dreams are an integral part of the Inuit shamanic tradition and are closely associated to the initiatory calling; dreams of dismemberment, death, and rebirth are thought to be a calling to the dreamer to become a shaman. In other instances, they are called, in the dream, by an animal spirit who possesses the dreamer. The dreamer then awakens and proceeds to wander naked through the wilderness, grappling with the spirit for control of the body. Eventually, the dreamer will gain control over the spirit—a victory they mark by the making of a drum—and once again return to their people and start the training as a shaman initiate.


, Innuit
any of several Native peoples of N America or Greenland, as distinguished from those from Asia or the Aleutian Islands (who are still generally referred to as Eskimos); the preferred term for Eskimo in N America
References in periodicals archive ?
She said, "True reconciliation will only be achieved if we as governments and citizens are willing to make a fundamental shift in our relationship with the First Nations, Metis and Inuit peoples of Alberta.
This is also the case for roughly 78 and 84 percent of Indian and Inuit people respectively.
During the same period that philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari first touted the potentials for people becoming-animal with a pack or a "demonic multiplicity" to topple the psychic subject of capitalism (241), Inuit people living along with their packs of sled dogs appear to have been similarly identified with danger by the agents of expanding market forces, only in their case such associations largely led to separation and consequent victimization by the state, respectively in the name of becoming enfranchised voters or immunized animals.
The Inuit people of Canada enjoyed virtually no political representation until 1965, when the first Inuk (singular of Inuit) was appointed to the governing council of the Northwest Territories.
The NIHB program provides coverage to eligible First Nations and Inuit people who are not insured by private or provincial plans.
In the Sixties, the local Inuit people abandoned their nomadic existence and formed communities around Hudson's Bay posts.
So the last leg of our trip faced a setback and our plans of meeting the Inuit people had to be called off.
For the Thule Inuit people of Greenland, however, there is a more powerful and important fifth element: ice.
1077) investigated whether blood mercury levels are linked to decreased plasma PONl activities in Inuit people who are highly exposed to MeHg through their seafood-based diet (n = 899).
The Canadian origin also adds a unique feature to the exhibit stations: You choose which language you want, English, French or Inuktitut, the language of the Inuit people who inhabit the Arctic regions.
We also see the lengths the Inuit people of Canada go to catch mussels, and we witness the desperate race against the tide to catch shellfish before the sea rushes in to claim them back.
The Inuit people have been known by what other name?