With the thermometer locked up at 45 below zero, it might not seem like much of a prize. But to the Inuit, or Eskimos, this land in the Northwest region of Canada is a place they have always called home. And now they can finally point to themselves on a map. At midnight, as Thursday became Friday, a new territory was born in Canada: Nunavut. Roughly the size of Western Europe, the land used to be part of Canada's Northwest Territories. The creation of the new territory represents a gesture by the Canadian government to balance the books with its native population. Nunavut has an Inuit majority and will be nominally ruled by a native government, although Ottawa still calls the shots on the big things. While some Canadians have opposed Nunavit, arguing that the only thing it creates is a spirit of racial tribalism, the territory's new governors insist that they intend to represent all residents equally.
A New Homeland
With the thermometer locked up at 45 below zero, it might not seem like much of a prize. But to the Inuit, or Eskimos, this land in the Northwest region of Canada is a place they have always called home. And now they can finally point to themselves on a map. At midnight, as Thursday became Friday, a new territory was born in Canada: Nunavut. Roughly the size of Western Europe, the land used to be part of Canada's Northwest Territories. The creation of the new territory represents a gesture by the Canadian government to balance the books with its native population. Nunavut has an Inuit majority and will be nominally ruled by a native government, although Ottawa still calls the shots on the big things. While some Canadians have opposed Nunavit, arguing that the only thing it creates is a spirit of racial tribalism, the territory's new governors insist that they intend to represent all residents equally.
