(Correct me if I''m off-base):
As far as I understand, Eskimo is a term that includes people living in Siberia, Russia, Canada, Greenland and Alaska. Inuit refers to a subgroup of Eskimo people in Canada and Greenland and also their specific language subgroup. If I remember correctly from college anthropology courses, the term Eskimo was somehow construed as meaning "raw eat meater", which could, quite naturally, be seen as offensive (sometimes I think that it all depends on who is doing the naming and what they mean by it. e.g. the n-word can mean vastly different things depending on WHO is speaking and WHOM they''re referring to, as anyone who listens to popular music will notice). Therefore, most of those who speak Inuit prefer to be called Inuit, not Eskimo. Certainly there are good reasons for positioning oneself away from a term that is popularly perceived as derogatory. There are others who speak a different language and prefer to be called Eskimo (I think they''re Alaskan, not Canadian, so, different regions, too). The term Eskimo is also something that the French explorers "gave" to the people already living in northern North America before it was then named "Canada" et al. All of this name-calling and re-naming speaks to the still persistent issues of colonialism and the writing of history.
I think names are very powerful things, and if they want to be known as Inuit, then that''s fine. But, the dictionaries still stress that Eskimo is an overarching term that can be used to reference the larger group of people. Whether the term Eskimo is considered derogatory in this context, I dunno. It''s like the term Caucasian, which refers to the Caucasus people (central eastern Europe, mountain range, etc) but was also used by some Americans to express whiteness or European origins and has been slowly phased out in common usage.
Anyway! I have a Canadia diamond that I purchased from an American jeweler who is very active in promoting conflict-free mining and production in Africa and Burma. I heard that companies like Tiffany and DeBeers have been buying shares in Canadian companies, though, and the Kimberly Process, which has been touted as a guarantee to assuage consumer concerns, is self-regulated, so who knows whether promises are really being kept or they are truly held accountable. Also, many Canadian mined diamonds are cut and polished elsewhere, which could lead to concern over the ethics of diamonds. I think there is no magic solution to conflict-free diamonds because everything gets so entangled in the process. Canada definitely promotes itself as a producer of guaranteed conflict-free diamonds, but it seems from what I''ve read that not all Canadian diamonds are the same in terms of mining conditions (are the workers being exploited?), cutting, polishing, share-holders, etc.
None of this really has anything to do with the original question, I know! I''m really interested in etymology and the construction of identity/ethnicity, so I couldn''t resist replying to the last few posts.
