Inuit Culture Research Paper

This research paper examines the influence the Moravian missionaries had on the Inuit culture. The main goal for the Moravian missionaries was to spread Christianity among the Inuit in Labrador. Over the course of the past two hundred years the missionaries succeeded in doing so. They helped improve the Inuit culture from all the hardships that was faced because mainly of the land in Labrador. This paper includes a lot of history about the Moravian missionaries because they are the ones who introduced a new way of life for the Labrador Inuit and besides archaeologists- they are the ones who documented much of the history about the Labrador Inuit.
The Inuit
According to the “Canadian Encyclopedia,” the Labrador Inuit are direct descendants
By 1628, the people who were members left Bohemia and Moravia and went into hiding or they left for Poland. In Poland, the members of the Brethren were treated and faced with the same harassment because of their religious beliefs. One of the reasons why the members of the Brethren were treated so badly, could simply be from ignorance. The Roman Catholics and others probably didn’t understand what the Brethren was about and that scared them, the other people probably thought that there wasn’t any other way to be Christian. But, in Poland, there was a Bishop of the Brethren- John Amos Comenius. This Bishop wrote a book in 1660 which included the history of the Brethren church and the teachings (Moravian Church). The Unity of the Brethren began to fade away in Bohemia and Moravia. But the Unity began to rise after a converted Roman Catholic, Christian David suggested the Unity should move to Germany “where they would have freedom to worship God according to their old ways” (Moravian Mission 11). And so they did move to Saxony, Germany with the help of man called Ludwig von Zinzendorf. The members built a town in which they called “Herrnhut.” The town consisted of 300 people around 1727, some who were of different backgrounds, that seemed impossible for everyone to get along, until the people seen the Holy Spirit during a Holy Communion and
The Inuit were encouraged to go to church. The missionaries also selected chapel servants. One of the ways the missionaries used to help get the Inuit learning their beliefs was through music. Over time the missionaries had a hymn book and the New Testament translated into Inuktitut. It was within the church that the Inuit and missionaries developed a musical culture. The Moravian missionaries didn’t well document Inuit old music traditions because they believed a lot of it had to do with their old spiritual beliefs. In “Musical Traditions of the Labrador Coast” Maija M Lutz explains that traditional Inuit music has not been studied by other because many people believe that the Inuit’s music isn’t traditional in a sense that the music is just borrowed ideas and practices of the white man influences from the Moravian missionaries (Lutz). Yes, this is mostly true, but the Moravian missionaries introduced a whole new lifestyle to the Inuit, and the Inuit took the ideas and practices and made them apart of the Inuit culture. Lutz explains many important things in her book. One conclusion I made while reading was that, out of the few people of whom wrote about music among the Inuit, for how much the Inuit enjoyed singing and playing music, that other people have not often talked much about it. Lutz covers what she can, but she explains that there aren’t really many accounts on the Inuit’s