They are compiling a veritable canon of Inuit folklore. There is the story of the north Baffin hunter who travelled to the fabled shadow world and lived among the tarriaksuit, taking one of their women for his wife. There are stories of sickness and starvation that date to the turn of the century, strange accounts of mysterious giant caribou, tales of premonitions, cautionary tales, and lots of advice on how to hunt successfully. It will be just like going to college. The project is part of a national effort by the CBC to salvage select recordings stored in bureaus across the country.
Time is the archivists' chief enemy.
Regular audio tape recordings only last 20 years or so before their quality begins to deteriorate. The tape itself can eventually become too brittle to withstand playback. In addition to transferring the recordings to DAT format, information on each new tape is being sorted and catalogued in CBC's central computer database. The computer archives will also make it easier for CBC to answer requests from educators and academics who wish to use the tapes in their own studies of language and dialect use. An Inuk who is working on a project in Ottawa might, once we're done, be able to go to the CBC and say, 'I'm looking for stories about bowhead whales, I'm doing a school project' or whatever, and we would have access to some of that kind of stuff.