Rock and rap from Greenland: The language and culture are experiencing a renaissance, also through the means of pop culture

In Greenland, forced modernization, uprooting, and Danization of the school system characterized the decades after World War II. From 1964 to 1991, a law ensured that civil servants of Danish birth were paid more than their Greenlandic colleagues. Greenlanders feared losing their language and culture; they were forced to abandon their identity without being recognized as equals by the Danes.

This was the birth of Greenlandic rock. The first album in Greenlandic, titled "Wohin," was a huge success in 1973. The cover features a woodcut from 1860: an Inuk has just struck down the last Viking and chopped off his arm.

Sume—as the band was called—revitalized the shamanic drum, which had been suppressed by the Norwegian missionary Hans Egede. Egede had annexed Greenland for the Danish crown in 1721. According to a Nuuk university thesis, Sume's lyrics were of great importance for the "revival of a nuanced and independent Greenlandic language." Sume incorporated phrases like "Aajai ja aai aajaa aa" into his songs, which the Inuit had used in drumming. These became sound symbols of Greenlandic identity.

Today, rapper Tarrak follows in Sume's footsteps. As a 15-year-old student in Denmark, he experienced racism and stigmatization. "That's how I realized I'm Greenlandic," he recently told a Danish TV station. His video "Tupilak" (2016) has been viewed 300,000 times—five times the population of Greenland. "The Danes feel superior to the Greenlanders," says Tarrak, and he raps: "We only succeed in school if we speak a language that isn't ours."

Although Greenlandic has been the sole official language since 2009, Danish is used for instruction at secondary schools, and Danish still holds a strong position in business and administration. "Our history was not written by us," says Tarrak. The Greenlanders, a people without books, pass on their culture orally. Many grew up watching Danish television, and their image of the good life is Danish. Tarrak wants to change that. He identifies with Inuit values. Inuit tattoos, which the missionary Egede once fought against, adorn his body. The bridge tattooed on his nose signals his closeness to the spirit world.

The rapper also takes issue with his fellow countrymen. The Danes "label us as drunks and nobodies." Indeed, according to Tarrak, some Greenlanders abroad act like drunks. "They make us look bad. / We return home broken, / considering ourselves worthless." "Greenlanders! Wake up! . . . We are Tupilak."

In ancient Greenland, a tupilak was a being with magical powers that a shaman would bring to life to deliberately harm someone, perhaps out of revenge or resentment. This was not without risk. If the victim possessed a powerful counter-spell, the tupilak would attack its own creator.

In the video, Tarrak raps in front of Egede's statue, which stands on a hill above the city of Nuuk. It was repeatedly doused with paint, even beheaded, and its crosier replaced with a whip. Before the 300th anniversary of Egede's Greenlandic conquest in 2021, a petition called for its demolition: "Let's sink it in the sea!" Another petition promoted "Greenland's Apostle," who brought Christianity to the island. After all, Nuuk citizens erected the monument to mark Egede's 200th birthday.

A referendum was called. With a turnout of 6.5 percent, the statue's defenders prevailed by 921 votes to 600, right in the middle of the summer holidays.