Aleut is an Eskimo-Aleut language spoken along the Aleutian Island chain of Alaska and islands off the coast of Siberia. Fewer than 500 people still speak this language today, while another 500 speak Alutiiq, a related but distinct language spoken further to the north. Speakers of both languages are referred to as "Aleuts" by the Americans and Russians, but while some Native Alaskan people do refer to themselves as Aleut, others prefer their native terms, Unangan ("The People") and Alutiiq. They have their own language with two dialects; the Unalaskan, spoken in the eastern Aleutian, Shunagin and Fox islands and the Auttan, spoken in the western Aleutian islands. First contact with these People occured in the eighteenth century when Russian fur traders introduced them to smallpox and influenza. Their estimated population was around 25,000. With the introduction of disease, slavery, interbreeding with Russians and wide-scale killing, it is difficult to determine their present population, or find full-blooded Aleuts and current estimates vary from 2000 to 8000. During WWII, there was a forced evacuation of the Aleutian Islands, further accelerating the decline of their traditions, culture and shamanistic way of life.
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