What makes her TikTok?

TikTok influencer and pop singer-songwriter, Brenda Montana, explores the ups and downs of social media content creation

Brenda Montana poses for a photo to use as her profile picture on her TikTok account, @inuksuk.

By Kendra Seguin

“Wipe, wipe, wipe it down, wipe.” Those are the words that played over and over again as social media influencer and singer-songwriter, Brenda Montana, filmed her very first TikTok video. It was May 2020 and Montana had been an avid TikTok watcher for over a year; though, she had never posted videos of her own. When she saw the “Wipe It Down” challenge trending on her “For You” page, she had an idea that sparked her start on the platform. 

“I wanted to try it out and make it a culture thing,” said Montana.

Like others who participated in the challenge, the video starts with a sweatshirt-clad Montana spraying her mirror with cleaner and wiping it down. During one of the wipes, Montana’s reflection is suddenly wearing a different outfit. Now, she sports a black and white atigi and traditional Inuit tattoos, showcasing her Inuit culture. 

Unknown to Montana at the time, this video set a precedent for the type of content she would be known for by over 120,000 followers just two years later. 

TikTok is a popular social media platform that launched worldwide in 2018, after merging with the now-defunct platform, musical.ly. The app is known for its short videos and simple editing software that allows users to add trending music, text captions, and unique filters to their content with ease. TikTok received a surge of downloads during the Covid-19 pandemic, making it one of the biggest social media platforms today. 

Like the YouTubers, Viners, and Instagram influencers of the past decade, TikTok has launched careers for a number of content creators, known as TikTokers. Everyday people – whether they are talking to their camera, editing together a video montage of their summer memories, or lip-syncing to a popular “audio” – can find success through the platform. Because every TikTok user has a curated “For You” page feed, videos have the chance to make their way to the “right” viewers, potentially gaining thousands and millions of engagements. 

Montana remembers the very first time she went viral on TikTok. Although she was slowly gaining likes and followers through her first few videos, it was not until a post on August 21, 2020 that her account, @inuksuk, had its big break.

In the video, Montana prepares maktaaq, a traditional Inuit food (also called “country food”) that consists of whale blubber and skin. She and her sister sit on the floor to cut the maktaaq, while Montana’s father stands back to watch – the video’s caption says that he “hates the smell.”

The video made its rounds on TikTok and once it hit 10,000 likes, Montana said that she felt like she had gone viral. Currently, the video has over 41,000 likes and 200 comments. 

“I felt like it was a big accomplishment,” started Montana. “Until I did the throat singing video and I ended up getting a lot of views on that.”

Montana was referencing her most popular video on TikTok. In it, she uses the “duet” feature to appear side-by-side with a video by TikToker and pop singer, Bella Poarch, who is bobbing her head to a banjo beat. Poarch’s original video, which today stands at over 200 million views and 18 million likes, became a popular video to duet in late August and September 2020.

“It was a trend at the time – there were people who were yodeling with the song and doing metal,” recalls Montana. “I wanted to try [adding] throatsinging.”

Montana remembers the video took off quickly. 

“I went to use the washroom and I came back to my phone, and I already had 5000 likes,” she said. “I was like, ‘‘What, already?’”

Today, the video has over 1.2 million views and 260,000 likes.

Montana said that she suspects the high engagement of her videos is a result of people rarely seeing aspects of Inuit culture, such as throatsinging and country food, represented. 

“A lot of people haven’t seen Inuit eat raw food so [the maktaaq video] got a lot of comments,” she said. 

Reading and responding to TikTok comments have become a big part of Montana’s life online.

In the comment section of the maktaaq video, Montana heard from fellow Inuit who enjoy eating maktaaq, non-Inuit who are interested in trying, people with questions about the food, and haters.

“I have a few comments where people are disgusted about what we’re eating,” said Montana.

She said that she notices a difference between somebody genuinely curious about Inuit culture and somebody who intends to spread hate. 

“If somebody’s commenting and they don’t mean it disrespectfully, they usually say ‘I’m sorry, I don’t mean to cause any offense,” she explained.

Because she receives a high influx of questions and comments on her videos, Montana’s TikTok page has gone beyond being a comedy and lifestyle account. It is also a place for education. Through the video reply feature, Montana has answered questions about eating raw meat, learning to throatsing, and Inuit identity. Regardless of the nature of the original comments, Montana always maintains an upbeat personality in her responses.

“Growing up, I’m used to responding kindly to other people even if they’re being mean,” said Montana. 

Looking past the negative comments, Montana said that most of her comments meet her with kindness. 

“[People] say, ‘Wow, that’s so cool! Thank you for sharing! I’m glad we’re Inuk,’” she said.

By being proudly Inuk online, Montana has been a source of representation, education, and inspiration for Inuit and non-Inuit followers alike. 

“I think it’s really important to share our knowledge and our language with people to keep other people educated and for them to learn our culture,” said Montana. 

“It’s important to do that to keep it alive.”