DCHP-2

north of 60 north of sixty, North of 60 DCHP-2 (July 2016)

• n. — Geography

  the area north of the sixtieth parallel north, comprising the Yukon Territory, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut.

  Type: 5. Frequency — The term evolved from its use in navigation as a reference to latitude (see, e.g. the 1821 quotation by Captain James Cook in which he refers to Pacific North America). The expression has become lexicalized, that is, "degrees of latitude" is dropped from the phase as understood. Chart 1 shows the term's dominance in Canada. In the light of Canada's status as an Arctic nation (see Grace 2007 for a historical-cultural account of the impact of the notion of "north" on Canada's development), this boundary has acquired important cultural salience, so much so that a 1990s TV series was named after the term. DCHP-1 lists 19 noun compounds beginning in Arctic, such as Arctic officer, which is linked below.
  See also COD-2, s.v. "north of 60", which is marked "Cdn informal", and OED-3, s.v. "north"(1.d 'north of 60'), which is marked "Canad. colloq.".

  See also: Arctic officer  south of 60  nordicity  49th parallel  

  • Although north of 60 may seem to some as quite informal, the expression is a quite well established standard variant in Canadian English.