Monthly Archive: August, 2015

How to say “copy machine” in Chinuk Wawa

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(Just don’t say kaupy machine.)* Here is the moment when Chinook Jargon office work was born 🙂 As pictured above, issue #9 of the young Kamloops Wawa newspaper set several standards for the new literate culture that… Continue reading

A toast to the Queen in 2015

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I’d like to point you to someone else’s blog post, where he tells of deciding to make a traditional yearly toast to the Queen more reflective of BC’s history. Read Mike Scoretz’s “Chinook Jargon… Continue reading

Another new Chinook Jargon discovery confirmed: LAMALA for “bottle”

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LAMALA = “bottle”.  I’ve already blogged today on another subject, and I’ve already blogged about the word that’ll be in focus here — so this will be brief. Looking at issue #4 from… Continue reading

A map of Fraser River gold-rush placenames is illuminating

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In 2012, Andrew Nelson and Michael Kennedy published a good article in the highly readable journal, BC Studies, that they titled “Fraser River Gold Mines and Their Place Names”.  (BC Studies 172 (Winter 2011-2012):105-125.)  It comes… Continue reading

Proof of Chinuk Wawa use in brand-new Seattle

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This post is short and sweet to create: “New York Markook House“, the newspaper advertisement is headlined.  Seattle was originally called New York.  (The more distinctive “New New York” presumably was clunky!)  It… Continue reading

Cathlamet on the Columbia

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“Cathlamet on the Columbia: Recollections of the Indian people and short stories of the early pioneer days in the valley of the lower Columbia River“, by Thomas Nelson Strong (The Holly Press, Portland… Continue reading

A.C. Garrett’s lost Anglican manuscript in Chinook

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Chinook Jargon lore abounds with tales of lost resources.  There’s the pre-shorthand attempt to write CJ in Cree/Dene-style syllable symbols: Some 500 ‘books’ of such syllabic productions were said to have existed in the late… Continue reading

What do you call a meteorite in Chinook Jargon?

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Bobby, I don’t know (this is paraphrasing James Brown because we are talking about rock history), but whatsoever I call it, I got to make it “Tomanowas“.  Chinook Wawa history is stone soul… Continue reading