Didactic dialogues in CW dictionaries, part 7A: Shaw’s “examples” (1st installment; a Boas mystery!)
A big goal in my examination of the “didactic dialogues” that some Chinuk Wawa (Chinook Jargon) dictionaries used to present is this: to help you see which ones are the most useful.
So you can talk pretty one day.
(All installments in this mini-series.)
Image credit: Amazon
I’ll remind you that this mini-series has the purpose of showing full SENTENCES in Chinuk Wawa — SENTENCES that were used by the old dictionary makers to demonstrate how the language really works.
So I won’t be featuring mere interesting phrases, which definitely abound in those dictionaries.
Let’s start off our look into George Coombs Shaw’s contribution, a book titled “The Chinook Jargon and How to Use It“…
Page 2:
- Nika kumtuks. ‘I understand.’
nayka kə́mtəks. - Nika kumtuks alta. ‘I understand now.’
nayka kə́mtəks álta.
In actual use, it usually feels very odd to me to place the time Adverb at the end of the sentence like this. It’s more of a Settler usage. Here, having alta at the end does work, in the context of someone having been attempting to figure out what was going on until this moment. - Nika kumtuks ahnkuttie. ‘I understood.’
nayka kə́mtəks ánqati.
Same comment about weird Adverb placement as above. It’s harder for me to take this particular sentence as being natural, because anqati imparts the feeling of ‘I used to know’, which I think is something I’d rarely say. - Nika kumtuks alki. ‘I will understand; I will understand by and by; I will understand after a while.’
nayka kə́mtəks áłqi.
Same comment as with the 2 preceding sentences. Definitely a strange sentence, even though it’s technically grammatical. Something like “Me Talk Pretty One Day”! - Alki nika klatawa. ‘I will go presently.’
áłqi nayka łátwa. ‘I’ll go eventually.’
This is a much more normal way to talk Jargon. - Alki nesika klatwa kopa nika boat. ‘Soon we will go in my boat.’
áłqi nsayka łátwa kʰupa nayka pút. - Nika skookum alta. ‘I am strong now.’
nayka skúkum álta.
You might say this upon recovering from being sick. - Mika kumtuks Boston wawa? ‘Do you understand English?’
mayka kə́mtəks bástən-wáwa?
Bonus fact:
Page 2 also carries a mysterious quotation attributed to the great anthropological linguist Franz Boas, telling us that the word:
“Sister[“] is used on Puget
Sound. Sister yaka tenas klootchman,
-a niece.”-Boas. (The word Ats is
becoming obsolete.)
We already know very well that sista is the usual word in the Northern Dialect, so that’s not the unexpected thing here.
Instead, I’m fascinated that I can’t seem to track down where Boas said (in print) any such a thing about the Jargon! Was this in a personal letter to GC Shaw?
It certainly matches what Boas himself documented of BC Coast Chinook Jargon.
