Ads and cultural references
We’ve seen a number of ads that used Chinook Jargon.
Image credit: DailyVerses.net
Also advertisements 🙂
Here’s more, thanks to our reader Alex Code.
This advert uses some frontier-era humour as well as one of the all-time basic Chinook Jargon survival phrases…
Josh Billings says: “With all your getting, get knowl- edge.” Solomon says, “Get Understanding.”
LEAVING YOU TO DECIDE WHICH YOU WOULD PREFER, WE WOULD ADD THAT THERE ARE PLENTY OF PLACES TOM OBTAIN THE FORMER, BUT GRANT & MACLURE’S IS THE PLACE TO OBTAIN THE LATTER. MIKA KUMTUX? dwje22to
— from the New Westminster (BC) Daily British Columbian of November 21, 1888, page 1, column 2
“Josh Billings” was the pen name of famous folksy funny man Henry Wheeler Shaw (1818-1885). Bonus fact: the darkly humorous true story of his death is told in Chapter 12 of John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row.
The reference to Solomon is as the generally understood author of Proverbs 4:5 in the Bible: “Get wisdom, get understanding; do not forget my words or turn away from them.”
Of course, mika kumtux? = maika kumtuks? in our BC teaching spelling, and mayka kəmtəks? in Grand Ronde spelling, and it means “Do you understand?”
