Great little snapshot of how iskum ≠ tl’ap
When I was a younger learner of Chinuk Wawa, you can bet I had a heck of a time getting ‘get’.
What does Sephora have to do with Chinook Jargon?
(Image credit: Sephora of course)
The dang ol’ English-speaker-oriented dictionaries from The Day had a habit of telling you quite a few Jargon words meaning ‘get’:
- t’ɬáp (that’s tl’ap in Northern spelling)
- ískum
- cháku (chako)
- q’úʔ (k‘o’)
- etc.
Being a fan of maximally simple solutions, I went to grad school & did my Linguistics PhD to figure out this language.
One point that I teach all the time now is about those first 2 words in the list:
t’ɬáp ≠ ískum.
They’re definitely not synonyms, because t’ɬáp is out of your control ‘getting’, & ískum is by your choice ‘getting’.
Here’s a nice short example where both are used, and the difference comes out clearly:
Mosis chako, pi iaka mitlait kanamokst
‘Moses came there, and stayed with’ukuk tilikom, pi iaka iskom iht Shitro
‘those people, and took one of Jethro’s’iaka tanas, iaka nim Sifora, pus iaka
‘children, named Sephora (Zipporah), to be his’kluchmin; pi iaka tlap kopa iaka mokst
‘wife; and by her he had two’tanas, iaka mamuk nim iht Shirson,
‘children; he named one Gershon’pi iht iaka nim Iliisir.
‘and one Eliezer.’
— which is from Kamloops Wawa #202 (September 1902), page 151
Of course you understand, don’t you, that Moses ‘getting’ ~ ‘taking’ Sephora as his wife was a matter of his choosing.
And his ‘getting’ ~ ‘having’ kids with her was a matter of good luck.
𛰅𛱁𛰃𛱂 𛰙𛱁𛱆𛰅𛱁 𛰃𛱄𛰙𛰃𛱄𛰙? qʰáta mayka tə́mtəm?
kata maika tumtum? Qu’en penses-tu?
What do you think?
And can you say it in Chinuk Wawa?
Hey! It’s free! Teach Yourself northern-dialect Chinook Jargon! Free, I say!
And join free Zoom sessions…
Contact me for the Zoom link.
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