Category Archive: Chinook Jargon

“kʰíláy” for joy! We’ve found a relative of “kímtəks”!

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“Ocian in view! O the joy!” (image credit: US Mint) The idea that I want to share here comes from a train of thought that includes my previous post, kímtəks: not such a rarity,… Continue reading →

Charley Kahana, Kanaka-Salish fiddler (1865-1959)

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A good article at the Smithsonian Folkways website about early Pacific NW fiddlers includes some wonderful discussion of Charley Kahana.

Alphabetical order in Chinuk-Pipa a.k.a. Chinook-Peipa

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When you’ve been researching a subject for 30 years, there will be topics that you thought you had already told people about. But haven’t.

1909, WA: Jake Harding called quadrille dances in Chinook, in the frontier era

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“JAKE HARDING FIDDLED FOR FIRST DANCE IN SEATTLE”!

Who is going to record these precious old Chinook Jargon tunes? (Part 2 of 3)

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I’m not getting any younger, these songs won’t record themselves, and clichés won’t get the job done either!

NSFW! Valuable 1880’s BC naughty Chinook: The diaries of young Lou G Hare

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THIS IS INCREDIBLE. I meant to headline this as just “valuable”, but the “naughty” parts are in fact an exquisitely rare find. NSFW, nor for minors!

Could ‘lamprey eel’ be Proto-Salish in origin?

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Chinook Jargon’s skákʰwəl ‘lamprey eel’ is a weird-looking word, for having come from Chinookan languages.

BC: Misfiled: “new” Chinook hymns + the earliest Stó:lō manuscript

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An item at the Royal BC Museum filed as “Journal, Southern BC” ought in fairness to be described better.

Great little snapshot of how iskum ≠ tl’ap

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When I was a younger learner of Chinuk Wawa, you can bet I had a heck of a time getting ‘get’.

Mrs Ada Markishtum’s marked-up copy of a Chinook Jargon dictionary (Makah Tribe)

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A Makah woman contributed this treasure to posterity!