Eyeballing all recorded “Nootka Jargon” (pidginized Nuuchanulth of Vancouver Island, BC) and the earliest documented history of Chinook Jargon, I see an obvious difference…
Everyone was getting old.
A famously Lower Chinookan word could conceivably trace farther back to neighbouring Lower Chehalis Salish.
In the Northern Dialect (see afterward for a Southern Dialect comment),
Once we realize that in its earliest pidgin form (in Nootka Jargon), the famous Chinuk Wawa word kəmtəks / kumtuks / komtax lacked an “s” sound at the end, we can become enlightened.
For early Chinook Jargon history, it’s enormously significant to find virtually the same sentence spoken at about the same time, but 300 miles apart and by different ethnic groups.
Little people? (Image credit: Etsy) An interesting article from one of the only newspapers ever published in Haida Gwaii contrasts Chinook Jargon and Haida in one section: Children born of slaves were also… Continue reading →
My friend Beth is perhaps the best Chinuk Wawa teacher in the business.
Chinook Jargon was there. I lifted this from a recent Facebook post by the excellent Nicola Valley Museum & Archives in Merrit, BC. Enjoy! Happy Easter! Today we’ll take a look at the… Continue reading →
