In Chinook, his name is Jim, not James.  Yup, it’s a street language 🙂 I don’t always get so technical here, but partly because I have linguists reading my site, today I will… Continue reading →

For its respectful and/or restrained treatment of an elder, and for its antiquity, I’m pleased with the following find of early rez-period Grand Ronde Chinuk Wawa. (Explanation: the S-word is used here, but it’s… Continue reading →

What’s your take on this?  Looks like we can add “Freemason secret language” to the file on Chinook Jargon as “oldtimer’s secret language”, as “code talk”, and as “ipsət wawa” (secret language)! A… Continue reading →

Chinook Jargon was not actually used very much in the Yukon Territory, despite the impressions you may have gathered from Jack London‘s using it for local colour. That’s why today’s Klondike gold rush-era… Continue reading →

<Harvey & Bailey. General Merchants, Ashcroft, B.C.> Tilikom klaska makuk haws kopa Ashkroft. The [Indian] people’s store in Ashcroft. — Kamloops Wawa #201 (June 1902), page 143

With today’s Chinook Jargon song “Lilly Dale”, I’m getting around to writing what I thought was just another doggerel bit, but turns out to be tangled in a heck of a web of… Continue reading →

A colorful firsthand telling of a dangerous scene by a girl who lived through it, to recount it in the fullness of her age. “This was about 1854”, Mrs Parker says, and she provides… Continue reading →

This pleasant antique piano is here to offset the unpleasant elements in the story that follows. “When Sheridan Was in Oregon” by Turner F[enner] Le(a)vens (Washington Historical Quarterly, July 1925 / 16(3):163-185). Levens/Leavens… Continue reading →

A Canadian Indigenous Thanksgiving, for my American readers. I’m grateful for our always growing community of Chinuk Wawa-Chinook Jargon speakers & learners!  

In news of a local version of one of the then-popular statewide annual reunions of “old Oregon” pioneers, we have this teaser:      George W. Dunn is the retiring president.  Rev. P.R.… Continue reading →