Count and mass nouns in Chinuk Wawa
There are two kinds of nouns, in every human language I know of. They can be distinguished as items (what linguists call “count nouns”) vs. substances (“mass nouns”).
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R.I.P. to a Seattle fella known for his “Klahowya!”
In the Pacific Northwest, there are folks known for their love of Chinuk Wawa…
Idioms/compounds headed by íkta
I often note the rule that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree in Chinuk Wawa.
‘Chehalis’ is Chinookan — and therefore CW?
The Natítanui language, as spoken by Q’lti, and preserved in the 1894 “Chinook Texts”, gives us clues about Chinuk Wawa’s history.
‘Going to the chief’s house’ in Kamloops slang
We keep on finding Chinuk Wawa speakers expressing a lot of humour, back in the day…
1904: Riot at Nootka, and echoes of Sir James Douglas!
Settler readers understood the Chinuk Wawa argument reported below without translation…
1916: Chinook as a wartime code language…again
I’ve previously shown that the Jargon was a useful code in more than one wartime setting, including for both blue- and greycoats in the US Civil War, and for Canuck troops in WW1…
Circa 1860: Remember Victoria’s queer Chinook town crier?
Victoria, BC was already old enough in 1924 that folks indulged in nostalgia about Chinuk Wawa…
1853-54, Puget Sound: Lt. William P. Trowbridge diary
William Petit Trowbridge (1828-1892), my fellow Columbia University Lion, did some coastal surveying work in the Pacific Northwest during the frontier era.
El Comancho’s Washington, DC newspaper column on Chinook Jargon (3 of 6)
To the list of fun research we can do once Covid-19 restrictions go away, add “find the full archives of the Washington Star“…