Canadian English

1. Canadian English LING 202, Fall 2007 Dr. Tony Pi Week 8 - Dialects: The West

6. Ky-OAT-ee or KY-oat? Controversy in Toronto about the proper pronunciation of the word ‘coyote’ • Torontonians: Ky-OAT-ee • Westerners: KY-oat or KY-oot (Northern Alberta) - claims this is the ‘Canadian’ pronunciation BUT • Origins actually from Nahuatl (Aztec) ‘coyotl’ > co-yo-te (Spanish) • borrowed into southwestern US English in early 1800s • both pronunciations American

7. Bungi/Bungee 1779—letter from Sturgeon River Fort: “This goes to inform you of Five Indians that Arrived Here Last Night, Three Natives of the Land and two Bungees or Sauteux [= Saulteaux] Belonging to Carriboes Head.” (quoted by Stobie 1967-68, p. 66) Scots and Cree • Speakers are descendants of mixture of Cree, Orkney, Scottish, and Salteaux/French

8. Hudson’s Bay • origins in forts on Hudson’s Bay around 1730s-40s • Hudson’s Bay Company originally hired mainly Highlanders or Western Isles who spoke Gaelic rather than Scottish English • Orkneymen (Scottish English) employed after 1740s also contributed to Scottish sounds around the bay • Cree Indians acquired Scots-English as a result • children of mixed blood became common • the Company ordered women and children to be addressed only in English

9. Where Bungi Spoken • Languages heard • English, French, Gaelic, Chippewa, Cree spoken by large sections of the trading post communities • Emergence of Bungi • English dialect emerging from union of Scots and Indians, for whom English was a second language • inter-marriage resulted in chidren who learned the dialect • Where Bungi heard • Along old trade routes and from Lower Fort Garry to mouth of the Red River

10. Red River Settlement Victor P. Lytwyn, from Blain thesis, p. xiii

11. Phonology of Bungi • rhythm (lilting cadence) • syllable stress (equal in canoe or bannock) • marked pause between syllables (as in sum-mer, win-ter) that is characteristic of Cree • consonants and vowels • southern Bungi (Plains Cree influence) • affricates common in Swampy Cree lost • shawl > sawl, picture > pitser, judge > dzudz • no distinction between p/b, t/d, k/g (same in Cree and Gaelic) • dog > dock • vowel in lake and plate closer to e in pepper • vowel in man sounds more like mon • boat has two syllables • willows along the river > wullows along the ruvver

12. Syntax of Bungi • Freer use of demonstratives • ‘that beer shouldn’t come first; that education should come first’ • pronoun ‘he’ (Cree influence) • used for corporate entities • “the government, he”; “the Hudson Bay, he” • used for women • “my daughter, he”; “my wife, he” • unlike English (masculine, feminine, neuter), Cree only has (living, unliving) distinction

13. Vocabulary of Bungi • Mostly disappeared • Scots dialect expressions • “to think long”: to yearn for • “whatever”: common interjection • “slock”: put out a light or fire • Cree influence • “new chee!”: Cree greeting ‘wachiyi!’ mistaken for ‘what cheer!’ - greeting New Year • “keeyam”: never mind • “chimmunk”: hollow splash when a stone falls perpendicularly in the water from a height • “apeechequanee”: head over heels

14. Indian Influence on BC English • Native Indian influence on BC English • fish • sockeye < Salish suk-tegh ‘red fish’ • chinook / quinnat = king salmon (Alaska) • spring salmon (BC term) • chum = dog salmon or keta • coho < Interior Salish (?) = fall fish / silver salmon (US) • kokanee < Interior Salish • Indian life • grease trails (for transporting valuable oil of the candlefish between the coast and the Interior Indians

15. Chinook Jargon • language once spoken along the Pacific coast from Alaska to the mouth of the Columbia River • auxiliary trade language • not a first language

16. Shrouded Origins • some think Chinook Jargon existed before white traders as a trade language between Indian tribes, while others think the Jargon was spread by white traders • Sources of Chinook Jargon • Chinook language as base • words from Nootka (west coast Vancouver Island) • Salish, Kwakiutl • English and French • Chinese • Russian • Polynesian language of Hawaii

17. Basics of Chinook Jargon • restricted use • extremely simple grammar • almost no inflections • number to indicate plural, or repetition of a word • no tenses • time inferred from context or by adverbs like alta ‘now’ or alki ‘soon’ • words can function as any part of speech • meaning can change depending on word order • limited vocabulary • Chinook nation provided half of ~500 words in the Jargon • basic terms and structure words (numerals, pronouns, interrogatives • catch-all preposition: ‘kopa’ - to, for, by, from, etc.

18. skookum ‘big, strong’ chuck ‘water’ saltchuck ‘ocean’ klahowya ‘hello’ or ‘goodbye’ tyee ‘chief’ or ‘huge salmon’ tillicum ‘people’ or ‘person’, extended to ‘friend’ kin chotsch-men ‘King George Men’ = Hudson’s Bay Company traders Boston-men ‘Americans’ passioks ‘French traders/blanket men’ potlatch ‘give’ Chinook Jargon Vocabulary

19. English/French roots capo ‘coat’ Mah-sie ‘thanks (merci)’, ‘pray/prayer’ la puss ‘cat’ book boat cole ‘cold’ mama cosho ‘pig (couchon)’ Onomatopoeia tik-tik ‘watch/telegraph’ poo ‘shoot’ tumtum ‘heart’, ‘emotion’, ‘love’ chik-chick ‘wagon, wheel’ Chinook Vocabulary II

20. Indians f, r difficult f > p r > l or omitted fish > pish coffee > caupy courir (run) > couley v > w -dge > -tsh sauvage > Siwash n, -ing, d often omitted handkerchief > hak-at-shum Europeans tl (velar clucking) tlicum > tillicum klkwu-shala > salal (evergreen shrub) Adapting Jargon Sounds

21. siwash cocho ‘Indian pig = seal’ hyas mowitch ‘big deer = moose’ hyas Sunday = ‘holiday’ skookumchuck ‘strong water = rapids’ colechuck ‘cold water = ice’ cultus coulee ‘useless run = stroll with no set destination’ go klatawa ‘to go visit a special place’ cultus potlatch ‘a little gift of no value, and nothing expected in return’ Creativity with Jargon

22. opitsah ‘knife’ opitsah sikh ‘knife friend = fork’ hyack ‘hurry = volunteer firefighter’ skookum tumtum ‘strong heart = courage’ Saghalie Tyee ‘chief above = God’; Sockalee yaka book ‘his book = Bible’ Causative verbs mamook ‘to fish/do/make’ mamook tumtum ‘make up one’s mind, decide, plan’ sick tumtum ‘to be sorry, feel sad’ cultus mamook ‘to do wrong, do something badly’ mamook kumtux ‘make understand = to teach’ Gesture and intonation siah ‘far’; sia-a-a-ah ‘far, far away’ Jargon Metaphors

23. Meanings change hyas muckamuck ‘big food’ or ‘plenty to eat’ England > high muckamuck ‘derogatory term for leaders of society’ Chinook southwest wind in Oregon, Washington, BC, Alberta > warming and drying wind Siwash ‘Indian’ verb meaning sleep without shelter ‘to siwash’ > to be interdicted (from buying alcoholic drink) Cowichan sweaters skookum everything is skookum ‘satisfactory’ skookum house ‘jail’ Borrowings by Other Languages

24. klootchman ‘woman’ > klootch ‘any Indian woman living common-law with a white man’ then klootchman became the man living this way English word-formaton rules saltchuck ‘sea’ > saltchucker ‘someone who fishes in the sea for sport’ > chucker Changes to Chinook Terms

25. Mamaloos Island ‘dead/to die’ Canim Lake ‘canoe’ Skookumchuck Cultus Lake ‘worthless, bad’ Siwash Rock Chickamin Mountain ‘metal/money’ Tyee Lake Mowitch ‘deer’ Mesachie ‘evil’ Chinook Jargon in Place Names