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<DIV><FONT color=#800080>It was great to see Carolyn Q at the Osage Iroshka
Society Dances last weekend. The weather was reasonable. Always a
blessing there to be had.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080>Last year, I learned that the Osage Language Committee
decided to invent a new writting system to express sounds not in English,
which will be "easier" for the children and adults learning Wazhazhi. At
the Saturday noon feast of theDrumKeeper Cameron LookOut on the 24th June,
(the grandson to Moogri LookOut, the main Osage teacher), there
were plastic glasses and napkin setting which held an inscription in
Osage. Last year, I could read the entire passage. This year, they
have advanced their new writting systems with more characters/ symbols.
The first word read or spelled out was:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080>W (an inverted "V")(a period)(what looks like a
3-pronged hay fork)(inverted "V") O (a period) L (an inverted half circle) (a
hatchek).</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080>Together with Ardeena Moore, Osage & Quapaw
speaker and independent O&Q teacher, who attended the SxCaLangLingConf last
year at Kaw Nation, we determined that this first word was:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080>"Waxakolin" = People in the Thorny Thicket. (CURRENT
PRONUNCIATION)</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080>[LaFlesche Dictionary, p207
"Waxa'gaugthiN"]</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080>Ardeena said she received the study book and CD of the
system and would "try" to understand it, but in her opinion.... it was nice that
they were inventing a non-historical orthography, but did not believe it would
be successfull unless the children were immerged regularly and consistantly in
the script. She herself would continue to write, building on the
already known English Roman letters, which her students would more readily
understand. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080>Neither she nor I attempted to wade thru the rest of
the undeciphered characters which beared a resemblance to Cherokee
syllabary.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800080>Jimm</FONT></DIV>
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