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<DIV>Bryan,</DIV>
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<DIV>Perhaps one might also gloss the Jiwere form as "makes speech clear" as in taking the confusion of an unknown tongue, and making it understood (or clear) to the listener. Still, that seems a different metaphor. Cross-sensory description (sight/hearing) is not the same as intelligence vs. stupidity... I liked Rory's comment about the potential innate bias in such a concept anyway, especially considering that individuals who Europeans might have once labeled "idiots" could be seen as possessing special qualities and different, rather than inferior "intelligence." And different elders commented about a mentally retarded individual that traditionally, such a person would be taught to do work or be "useful" to their abilities. Unfortunately the conversation was in English, and no Ioway or Otoe words were used in that context which might contribute to the discussion here. </DIV>
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<DIV>Where would we find a native speaker of a Siouan language who isn't potentially influenced by having the English metaphor already known in their bilingual speech repertoire???</DIV>
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<DIV>And just for curiosity, are there any other metaphors believed to be universal?</DIV>
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<DIV>For us, light/bright also equates good vs. dark/evil, and quick vs. slow can be mapped to wit instead of visible activity. </DIV>
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<DIV>Jill Greer</DIV>
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<DIV>>>> Bryan James Gordon <linguista@gmail.com> 2/22/2011 2:58 PM >>><BR></DIV>
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<BLOCKQUOTE style="BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; PADDING-LEFT: 1ex" class=gmail_quote><BR><BR><TT><FONT size=2>But since this is a Siouanist list, what about Siouan and other native North American languages? For Omaha, we have wazhiN-ska listed in the Stabler-Swetland dictionary for 'smart/intelligent', along with 'wise', 'knowledge', 'clever' and 'sober'. wazhiN seems to mean something like 'disposition', 'will', 'mentality' or 'anger', perhaps like the early Germanic meaning of /mood/. ska means 'white', and is also said to mean 'clear' or 'bright', although I've never been able to make that connection. So the term actually seems to mean something like "white-disposition", with the main implication of wisdom and sobriety of conduct, not so much what we're looking for here as the ability to grasp ideas quickly. No word is listed for 'stupid', and the closest I can get is 'foolish', which merges with groNriN, 'crazy', as the opposite of wisdom and sobriety.</FONT></TT> <BR></BLOCKQUOTE>
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<DIV>What if the -ska in wazhíⁿska is not the same as "white"? There are also other words, like tápuska, iyéska, which confer the impression that it might be nothing more than an agent-nominaliser, perhaps historically related to shkoⁿ "active/move/do" (which would go some way towards explaining the apparent part-cognate-part-loanword set hethúshka iróska ilóⁿska where some languages have s and others sh). I think I recall hearing some words in Macy that indicated a productive use of this suffix on verbal predicates that don't show any signs of taking -ska in either Dorsey or the Swetland-Stabler lexicon. I've even heard an interpretation of "pahaska" (Pawhuska) as meaning "person who stands forward" instead of "white head/scalp", although that might be a creative back-formation.</DIV>
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<DIV>On the other hand, however, the Báxoje word for translator is "ich^é brédhe" "speaks clearly", which hints that clarity if not colour may well have something to do with the semantics of this family of concepts. I think what we need is either luck in finding a section of discourse documented that confirms or rejects the hypothesis, or a native speaker who has the relevant intuition. </DIV>
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<DIV>- Bryan</DIV></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>