Chinook Jargon

[Mike Cleven]

>Date: Fri, 06 Nov 1998 20:57:44 -0800
>To: R K Henderson <rkhen at SoftHome.net>
>From: Mike Cleven <ironmtn at bigfoot.com>
>Subject: Re: Chinook Jargon
>In-Reply-To: <19981106035740Z512892-29209+578 at smtp.on.rogers.wave.ca>
>
>At 07:30 PM 11/5/98 -0800, you wrote:
>>Hi Jim,
>>
>>I enjoyed your Chinook Web page. I'm a "native speaker" of Chinook,
>>having been taught it by my grandfather. These days I live in Chilliwack.
>>
>>The September 97 issue of True West magazine carried an article I wrote
>>on Jargon, just the basic stuff. I assume you have a copy of Melville
>>Jacobs? It's the most useful Jargon document I've found yet. Very
>>important pronunciation and dialectic info.
>>
>>Very nice to see Web presence for the old Jargon.
>
>Thanks for writing, and for your approval.
>
>By "native speaker" do you mean that you are a native, or simply that you
have spoken the Jargon since childhood?
>
>Would it be possible/feasible to publish the True West article on-line
(with permission and copyright/credits, of course)?  You can add it to my
website, or if you want to put it in your own website I will be glad to
furnish a link to it.
>
>I just spoke with Terry Glavin, another of our on-line Jargon community,
who told me he just met an 80 year old white man in Delta who is fluent in
the Jargon.  Although Ethnologue maintains that there are fewer than 100
Jargon speakers left in the BC-NW region, I think they're about to be
proven wrong if we can ferret everyone out - including yourself!  One of my
goals in the wake of our recent workshop in Mission is to see if we can
connect up all the various native/old-time Jargon speakers around BC and
the Northwest with each other, perhaps using the internet as the medium.
If everyone starts talking together again, it will encourage a lot of the
"closet" speakers (who can understand but won't speak), and also be a
valuable environment for those of us desirous of becoming fluent.
>
>You may be interested to know that our instructor from the Chinook Nation
in Oregon found it possible to be understood by elders in the Mission area
who did not attest to being Chinook _speakers_ but who had no problem
understanding him (he's in his 20s/early 30s).  There were also three
Sto:lo women from Chilliwack who took the workshop and were very
enthusiastic about propagating the Jargon within their community and
sharing it with others; if you like I can give you their names and numbers.
>
>I would have cc.'d this reply to our CHINOOK listserve, but didn't want to
do so unless you authorized it.  Please let me know if I can forward your
message to everyone else; also if you'd like to subscribe to the listserve
send an e-mail message to listserv at listserv.linguistlist.org with the
message content "subscribe chinook <youremailaddress>" (without quotation
marks or <> hatches).  There's quite an active discussion.....sometimes
actually in the Jargon.  Your input and participation will be more than
welcome.
>
>Sincerely,
>
>Mike Cleven
>North Vancouver
Mike Cleven
ironmtn at bigfoot.com
http://members.home.net/ironmtn/

The thunderbolt steers all things.
                           - Herakleitos