Wawa

[Nadja Adolf]

This is in English to try and prevent misunderstandings.

	[Maybe some people say Grand Ronde Wawa can make better speech, this
	"high tongue" - a name I use for it - and the skookum wawa/trade
	language/skokum hiyo/the Jargon, that is in all the country outside of
	Grand Ronde and the Chinook (Lower Columbia) Country, that this is not
	as good for making wawa.  I think that it is a different wawa, but the
	two can be mutually understood.  And be different!  And this other wawa
	is a good wawa, not a worse one than a better.]

Here's my personal view on the relationship between the trade language and
the Grand Ronde dialect; comments and corrections desired.

1) There were originally some differences in the jargon depending on
region according to some authors.

2) In most places the jargon fell out of use, or was secondary to other native
languages.

3) At Grand Ronde because of the original linguistic diversity, the Wawa
continued in use, and underwent Creolization to an extent. (The extent of
the Creolization isn't something I understand, but this is what appears
to have happened at GR according to what I understand "Creolization" to
mean from the linguistics book I've been reading.) This process has
given this form greater expressivity and more shades of meaning from
what I have seen - and indeed, I may not have seen enough to even know
what I'm talking about!

4) I have been using the term "ahnkuttie" for trade language jargon
because it appears as if it were one of the ancestral forms of the
jargon now spoken at GR. This may be a misunderstanding on my part.


I apologize if my calling the Modern Grand Ronde language "GR dialect" has
hurt anyone; but I don't know how else to differentiate it from the other
when discussing both forms.

5) I don't know quite what to do to help the jargon interested
buckskinner folk here in California; but suggestions would be
appreciated.

nadja