I. Hancock re "Saibashi" in Canadian Japanese

[Ros' Haruo]

>From: "David D. Robertson" <ddr11 at COLUMBIA.EDU>
>Reply-To: "David D. Robertson" <ddr11 at COLUMBIA.EDU>
>To: CHINOOK at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG
>Subject: I. Hancock re "Saibashi" in Canadian Japanese
>Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2003 01:04:49 -0400
>
>Dear kanawi-lhaksta,
>
>In his intriguing short piece titled "A Chinook Jargon Loanword in Canadian
>Japanese" (_American Speech_, vol. 44:231-232, 1969), Ian Hancock discusses
>the term <saibashi> referring to Canadian Indians.  He says it's "derived
>from the Chinook Jargon word <siwash> ['saiwaS]".
>
>Hancock notes too that the Japanese Canadians say the word entered the
>language due to Japanese fishermen's time spent working the BC coast.
>
>Near-synonyms offered are <dojin> "aboriginal" and <indian> from English.
>(Would that sound like [injian]?)

Might or might not. "di" in Japanese is normally pronounced [ji] (same as
"zi"), however it is possible to "force" the [di] pronunciation, and for
Japanese-speakers with some acquaintance with spoken English (this would
include most Japanese Canadians) the [di] will not be hard to produce,
though it will never occur in fully naturalized Japanese speech.

>The author says the "closest Japanese
>term to <saibashi> phonetically is <saibashiru> 'clever, precocious', and
>the possibility of folk-etymologizing cannot be discounted."
>
>On this last point I'd like to raise a question or two. -- Can anyone here
>speak authoritatively about Japanese?

Not authoritatively, certainly, but I can say something about it.

>-- By searching www.google.com, I've
>turned up 62 hits for <saibashi>, virtually all of which refer to long,
>thick Japanese chopsticks for cooking.  Is there any chance that Canadian
>Japanese has <saibashi> due to some sort of lexical interference from the
>Jargon and English term "stick (Indians)"?
>
>This seems a bit of a long shot, but the form of the Canadian Japanese word
>sets me to wondering; after all, isn't Japanese perfectly capable of
>pronouncing the Jargon word <saiwashi>, nearly identically with the
>Canadian English pronunciation?  In other words, I'd be interested to know
>what motivates the pronunciation <saibashi>.

I think you're right to call a derivation from "saibashi" in the chopstick
sense a long shot. Very long shot.

My guess is that the CJ pronunciation that the Japanese loan was taken from
used a slightly "stronger" w than is usual in English. By a stronger w I
mean one that could be perceived as a [v]. In Japanese "b" is the normal way
of realizing English "v" (e.g. <terebi> from "television"). Is it possible
that in some local forms of CJ the "w" was pronounced as a "v" or that v/w
were in nearly free alternation (as e.g. in Hawai'ian or Hindi)? After all,
the French underlying the CJ is a v (sauvage). I suppose it's even possible
that the true source of "saibashi" is Canadian French rather than CJ.

>Your thoughts would be good to hear...
>
>Best,
>
>--Dave

lilEnd


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