LL-L "Orthography" 2002.04.09 (10) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 09.APR.2002 (10) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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 A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian L=Limburgish
 LS=Low Saxon (Low German) S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic Z=Zeelandic (Zeeuws)
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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Language varieties

Lowlanders,

Recently, Father Andreas and I mentioned the Lumbee and their largely
Appalachian-based language variety:

I:
<quote>
Those of you who are interested in English, especially American,
dialects and Scottish and Irish as well as Native American influences on
them ought to check out the following online article published by North
Carolina State University:
"NC State University Sociolinguist Tracing Roots of Lumbee Language"
http://www2.ncsu.edu/ncsu/univ_relations/news_services/press_releases/98_11/374.htm
</quote>

Father Andreas:
<quote>
     Regarding the article on the Lumbee language pointed out so kindly
by Ron last week: the chief investigator is Dr Walt Wolfram, who has
done so much for the study of the Appalachian language.
     It is always encouraging to read such news, and to know that such
distinguished academics as he and Dr Michael Montgomery are giving their
time to the preservation of our language and culture.
</quote>

Further on this topic, you may be interested to discover more about the
histories, and cultures of the Lumbee and other Southern Appalachian
"Melungeons" (i.e., people of mixed Native American, European and
African origin, with rumors about Roma ("Gypsy") admixtures).
Apparently, the "tri-racial" "Black Indians" of the Upper South tend to
be included in this category, also the "Black Dutch" and "Black Irish."

There is a splendid website dealing with this fascinating topic:
"The Melungeons": http://appalachian_home.tripod.com/melungeon.htm

This website provides a long list of links to related topics and to
bibliographical data.

As you will see, there are all sorts of theories flying around about the
origin of these groups and the general label "Melungeons," including
Malungu African origin, and Turkish origin (someone claiming that the
name is derived from Arabic _Melun-Jinn_ "one who has been abandoned by
god - a cursed soul" ... And here I am, naïve little me, considering a
more obvious source: French _mélangeons_ 'mix(ture)' ...).

By the way, the Lumbee people have their own official website:
http://www.lumbeetribe.com/, and there are other Lumbee sites.

I have looked for more information on the language varieties of the
Lumbee and similar groups, but it seems to be still difficult to find.
I was hopeful when I found a page devoted to Lumbee storytelling with a
link to "Transcription of a Lumbee story"
(http://www.ibiblio.org/storytelling/lumbee.html), but, alas, the page
turned out to be defunct.  I think we ought to encourage the webmasters
of relevant pages to post language samples.  Hopefully we will learn
more about that as a result of Walt Wolfram's research among the Lumbee,
should it ever be posted.

In the meantime, I have placed a link to this great web resource on our
Creole resource page
(http://www.geocities.com/sassisch/rhahn/lowlands/links_creoles.htm).

I regret that there is not more online information about Appalachian
language varieties.  It would be great to have access to entire
corpora.  Does any of you know of such online sources?

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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