butterfly

[ROOD DAVID S]

The "Dictionary of American Regional English" cites attestations beginning
with 1832 for "coon" meaning just 'a person, a fellow' and especially a
'sly, knowing person' and sometimes 'a rascal'.  The use as an (offensive)
term for a Black is first cited from an 1848 source.

David


David S. Rood
Dept. of Linguistics
Univ. of Colorado
295 UCB
Boulder, CO 80309-0295
USA
rood at colorado.edu

On Wed, 29 Oct 2003, Rory M Larson wrote:

>
> >On Wed, 29 Oct 2003, Koontz John E wrote:
> >> 'Woman' is probably historically *wiNh-, but the first question is
> whether
> >> and how mikkahe inflects.  My recollection is that gahe alone behaves
> like
> >> a ga-instrumental form - aahe, dhaahe, gaha=i, aNgaha=i.  With the
> >> instrumental locative it should yield i'dhagahe, idha'gahe, i'gaha=i,
> >> aNdhaNgaha=i.
> >
> > Sorry - these are first, second, third, and inclusive forms.  I got the
> > accentuation of igahe reversed in the first and second person.  It should
> > be idha'gahe 'I combed with it', i'dhagahe 'you combed with it', ...
> >
> > If we regard initial accent as conditioned by length, I suppose that
> works
> > out to idha'gahe, ii'dhagahe, ... or possibly iidha'gahe, ii'dhagahe, ...
>
> Alright, but the name of an instrument should be
> coming from the third person form of the verb it's
> derived from, so that leaves us with i'gaha=i.
> But I don't think the =i particle will normally
> be used in this case, so that gets us i'gahe.
> If we want to add 'self' to the implication of
> what is being combed, will that give us i'kigdhahe ?
> I believe Alberta said that 'I comb myself' is
> aki'gdhahe.  (I think that's right-- my notes were
> co-opted by a girl who had dared me to draw her
> portrait during class today: they were on the same
> sheet.)
>
> A form like PDh *miNh-ka-phe would work, except that
> we would expect that instrumental i-: *miNh-i-ka-phe.
> What if the h and i switched places:
>
> PDh *miNhi'kaphe
>
>  => *miNi'hkaphe
>
>  => *mii'kkaphe
>
>  => OP mii'kkahe
>     Ks nii'kkaphe
>
> This is nice, except that the accent seems to
> end up on the first syllable, which ought to
> be long.
>
> Rory
>
>
>